The (slight) difference between our initial approaches I also find interesting. I have been writing the honors curriculum for History under the new rules, and have been frustrated by the demand to tie course “content” (in our case, usually a chronological list of items) more closely to the “student performance objectives” (which I want to be more skills-based). I would like instructors to be able to choose, even on the spur of the moment, which content they want to use to achieve those objectives. Kind of like my open-ended questions applied to curriculum.

@Frances That is one of those things I’ll leave open the first time I do it, to see what happens. In terms of method, if they bring in just one additional item to prove their point, that would work great, but I want to encourage them to bring the good stuff in up front, then work with what’s there, creating a pattern. I know some students will bring in more during the second part of the discussion, regardless of any instruction, so I’ll leave it open.

@John Although articles have said otherwise, I have not found that lack of easy sociability in a real-world environment relates to online behavior. I think most students who are shy to post online are unsure about what they say. Here, perhaps, those students will find it more comfortable to post an actual item on which they can base their comments. What I want is for them to feel OK about exploring ideas with others.

“Find an image, video, our sound clip on the web and apply Jack Solomon’s ideas about competitive elitism in America to what you find: What would Solomon say about the example you have found. Make sure you wrap up your post with some evaluation: do you agree with what you have posited as Solomon’s analysis or not?”

Of course, this can be opened up in lots of ways, but the idea of finding something out there and then applying and evaluating something the student has read has been working for me…

So there is a need of new design to approach the problem.

I like your approach, in that you intend to empower them to put more efforts into learning and reflect more regularly in order to improve their learning.

Designing for openness sounds good. What about your students’ readiness of openness?

My first few encounters with fellow colleagues (in staff development courses) and students “on-line” were not easy. I would say most people were faily “closed” – not much interaction or openness, especially if people don’t see the needs.

Sometimes, it may be “good” to learn from such “mistakes”. Learning styles DO exist.

As some people are introverts, how would you cater for their needs in such environment.

You might also have found such scenarios from CCK08, where one could find no comments for nearly all posts, or some are just lurkers….without much sign of openness.

So, that would be interesting to learn how to design and apply “openness” in practice.
John