The main learning in my course will come from readings and video’s. Learning about the subject matter that my class is about, the economic collapse of 2008, I found many amazing articles online, from newspapers, from political writers, from researchers, from journalists, and I have found many video documentaries on youtube. I would like my class to read a few articles and watch one documentary in each of my three core modules. My first two modules and my last module will not be as intense, material wise, as the 3, 4, and 5th module will be.
An example of someone I would like my students to be familiar with is a man by the name of Jeff Madrick who just penned a book titled, Age of Greed; The triumph of finances and the decline of America, 1970-present. Now if you watch the news on tv or even scratch the surface of the information to be found online about an issue like the collapse of the economy in 2008 you will know some very popular names who discuss the issues of the day. Someone like Bill O’rielly, Rush Limbaugh, or Katie Couric. These are the prominent journalists in this country. From my study of all subjects, I tend to stay away from the prominent. Many prominent figures had to tow the company line for too long. I like to find figures under the radar. My course will be based on these types of figures. Jeff Madrick is one of them. This is not to say that the “under the radar” folks are not at the top of the game, but they have made some enemies along the way and are kept out of the “prominent clubs”.
So Jeff Madrick has written his latest book and as usual he is trying to sell it. What do authors do when they are trying to sell their books? They go on a speaking tour. So youtube has many speeches by Jeff Madrick talking about his book, how our economy began to radically change in the 1970’s.
Jeff Madrick is a former economic columnist for the New York times, and as such his writing can be found on line. So I might use some of his articles as readings in my course.
Jeff Madrick could be one of the Rock Stars of this course.
After I have my students read a few articles and watch a few youtube video’s we will need to assess them. I will be using the discussion forum and reflective blogging to do this, as we do it in our current course. The students will be forced to write a certain number of posts in the discussion and reflective blog, that show me, the teacher, what they are learning and how they feel about it, while engaging the other students in the class .
I will also have the students doing research on their own to give proof to their discussion and reflective blog postings. My hope is that I can guide the students to search the internet to find research or articles to back up and support their ideas. On their search I hope they find their own Rock Stars that they bring back to the class, teaching the class and myself something new.
The postings in the blog and the discussion forum will give the student the opportunity to do research on issues they find value and interest in. The main topic of the class has too many focal points for one class to cover. I will have students read articles covering the general ideas and they can go off on their own to expand on the information in the readings.
I really liked the idea of freedom for the student in the student-centered approach to teaching online. Bill Pelz talked about it. I am experiencing it from a student perspective in this course. And I have learned more about it in the research I have done in this class. In Professor Pickett’s comments that she left me for my module 3 assignment on course activities she mentioned instead of me the teacher giving out information have the students find it as much as possible. So that is what I intend to do with the reflective blogging assignment and discussion forum assignment I will be using in each of the 3 core discussion forums.
Like I talked about in an earlier discussion forum, each article you read on anything usually has dozens of references, to ideas, theories, philosophies, other writers, authors, journalists, other books. A goal of this course is to have the students read an article I provide, pick a few of these references that intrigue them and go research that, only to find more articles and more references. The cycle of research and intrigue goes on and on. But the point is the student is not boxed in, having to read only items or books that the teacher gives them. Read one or two things that I give you, than go play, in an educational manner, and don't come home until you found something to teach the rest of the class.
I will also be using Diigo so the student can document their path through the world wide web as my students build and share with the class their database of economic rock stars.
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