December 2008 Archives

Matt Jackson approached ETS after being assigned to teach Comm. 180 (Introduction to Telecommunications) for the first time. The main focus was on aiding Matt as he developed the basic course throughout the semester as well as suggesting ways that he could incorporate technology into the learning process.

The main new technology feature was having students create blog entries for extra credit in response/addition to class assignments. This served the dual purpose of getting students to use the technologies discussed in class, and giving them an opportunity to reflect on the subject matter. Results:

Extra Credit Blog 1: 120/350 = 34.2% of class responded.
Extra Credit Blog 2: 148/350 = 42.3% of class responded.
Extra Credit Blog 3: 190/350 = 54.3% of class responded.

Matt and the TAs were able to view class results by using the tag aggregation and further narrowing the search by adding the tag for each blog (B1, B2, or B3).

Matt would like to keep using the blogs as an extra credit option for spring semester. He asked that I give a short session on setting up blog space and getting started in hopes that more people will take part and less issues arise with the process (the TA got ~50 emails with issues for each of the three assignments). If all goes well in SP09 Matt would like to work on mandating blogging for FA09.

Matt will be blogging starting SP09 as well. He wants to get away from the textbook for FA09 and focus more on online readings and resources that he can post on his blog.

Next Semester:
In addition to furthering the use of blogs in the class, Matt would like the students to gain a better understanding as far as how technologies work. For example, "here's how the Internet works, here's how radio and television work with waves, the difference between AM and FM.

Building a list of resources is going to be crucial to subsequent semesters of this course. Matt is thinking of (in FA09) grading participation based on a weekly reflection entry or adding a resource beneficial to the lesson at hand by each student. This will allow the students to take more ownership in their learning as well as contribute to the resources that can be used for future offerings.

Wiki Page with Weekly Updates

Dean Christian Brady approached ETS wanting to determine the effectiveness of using the Blogs@PSU platform as an advising tool while also having students learn to relate their everyday lives to the mission of the Schreyer Honors College.

Dean Brady wanted to get things moving by getting the students comfortable with blogging before adding the advisers to the project. He posted an initial blog entry and nine students (seven freshman and two upperclassmen) volunteered to take part in the project. We held an initial "getting started" meeting two weeks into the semester and followed up a month later to see how things were progressing now that they were settled. We then held bi-weekly "what's on your mind" meetings for the rest of the semester.

I had some initial trouble contacting some of the students and trying to get them to feel connected with one another. I solved this by creating a Facebook group just for them and other key players (Dean Brady, Associate Dean Judy Ozment, Allan Gyorke, and myself). The students love the fact that they can interact with each other and get event invitations, meeting reminders, etc. all in one place. I think it also made them feel more personally connected to the staff involved and maybe even part of something more concrete since other people on Facebook can read about it.

One of the biggest issues students have discussed is having trouble choosing topics to write posts about. They have a set of six predetermined tags (academic excellence, civic engagement, global perspective, honor, integrity, and leadership) and just aren't sure of how to start posts that pertain. Dean Brady told them to just write, write, write, and then see if any tags pertain. The students still seem to want more. We are going to test giving the students subject prompts for a while to determine if this solves the problem.

Next Semester:
Dean Brady plans to hold an initial meeting with advisers from across the campus toward the end of January. We'll then gauge interest from the group as well as set up adviser/student meetings with those advisers that have students currently taking part in the pilot program. The advisers would read the student's blog before their advising meetings in order to get a better picture of who the student is, their interests, and where they could use help. Building schedules and suggesting instructors based on common interest/learning styles are foreseeable benefits.

Dean Brady is also trying to determine if he'd like all incoming freshmen to blog. The issue is that he doesn't know how he'd be able to make it mandatory and enforce it.

Student posts can be viewed view the Blog Search Tool with the PSUHonors tag.

Stuart Selber, Director of Composition and Associate Professor of English and STS, approached ETS about "bringing English courses into the 21st Century." Currently assignments are strictly paper-based and don't necessarily build upon each other. I suggested using the Blogs@PSU platform to create online portfolios/databases of student work so that they could improve their Internet skills and have their work in electronic form to share with others (such as prospective employers).

Stuart assigned Matt Weiss, composition assistant in the English department, to work with me for the redesign project. Matt spent two hours each Friday this semester (FA08) at ETS where we met to go over progress in design and development. Matt created two sample blogs on his personal space to explain the project to the pilot instructors:

Sample Instructor Blog

Sample Student Blog

These pages are obviously a work in progress but they show just how far we've come with ideas and development. We are looking to move these two sites off of Matt's personal space and onto a departmental server where the address does not need to be tied to a particular person. One of the biggest tasks was taking existing assignments and moving them to the online environment and learning how these assignments would change because of the new submission method.

Next Semester:
We are piloting the new layout of English 202C in eight sections (six different instructors). The instructors have varying levels of technical ability that will help us to determine the range of assistance required when rolling out this redesign to other sections and/or courses.

The instructors are using five of the assignments from FA08 semester without any major changes. The big difference will be using the ePortfolio system to post. We will explore changing the assignments (adding podcasting, video, etc.) over the course of the SP09 semester. These additions/changes to assignments will roll out for the FA09 semester.

Should all go well with implementation, this project has the potential to move toward a redesign of English 202A, B, and D, as well as English 30 and English 15.

Wiki Page with Weekly Updates