Source: http://www.37signals.com/svn/images/fear_poster_med.jpg

Update 12/4/2008: Thanks to Cathy (in Texas) and Cheryl (check the comments), I’ve made some updates and those appear here (login as guest). There was one suggestion that I disregarded–for now, though I may implement it after my first attempt with the course–and that is to change the days into weeks. I’m going to push ahead pretty aggressively and see how many folks hang on . Once it’s been tweaked a bit more, I’ll start creating this in a Moodle course, back it up and share online for download.

I’ve been agonizing over designing courses for use in Moodle. Since it is my first attempt, I chose a relatively straightforward subject…and I’d love your feedback/constructive criticism. Although I’ve facilitated online courses, I haven’t designed one.

As such, I’m sharing my first effort here in the hopes of getting some feedback and suggestions for improvement. One of my concerns as folks in Texas move towards using Moodle is that we will all end up with a hodge-podge of courses that lack the same structure, hence making them unusable. So, here’s a syllabus that tries to take into consideration the EdTechLady’s ideas and steals Dr. Mike Ribble’s syllabus structure, which he graciously shared with me as we consider development of a Digital Citizenship course for school district use.

I also tried to include some K-12 Online Conference content when relevant. Finally, I obviously still have to build this course in Moodle, but with a syllabus well on its way, it shouldn’t be that difficult…right?

Syllabus

Title: Get a Blog! Course

Introduction
As a SCHOOL DISTRICT employee—teacher, leader, administrator—you can have your own blog to share the best of what is happening in your work setting. Think of your blog as a notebook where you can share the work that is happening in your classroom, your campus and your work. Include video and audio to augment that work.

People around us—students, teachers, parents, and the Community at large—want to know what we’re doing in our work. One of the ways to celebrate the wide variety of positive efforts happening in our classrooms, schools, and meetings is to share that via a blog. The blog replaces the tough to maintain classroom web sites of yesterday, enabling you to keep colleagues and parents up to date.

Blog entries are often short, immediately relevant to events in work settings, and time-sensitive. It is impossible for any one person or office to keep up with all the wonderful things that you are involved in, but you can. You can publish content at will that can provide insight into what is happening.

By sharing what each of us is doing, we are able to engage in proactive conversations that focus on the positive work we are doing as educators.

Learning Objectives

At the end of the course, the adult learner will be able to:

• Communicate with Students, Teachers and Parents through the use of a Blog
• Understand the essential elements of blogging and its importance in facilitating conversations with students, parents, and teachers.
• Understand the technical aspects of adding images, text, audio/video, and other documents to blog entries.
• Interpret what the correct response should be to technological misuse and how to help steer students in the right direction.

Course Pre-Requisites
Please realize that the following pre-requisites should be met before engaging in this online course:

1. Participants need to have completed the Introduction to Online Learning course, a one-week course introducing you to how to “learn online,” manage your time, etc.
2. Participants need to be comfortable engaging in Internet browsing, knowing how to copy-n-paste content from web pages.
3. Participants need to dedicate approximately 1 hour per day to complete activities.
4. If using your school district computer, be sure to contact the HelpDesk? early in the course to get Audacity installed.

Course Requirements

1. Each day you will be expected to complete 1-3 activities, which will include a reflection component where you respond to a discussion forum question. Since this class does not meet face to face, it is important everyone participate in the discussion forum. To receive the maximum points for each day’s participation, you will need to post one new message and reply to two other students.
2. On the first day, I will provide articles and other resources (audio/video) related to the use of blogs in education settings. You are required to read each and provide a paragraph summary of the article and reflect on how blogging would work in your classroom. Your discussion of the reading must be posted at the end of each day according to the schedule below.
3. You should plan to spend–depending on your level of comfort with technology–approximately 1-2 hours per day working through the activities and readings. Y

Course Schedule – Week Long Course

Topic List	Activity/Activities
Day 1-2 – Engaged Learners For Discussion: How do you perceive blogs could impact teaching and learning in your work? What connections can you make between the reading/resources and your own work?	Discussion Forum: Do Blogs Support Reflective Practices? Video – Blog if You Love Learning (Mark Wagner) Video – Sustained Blogging in the Classroom (Jeff Utecht) Blogging and Teacher Reflection – Example Technology Activity: If you haven’t already, complete the Get a Blog! Online Request Form Read the tutorial to learn how to: Customize Look-n-Feel of your blog Decide on Specific Tags to Describe your blog entries Add a text only blog entry to your page
Day 2 – Professional Learning Networks For Discussion: What are the benefits of developing your own Professional Learning Network?	Discussion Forum: Developing your own Professional Learning Network Technical: Get a Google Reader Account – View Video Overview Tutorial: Subscribe to Your Blog and a minimum of 3 others in the course.
Day 3 – Exploring Copyright in Online Publications For Discussion: How will you manage copyright issues in your classroom’s online publications?	Discussion Forum: Crossing the Copyright Boundary in the Digital Age (Karen Richardson) District Web Publishing Permission Form District Guidelines for Blogs, Wikis, and Podcasts Technical: Tutorial: Embedding Media in Your Blog: Images, Videos, Audio and Slideshows Resources: Flickrcc.bluemountains.net Creative Commons Search
Day 4 – Podcasting Made Simple For Discussion: Share your insights into 2 podcasts that you found online and how you might adapt a podcasting activity for your classroom.	Discussion Forum: The Education Podcast Network Eric Langhorst’s Studycasts
Day 5 – Developing an Action Plan	Discussion Forum: Action Plan – Share 3 ways in which you will be using your blog in your classroom.

