It's four weeks into my second semester teaching at Boston University, and I do feel like I've learned a few things. Compared to my first go-round, this time more than ever I am keeping Don Ronchi's words close to heart: "People create and navigate social networks best when the process is driven by the search for value" (which I first posted here).
Students come to my class largely ignorant of and uninterested in the science of networks. Last term I tried to teach them about networks with mixed results.
What my students do come hungry for is learning how to build their own websites. While it might be seen as a liability that I prefer not to teach website-building, I choose to use that as a pillar of instructional design: Instead of "teaching" that part of the class, instead I help my students learn that material from each other. Together we end up with a lot of cool website projects and very active social networking--which provides ideal case study material for the topic I most want to teach.
Every step of the way, I am thrilled with Moodle, the open-source course management system that is also one of the best collaborative platforms I've ever used. Please be my guest and visit our classroom.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License and is copyrighted (c) 2007 by Connective Associates except where otherwise noted.
Students come to my class largely ignorant of and uninterested in the science of networks. Last term I tried to teach them about networks with mixed results.
What my students do come hungry for is learning how to build their own websites. While it might be seen as a liability that I prefer not to teach website-building, I choose to use that as a pillar of instructional design: Instead of "teaching" that part of the class, instead I help my students learn that material from each other. Together we end up with a lot of cool website projects and very active social networking--which provides ideal case study material for the topic I most want to teach.
Every step of the way, I am thrilled with Moodle, the open-source course management system that is also one of the best collaborative platforms I've ever used. Please be my guest and visit our classroom.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License and is copyrighted (c) 2007 by Connective Associates except where otherwise noted.
