Dear Next Year’s students,Throughout the year we learned a lot from the course A Blog of One’s Own. In the beginning of the semester you spend more time doing the work, but towards the end it gets easier and goes faster. We watch a few YouTube videos in the class which are very interesting.You should stay organized and be prepared to be successful in the class. The library and the writing center are very useful for this class because we have a lot of research and writing. We learned how to use library tools and we received research tools. We also learned about different internet tools. For next years student we hope they have a different perspective on the war after reading Baghdad Burning. This course is not the hardest but it is somewhat time consuming. This is an interesting course and we hope you learn a lot.Sincerely,
Tau Pod
Dear Students of the Fall ‘08 ITW class:
There are a lot of things you need to know about this class before you get overwhelmed. Make sure you keep on track with your blogs and the readings. Scheduling and time management are huge factors in this class. Reading will take up a lot of time and never forget your book in class.
The work in this class was fairly easy, but very time consuming. Be prepared to work on your research paper as soon as it is assigned, that will be to your benifit. Make sure you keep up with all the deadlines and it should help you stay organized.
We have learned good research skills in this class. The library secessions were a big help when we were researching for our projects. We also learned about different cultures and how blogging affects many other countries. We hope that they enjoy the books and not get too stressed with all the blogs. Stay on track and GOOD LUCK!
Love, the Pi Pod
PS: Beware of Virginia Woolf.
Future ITW Students:Expect homework for every class. These assignments can vary in length depending on how long you take to read the material. The assignments are usually not hard. If you read slowly allot more time for assignments. Pertaining to the semester long paper, if you meet the deadlines you will be fine. Do not save this paper til the last minute because you will wish you hadn’t.
You will certainly take away a lot from this class. Most people learned the most about their research topic. Then you will learn how to use a blog and post blog posts. This class also focused on politics and voicing individual opinionated responses after watching selected YouTube shorts. Next yr’s class will hopefully become more political and enjoy the class!
When taking this class you should expect to spend a maximum of about 4 hours a week out of class. This really doesn’t include the 15 page paper you will be working on throughout the semester. You also really want to stay on top of your work otherwise pulling yourself out of a hole will be hard. This course has been pretty hard because on top of your other classes you have at least two homework assignments a night. With this class using outside resources helped a ton. The Writing Center was a great tool. They helped you out so much to get a good jump start on your paper. So I would very much encourage using outside sources because they will help you out and keep you on track with your paper.
Before we started this class,
We wish we realized all the work were getting ourself into. It really never stops until the moment you leave class. We would never get behind on the work. Take advantage of the resources we have, like the Writing Center, going more than once, because you get extra credit. Always keep up to date with the blogs, because once you get behind it just makes it harder. We would also want to start researching early and organizing the research. Starting your portfolio when you start working and keep all of your drafts together.
You should expect to spend about two hours on each assignment, due ever class. The semester long project will take at least a month to complete. The readings and writings can be time consuming, especially when you have two at once. Taking other classes, you should plan a time to do the blogs every night.
The end, good luck!
Outside of class students should expect to spend at least an hour, including reading time, on each blog. When we had different portions of our paper due, depending on length, you should expect to spend at least two hours per night, and then as the paper gets lengthy, even up to 4 to 5 hours. With our courses, it definitely was hard to handle, just because we were constantly juggling our paper, with regular writing assignments. The Writing Center was helpful because they gave you a lot of feedback, and helped with the actual structure of the paper. Next semester students should definitely consider the Writing Center, more than once, not only because it’s extra credit-Lambda Pod
Hi everyone: just to let you know, there’s a Brown Bag lunch at the Student Center on Thursday where the KSC webmaster, Mike Caulfield, will be talking about blogs and blogging. These “brown bag lunches” are short presentations and conversations on topics of interest to the faculty and staff, and I always enjoy the ones about instructional technology. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to attend due to other commitments.
By the way, I’m using the block indent button to indent the material below–some students had questions about how to do this. It’s the 7th button in the tool bar if you’re under the Visual edit tab, or the 3rd if you’re in Code edit.
Subject: Brown Bag: Using Blogs to Get Things Done
Please join us for a lively conversation about the merits of blogs and blogging. Mike Caulfield will cover some of the many approaches to professional, political, and academic blogging. The conversation will focus mostly on how blogging can dramatically increase productivity, innovation, and academic community. We will review some examples of professional and academic blogging communities and discuss how blogging might be applied to challenges that Keene State currently faces.
When: 12-1pm Thursday 2/14
Where: Student Center 309
Light refreshments will be provided.
On January 22nd, the spring semester starts at Keene State, and I’ll be teaching three sections of my ITW 101 (Thinking and Writing) class for the new Integrative Studies program at Keene State College. The course, “A Blog of One’s Own: Women and Authorship in the Digital Revolution,” is also new–this is just the second semester it’s been offered, so it’s still very exciting and instructive for me as a teacher.
And just to add one more level of newness to the course, I’m using a new (to me) blogging platform, WordPress. Blogs are of course an integral part of this course–they serve as a central repository and means of communication for me and my students as we explore the world of social computing as a means of empowerment for marginalized groups. Since this is a course to teach academic writing, critical thinking and reading, as well as research skills, students do a lot of writing in the course, and much of it is done on individual blogs that students will create and maintain.
I’d like to welcome the 53 new students registered for the course. This course is a lot of work, but often fun and interesting, too. By the time you complete it, you’ll know a lot about writing, research, social computing, and popular culture.
Up until now I’ve used the service Blogger to create blogs, but now that Keene State is making WordPress available on a college server, I’m considering changing to WordPress. Right now I’m just experimenting with it, and this is my first post.
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