After this week's module, I'm less confident about transitioning to an online course. I had thought that CORE 120, our college composition course at Dordt, would be easily transferable to the realm of virtual learning. One major reason is that all communication would be conducted in the medium in which the students had to improve--writing.
What's concerns me now is how to demonstrate the standards of a college writing course in six short weeks. With the online modules, students work asynchronously and via pre-planned "steps." In BOLT, we've have six modules in six weeks.
Yet I realize that my regular course depends upon frequent feedback and some measure of disequilibrium. Basically, I now think of my current 120 as having many, many more modules than six. For example, students turn in a summary of an article on the second day of class. Most of them do quite poorly, because they don't write at the course standard. This is a shock, and other similar shocks happen, which actually helps students get used to the standard, which is higher and demands more precise work and thinking than they are used to. (This first week of class is a module of sorts, one of fifteen weeks.)
The week-long module online won't do this work. At least, I can't envision it yet. Six big chunks of a summer online course are too chunky.
I'm probably better off thinking about much shorter modules--maybe 10-12 in a 6-week span. One module every two to three days. That way, students can receive instant feedback, can know what the standards are, can aim for them as soon as possible. They are better off doing poorly in the first two of twelve modules than the first two of six.
All this I will keep in mind during the next four weeks.
I like your idea of shorter modules, but then I think of the logistics ... that's a lot of feedback to give on such a constant basis!
ReplyDeleteWhen I taught writing online, we had a luxurious 12 weeks to work with, and even that seemed too short. However, perhaps the goals were a little different than Dordt's. I see CORE 120 as providing a solid grounding in essay writing, researching, and general writing development. The course I taught seemed perhaps more akin to ENG 100, where it was more a triage or rescue kind of concept.
At any rate, the underlying goal of the semester was to write a research paper, and that one objective tended to infuse just about everything else I did. Write an initial informative essay? Let's use that to work on grammar, to develop research skills, and to get the general frame of even a larger paper.
It's been a while since I've taught CORE 120, but I don't think a research paper was so central. Perhaps that would be one route to think about in terms of providing structure for an online writing course?