Course Components

• Course Textbook Reading Assignments
  You are expected to read the weekly chapters assigned from the course text, prior to completing your bulletin board postings and your participation in the weekly online discussion. The assignments are posted and can be found by following the 'Course Assignments' link. You will typically be asked to read 1- 3 chapters in your course textbook each week. The text is a comprehensive one, and you are not expected to know everything in it, but rather to be familiar with its contents in order to use it as a resource during the online discussions and in the future portions of the course.
  • You will need to demonstrate that you have read and understood the readings. The way you do this is through using citations from the text during the online discussions and within your bulletin board responses.
  
  
• Online Lecture Notes Reading Assignments
  You are expected to read the online lecture notes associated with that week's reading. You will find links to the weekly online lecture notes by following the 'Course Assignments' link. These online lecture notes are not exhaustive coverage of the topics, since this is contained in the text. Rather, they highlight important issues and include the Focus Questions you will select from each week to complete your bulletin board postings. Each set of online lecture notes includes key substantive points, hot links to relevant Web sites, Focus Areas (within the Lecture Notes), and Summing it All Up (the last item in the Lecture Notes). The Focus Area questions and the Summing It All Up questions are generally the topics of the online discussions for the class that week. The Summing It All Up section should be used to reflect on the overall theme of the weekly topic.
  • You will need to demonstrate that you have read and understood the readings. The way you do this is through using citations from the text during the online discussions and within your bulletin board responses.


• Online Video Series
  You are expected to watch the online Annenberg videos associated with that week's reading. You will find links to the weekly online videos by following the 'Course Assignments' link. These online videos are a supplement to the topics, contained in the text. They highlight important issues in the field of cogntive development and teaching.
  • You will need to demonstrate that you have read and understood the videos. The way you do this is through using citations from the videos during the online discussions and within your bulletin board responses.
  
  
• Bulletin Board Assignments
  The course has an asynchronous Online Bulletin Board. Education 173 Online is intended to be a Community of Learners, and the Online Bulletin Board is an important component in achieving this. Because we cover different topics each week the bulletin board assignment is not the type of assignment which can be put off to the end of the course. To have an effective interchange of ideas the bulletin board postings are done as part of an ongoing discussion about the current topic that week.
  
  Each week you will write one bulletin board response/posting. Each week you will address one of the questions which are posed in any of the 'Focus Area(s)' within the online lecture notes assigned that week. This response should be a minimum of 3 paragraphs in length. The complete instructions for these postings are outlined in the Student Center by following the 'Learn About the Bulletin Board' link.
  • You will need to demonstrate that you have read and understood the readings. The way you do this is through using citations from the text during the online discussions and within your bulletin board responses.
  
  
• Online Discussions (Chats)
  The course includes weekly synchronous online discussions conducted in the TappedIn.Org web site. You are expected to participate in them as a member of the course's Community of Learners. The online discussions are held once each week of class. The day of the week for the online discussions will be announced. Online Discussions are held from 7 p.m. - 8 p.m. If the enrollment warrants more than one chat will be held each week. The additional chat (if warranted) will be held on a day determined by the instructor at the same time of day, 7 - 8 p.m. You are only required to attend one online discussion per week. If more than one is held you may choose the discussion which is most convenient to your schedule. We ask that you try to come to the same chat each week so that you and your classmates can become familiar with each other.
  
  These chats will focus on the content of the readings from the text for the week, the online lecture notes, including the Focus Areas and Summing It All Up, and the bulletin board postings. The online discussions will simulate a classroom discussion. All students are required to participate in at least one online chat each week. You are required to read the Chat Protocol, Chat Examples, and Chat Rubric before attending your first discussion. You will need to join TappedIn, which is a professional educators online community, prior to your participation in a chat. The membership is free. For complete instructions about how to do this go to the course Student Center and follow the 'Learn About the Chat Room' link.
  • You will need to demonstrate that you have read and understood the readings. The way you do this is through using citations from the text during the online discussions and within your bulletin board responses.
  
  
• Final Project
  Your Final Project will encompass your deeper exploration of a particular learning theory or a learning theory domain. You will research and produce a mini-literature review on the theoretical strand of your choice.
  