Course Evaluation
You will be evaluated on successful completion of technical activities, as well as active participation in the discussion forum during the week. Failure to participate during the week will result in a deduction of 3 points for every late discussion post. Be sure to use the provided rubric to ensure your discussion forum participation is at the level necessary to be successful. You will be dropped from the course after 2 days of inactivity.

Since you will be making changes to your District Blog, be sure to post a link to completed products in the Technical Forum as a reply to the prompt for each activity.

Minimum score to receive credit for this course is 85%.

Below is a list of activities awarded for successful completion:

Evaluated Activity

Day	Activity Title	Type of Activity
1	Engaged Reading and Reflection	Discussion Forum
	Customize Look-n-Feel of Your Blog	Technical Forum
	Introductory Blog Entry	Technical Forum
	Add Tag(s) Your Blog Entry	Technical Forum
2	Professional Learning Network	Discussion Forum
	View Google Reader Video (CommonCraft?)	Online Quiz
	Subscribe to Your Own Blog and 3 others using Google Reader	Technical Forum
3	Review materials and share your reflections in discussion forum.	Discussion Forum
	Embed an instructional video from Edublogs.tv into a blog entry.	Technical Forum
	Copy-n-paste a picture with Creative Commons ShareAlike?–NonCommercial?-Attribution into your blog and cite the source.	Technical Forum
	For extra credit, create a Powerpoint presentation, upload it to Slideshare.net and embed the Slideshare presentation in a blog entry.	Technical Forum
4	Share Your Insights into Podcasting	Discussion Forum
	Record an MP3 or save one available at Edublogs.tv and share it via your blog.	Technical Forum
5	Action Plan	Action Plan Forum

Discussion Forum Rubric:

Your participation in the online discussion will be evaluated based on the following rubric:

	Unacceptable	Needs Improvement	Average	Excellent
Initial Comments	0-1 Initial comments were posted but did not address the assignment.	1-2 Initial comments address some of the assignment requirements. Comments are not well organized and show limited knowledge and evaluation of the topic.	3-4 Initial comments address most, but not all, of the assignment. Comments are reasonably organized and demonstrate adequate familiarity and analysis of the content.	5 Initial comments thoroughly address all parts of the assignment. The comments are clearly and concisely stated, demonstrating that the content was appropriately reviewed and synthesized.
Message Quality	0-1 Postings are not substantial, limited to “I agree” types of replies.	1-2 Only one substantial message was posted.	3-4 Multiple postings including some substantial content were posted, however, a limited number include errors or need additional supporting detail.	5 Multiple postings are made offering substantial, well written contributions-opinions, observations, questions, experiences, critiques, suggestions, etc.
Response	0-1 Questions/comments posed to you were not addressed.	1-2 Several questions/comments posed to you were not addressed.	3-4 The majority of questions/comments posed to you were addressed.	5 All questions/comments posed to you were appropriately addressed.
Contribution/ Duration	0-1 Participation was not continuous throughout the discussion period (1 day only). Replies were only posted for 1 classmate.	1-2 Postings were submitted on at least 2 different days during the discussion period (11:xx PM and 12:xx AM the next day does not qualify). Replies were posted for at least 2 classmates.	3-4 Postings were submitted on 3 or more days during the discussion period (2 or more during a 1-week discussion), but may not reflect participation from start to finish. Replies were posted for at least 2 classmates.	5 Postings are evenly distributed throughout the discussion period reflecting participation from start to finish. Multiple replies were posted for at least 3 classmates or more.
Etiquette	0-1 Postings are not appropriate–poor grammar/structure, inappropriate slang/abbreviations, etc.	1-2 Postings include inappropriate references and may include several errors in grammar/structure.	3-4 Posting are reasonably appropriate, but contain a few errors.	5 Postings are appropriate, using proper language, cordiality, grammar, punctuation, etc.

Adapted from the Detailed rubric created by Lisa A. Heaton, Elementary and Secondary Education, Graduate School of Education and Professional Development, Marshall University. e-mail: heaton at marshall.edu. Available online at http://etatmo.missouri.edu/toolbox/doconline/discussionrubric.htm

Course Materials
All course materials are available online at no cost. No print textbook is required.

Statement Regarding Academic Honesty
San Antonio ISD’s Instructional Technology & Learning Services Office encourages academic honesty in all course work. As a student, it is expected that you will neither give nor receive unauthorized aid on the work done in these courses. Violation of this expectation will result in a denial of credit for the course.

Statements for Academic Accommodation for Disabled Students
If you for any condition, such as physical or learning disability, which will make it difficult for your to carry out the work as I have outlined or will require academic accommodations, please notify Miguel Guhlin (Director, Instructional Technology Services) immediately.

Course Facilitator Contact Information
Although the course facilitator will change from time to time, you can share questions and concerns by contacting Miguel Guhlin (Director, Instructional Technology Services) either via email at mguhlin@saisd.net or by phone at 210-527-1400.

Some of my concerns for the course above:

• Too much content to cover in 1 week?
• Are the activities engaging enough?
• Am I really taking advantage of the medium or not?
• What am I missing that I should include, what have I included that I should drop?
• Am I asking the right discussion questions?

Thanks in advance for your feedback/criticism!

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