This has been superseded by a more concrete description – what’s below is still true, but more details are given in the updated posting.
Link: Discussions on Canvas
With the kinds of topics we’re covering in this class, discussion is important. Whether its talking about different viewpoints, or ways the ideas might be applied in practice, or critiquing designs, or even just clarifying ideas.
Unfortunately, with 90 people, it’s hard to have a discussion. Even an online one.
So, we are going to try an experiment: for our online discussions (and in-class ones as well), we will break the class into smaller groups. So each person will be part of a discussion in a smaller group.
We think that such discussion is implemented in Canvas, but we’re not quite sure – so early on in the class we’ll test this out. But, for the group discussions, please only post to your group.
For online discussion assignments, we will always require every person to make an initial post. Usually, we will require people to make some number of additional posts. While the assignment will specify separate deadlines for the initial post and responses, we have no way to enforce it. However, be nice to your classmates, if you don’t get your initial posting done in time, they cannot respond.
Please be respectful of others in online discussions. There are lots of discussions of online etiquite (some nice ones are from CSU, Madison College, generic core rules, etc.) But the biggest thing: be a reasonable person and respect others. Remember that in this class, there is a wide range of students: people with different backgrounds, different levels, different abilities to write English, etc.). We reserve the right to remove inappropriate postings.
There will be several different kinds of online discussions assignments.
Note: Discussion assignments are only one kind of discussion that we will have online. There will be general discussions and student initiated discussions as well. These will not be done in groups, and will not count towards grading.
Learning Objectives: will vary based on the assignment
Grading: Discussion assignments will be graded. We will evaluate your initial posting, as well as your contributions to the discussion.
Other assignment types:
- Online Discussions
- Readings
- Seek and Find