  The complete instructions for the final project will be posted by the third week of the quarter and will be found in the Student Center by following the 'Final Project Overview' link.

Required Electronic Resources To Assist Students and To Extend Course Benefits

• Joining the Online Community
  This is the first step in registering to use the online electronic environment for the course. When you join our 'virtual' community you automatically get registered in our system. You will set your own password which you will use to access other parts of the electronic course tools. All of this is done by your completing the 'Student Profile Form.'
  
  As a part of any course we try to create a climate which is conducive to positive interaction among the participants. To help create an interesting exchange of ideas we like to provide a place where students can get to know each other better. By filling out and submitting the Student Profile Form you can introduce yourself to your classmates and course moderators. The complete instructions for joining the online learning community can be found in the Student Center by following the 'Join Our Online Community' link.
  
  
• Managing Your Personal Course Record
  The student ID number and password you submit by filling out the Student Profile Form will be used by you to access your Personal Course Management Record. Each member of the course is required to update their progress on assignments as you complete them during the quarter. This allows you to track your own progress throughout the quarter. The complete instructions for joining the online learning community can be found in the Student Center by following the 'Manage Your Coursework' link
  
  
• Course Email Listserv
  You will need to become a member of the Ed 173 Email Listserv as one of the first steps in joining our online community. We use this listserv to send you course messages and messages pertaining to professional development and learning theory. Once you have successfully signed up, you will receive all messages sent to the class from the listserv at your e-mail address. The complete instructions for signing up for the course listserv can be found in the Student Center by following the 'Subscribe to the E-mail Listserv' link.
  
  
• Library of Online Resources
  The Library of Online Resources was created as an Online Library for this course. This library was intended to serve as your major resource while conducting research for the course. Contained in these sites are literally thousands of links that contain high quality material related to the principles of learning and teaching. We strongly recommend that you take time to explore these extensive educational resources on the Web and use them for course activities and assignments.

Your success in the course is dependent on your active participation and interaction within the community of learners around the educational issues you will be studying. We place a heavy emphasis on your engaging in this process. Each component of the course is designed to empower you to 'voice' your ideas and learn from your fellow classmates by 'hearing' their perspectives. With that in mind, the grading for the course is divided up evenly between the bulletin board postings (30%), weekly chats (30%), your final project (30%), and your professionalism (10%). The weighting of the course assignments can be found by following the 'Class Information' and then the 'Grading' link.

Academic Honesty

Academic dishonesty in any form will not be tolerated. Please review the UCI Academic Senate's statement on Academic Honesty published on the web at
http://www.senate.uci.edu/9_IrvineManual/3ASMAppendices/Appendix08.html

It is my policy to deal with incidents of academic dishonesty following the procedures outlined there. In the context of Education 173 Online it is perfectly acceptable for you to work together on course projects. Indeed, I encourage you to do so. It is totally unacceptable to copy another person's work and turn it in as your own. That is, communicate together about the assigments all you want, but each person must do and turn in work that has been individually and completely carried out on their own.

It is totally unacceptable to copy Internet or any other sources without directly attributing the source. That is, use Internet and other resources to inform your work, but each person must do and turn in work that has been individually and completely carried out on their own. Specifically, you may copy from Internet or other resources if you do all of the following: (a) attribute the work with an appropriate citation, (b) use quotation marks around all direct quotes, (c) indent and use paragraph returns between any quote that is longer than 1-2 sentences, (d) do not rely on large portions of direct quotes to make up your work (e) do not copy portions of other's work and simply change words intermittently.

Any instance in which a person turns in work copied from another person or uses Internet or other sources without attribution using the format above will result in the strictest available penalties being applied.

See the above cited policy on Academic Honesty for further clarification, if it is needed.

We would also like to thank our course partners for all of the help and assistance they have provided to make this an exceptional learning environment. Educational firms that have products relevant to the goals of the course were invited to participate in its development. Particularly significant contributions were made by McGraw-Hill Higher Education and Apple Computer, Inc.

Contacting Us for Assistance