Discussion prompts

I had all of the discussion topics due before the midterm listed at the beginning, and the topic description includes the prompts that students can choose to answer. I decided to make the prompts a link from the topic description after the topic is locked. This should make the discussion topics less obtrusive and not require as much scrolling, especially toward the end of the semester.

Grading a dropbox folder

I discovered an efficiency in using the plagiarism detection tool for grading. The originality report is grouped by folder, so I open that in one browser window and the list of students with submissions in another browser window. The Turnitin window has navigation controls to move from one file to another, so using this navigation means I can provide feedback without having to download all the files. I do need to encourage students to provide their names in the text of the file or the filename, as otherwise I have to do some sleuthing to match the submission to the student.

Teaching with video - The Donner Party

I found an activity for analyzing the story of the Donner party by using the PBS video as testimony in a trial and then asking the student to write evidence as they watch the video. The trial is who is to blame for the disaster: the members of the Donner party themselves or Lansford Hastings, who told them about the tragic shortcut.

The video was spread over two class meetings and I wish I had more than ten minutes for discussion, but the students were interested in the video and the discussion was lively. I broke up the class into groups of three to five and had them discuss the evidence they collected and vote on a verdict. I then asked each for its verdict and for the strongest piece of supporting evidence. I liked it, and they were obviously interested in the video and the discussion.

Though it is from an eighth-grade history teacher, the worksheet and activity also did well in my lower-division class.

Wordle and discussion

I use the Wordle tool for each chapter's discussion topic to do a couple of things. It creates an interesting image that is generated by the words my students type in their discussion entries. It also highlights the words that were most commonly used, which helps me assess what interests them and write questions for exams.

I try to come up with a color scheme that matches the chapter in some way, and Adobe's Kuler web site is a great way to generate color values from an important image for that chapter. Wordle's settings I use include mostly horizontal, rounder edges, and maximum 75 words. I also leave the words as spelled and remove numbers. I open the Java applet in its own window and capture the screen at about 1300 x 800 pixels. On my Mac this makes a PNG file, which I upload as a new content item in Desire2Learn.

We'll see if my students appreciate it.

http://www.wordle.net/
http://kuler.adobe.com/

Turning off the rich text editor for commenting

I find that turning off the rich text editor makes commenting on assessment items (discussion and dropbox) a lot more efficient. Comments usually do not need formatting, and the page loads faster if the rich text software does not have to load.

Student-led creation of midterm study guide

I finished a lecture earlier than expected and had some time to spare, so I tried an activity I read about and had the students create their own study guide for the topic I just finished. Each student wrote his name on a piece of paper and then wrote one or two words to describe an important topic. The student then handed the paper to a classmate who wrote a different idea on the same sheet. They did this two more times and then returned the document to the original student. I then asked them for the ideas that were written on their papers and tallied the number of people who wrote each idea. We ended up with six or seven items on the white board, which I photographed and told them would be included in the study guide for the midterm.

Next time it would work better if I collected the papers by row and redistributed them for each item. This would reduce the confusion for those students who did not know where to send the papers. At the end, I would ask them to find the student whose name is on the paper, which would get them to talk and move around a bit.