Class,
Today we begin a new section on Global Issues and this week we will begin the first chapter in this new section examining chapter seven on terrorism, human rights, and torture. We move into some key areas of discussion and I will post some extra resources for outside research per a recommendation from the evaluations. I will try to add them to our course homepage, but may have to settle for D2L Content if I cannot get the links working on blogger.
A reminder that there is no celebration this week as you are turning in your third paper by Sunday, November 4, and I have published the rubric to help you write your third paper in Content. I will also see if I can upload it directly to the folder in the dropbox.
You are still responsible to answer the presenter's questions and to evaluate the presenters this week by Sunday, November 4, midnight.
An Important Change in Response to the Evaluations
When students make suggestions I try to explain why I can or can't do certain things, but if a request is reasonable and doesn't break any of the essential components of the syllabus, i am happy to make changes. One requested change I saw were concerns about the frequency of postings to so many essays, couldn't we just post to one area and have a more engaging discussion? I think we can and will make the change for Week Eleven going forward. To anticipate next week, I will be asking presenters to keep using the same format concluding with two questions. But instead of posting to each presentation, which is many small responses to several essays, I am going to ask students to pick one question from the presentations that they thought was worth engaging, and ask students to respond with the question they selected in the subject line of their posting. You will post your selected question and response in a new topic within that week, and the topic will be titled "Post your Discussion here." You will find it on Discussions, Week Eleven as the last Topic in that forum. If other students pick the same question, reply to the thread. If you chose another questions, start a new discussion. I am going to ask presenters to still reply to five student postings, even if it is not a question from your essay. The point is for presenters to engage the class and facilitate and extend the discussion. Students, feel free to reply back to each other and extend the conversation, although you will be critically graded on the initial posting only. As always, avoid attacks against any person based on non-academic terms, or in other words, have a civil debate.
Students, when you post you will need to indicate why you chose the question, identify the essayist's central thesis or big idea, and also nuance why you agree or disagree. Since you are only posting to one question, I will expect better responses that clarify the issue, analyze, the concept, and provide an informed opinion. Responses should be 150-300 words. Many are already doing this kind of detailed work in their responses already (I am thinking of Jacob, Niko, Adam, Johnny, Courtney and others who consistently write strong postings exceeding expectations). Avoid simple opinion, or hasty generalizations that do not display that you have wrestled with the issue or the essays. Most do consistent work in this class and if you have made it to week ten you deserve to be here!
I will have celebrations the other weeks, but thought taking one week off would not hurt the weights or overall points of students. I know many students need to demonstrate consistent points, and quizzes (or celebrations) are a great way to do so. I also heard from many that they weren't that onerous. I will also add prezi for the weeks going forward to help students prepare for quizzes, these can be found in Content and I think I have found a way to bypass D2L's restrictions on these outside links. If you cannot access a prezi from week eleven going forward, send me an email on Mondays and I will try and have things taken care of by 5:00 pm Mondays.
I have also clarified the course schedule for the rest of the semester and adding an updated course schedule in Content to help clarify openings of assignments on Mondays and closing on Sundays of that same week.
If I am missing something that you think is important from the mid-semester evaluations, let me know. I see three of the presenters have their presentations up, great work. Looking forward to getting past [presentation evaluation results back to presenters today and tomorrow.
