Post 365: Article Review: Asian Americans Are Still Caught in the Trap of the ‘Model Minority’ Stereotype. And It Creates Inequality for All

Article Review:

Asian Americans Are Still Caught in the Trap of the ‘Model Minority’ Stereotype. And It Creates Inequality for All (Click on this title to get to Time Article)

https://time.com/5859206/anti-asian-racism-america/?utm_source=pocket-newtab

This is an excellent article that gives an overview of Asian American history and Asian American racism.  It goes over how Asian Americans are viewed as 'Model Minorities', 'Yellow Peril', 'Perpetual Foreigners' and 'Coronavirus' all at the same time. By reading this article, you gain an understanding of the Asian American history beneath all these labels.

During this upcoming July 4th weekend, we celebrate the American Dream as Asian Americans with all other Americans. Yet, as the article states, no matter how many generations Asian Americans have been in the US, Asian Americans are still treated as 'perpetual foreigners.'

With Coronavirus still raging, many people blame China and indirectly all Asian Americans are implicated in the deadly spread of this virus. You can see the racism against Asians when coronavirus is still called, 'the Wuhan virus', 'the Kungflu virus' or simply, the China virus.

As an Asian American, when I wear my mask, I get nasty looks from some people who think that I am the cause of the coronavirus simply because I am Asian.

If I as an Asian American catch a cold, I am afraid to sneeze in public or cough in public for fear that people will see me as the coronavirus.  As a result, I avoid going out at all even exercising if I have a cold. I never go to the grocery store with a cold these days!  If I have a cough, I suppress it!

If you are Asian, you cannot be forgiven for having a cold, a sneeze or a cough because you are blamed for being the virus. It does not help that some politicians on TV still insist on calling it the 'China' virus because this causes more racism against Asian Americans.

I recommend you read this most informative article in this week before 4th of July and to remember we are all Americans and nobody in America is at fault for creating this virus! Happy 4th of July!

Post 364: What is your Teaching Persona? (Social Presence)

Post 364: What is your Teaching Persona? (Social Presence)

In the previous blog post, I said you should avoid being too chummy with your students, but at the same time, you should avoid being too nitpicky with your students. How do you know which is which? How do you know if your teaching persona is too chummy or too nitpicky?

For me, the answer to that question was, "It took practice."  In the beginning of my teaching career, I was WAY too chummy. I wanted too much to be liked by my high school students. And as you know when teenagers smell an easy mark, they go all in.

Because the high school students thought I was an easy grader, my classroom had no discipline. Students talked while I talked. Students paid no attention to my lesson. 

When students went off task during a lesson, I was not quick enough to punish them. In fact, I was reluctant to punish them because I feared, 'they would not like me'. Now THAT reaction is the 'being too chummy' reaction said my teaching mentor who shook her head disapprovingly when she saw me hesitate punishing students who disobeyed class rules.

I was giving a French Unit exam. The grade would have made up 50% of their final grade for that quarter. Almost all the students were quietly taking their test.  Then, my mentor and I noticed a student talking to another student and exchanging notes. They were disobeying the rule of "No talking during a test" and rule #2, "No cheating or exchanging notes during a test."  At first, I just stood there and let it go. I think I was just too shocked to react.

When the other students noticed my hesitation, they too started to take out their notes and cheat. My teaching mentor took immediate action unlike me. She went straight to the talking cheating students, took their tests away and gave them both an automatic F.  Instantly, the other students put away their notes, were quiet, went on task and followed class rules to take a quiet test.  I learned then that if I wanted to be respected and not be 'chummy' I had to take immediate action if I saw any infraction to class rules to gain student respect.

In a face to face class, it takes practice to figure out your teaching persona. Are you Dragon Lady or Chummy Teacher or a little of both?

In the online environment, you can also have varying teaching personas. My teaching colleague was very chummy with her online students. She wanted her students to feel comfortable around her so when she wrote her emails or announcements, she used no capital letters.

Example: my name is jane. i am your english teacher for this class. feel free to email me any time if you have any questions!

I said to Jane, if you are their English teacher, shouldn't you be writing in correct English? (Jane was my mentor and I was shadowing/auditing her class to learn how to teach online)

Jane said, "I want to project an informal teaching persona so students know that I am human."

Now for the purposes of Social Presence, (how you project yourself online to students), you should make yourself human and approachable especially since online students cannot see your physically. So, Jane said, not using capitals equalizes the playing field saying we are all the same, students and teacher.

It is up to you as an online teacher on how you want to project your online teaching persona. George Collison in his book, Facilitating Online Teaching, gives very helpful tips on how you can project your teaching persona onine--here are a few teaching personas you can adopt--Generative Guide, Conceptual Facilitator, Reflective Guide, Personal Muse, Mediator and Project Leader.  In future blog posts, I will delineate in more details these teaching personas which will give you an excellent social presence in your online classes.

Post 363: Avoid being the boring, know it all, chummy, nitpicking online teacher!

Avoid being the boring, know it all, chummy, nitpicking teacher online or face to face!

As we all know, the current trend is to have a student centered classroom where the teaching role becomes less the sage on the stage and more the guide by the side where the teacher's role is to guide the students in their learning.

Believe me, I have had my share of boring teachers who drone on and on. I also have had teachers who were chummy so students had recess all day and we learned very little and I have also had the 'know it all' teacher who thought it was 'beneath' him to be teaching lowly high school students or the 'snotty' professor who didn't want to teach us lowly undergraduates, but wanted to teach only graduate students! I have had them all!  So, you want to avoid being boring, know it all or snotty, if you want to engage and win over the trust of your students.

Here are some teacher roles you should avoid according to Warnock in his Teaching Writing Online book:  (Warnock, 4, 5)--(The characteristics listed come from Warnock, the definitions come from me!)

1. Sage--In the old days, in a teacher centered classroom, the teacher would give a lecture and the students would just passively absorb the information like filling empty vessels and then take a test to assess lesson mastery. Do not be a sage on the stage! Be the Guide by the Side!

2. Drone--Do not talk in a monotone voice and drone on and on to bore the students. I have had many boring teachers face to face who drone on in their lectures and they get so lost in their lecture they forget the students are there. I used to just tune out long lectures with monotone voices and I would just go home and learn the lesson directly from the reading!

3.Chum--All humans want to be liked. All humans want to be popular. It is easy for teachers to fall into the trap of wanting to be the student's chums. The disadvantage with this approach is you lose the respect of the students and some manipulative students can smell an easy target/easy grader and will walk all over an easy teacher, so don't be a doormat.  You have to exercise your authority as the teacher in order to be able to keep your credibility with students.

4. Fool--According to Warnock (4), many face to face teachers are afraid of teaching online because of the amount of writing you have to do, so many novice online teachers are afraid of making too many writing mistakes in front of their students, thus they prefer to teach face to face. I say you should not worry about making writing mistakes. If students do find a mistake, just own up to it, after all we are all human and students do not lose respect for you if you own up to the mistake.

5. Critic--Try not to nitpick your students too much. The opposite of being the chum is being the nitpicker where you nitpick every student error that a student makes. If you over correct students, this makes students more anxious and less likely to want to participate in forums or succeed in class due to student anxiety and low self esteem resulting from over correction. Focus more on the meaning of the message in the forums, and not on the grammar mistakes to encourage students to participate and raise student morale.

It takes experience to know when you are being too chummy or too critical. I will explore this topic in a future blog post. But, it is a delicate line we walk as teachers, how do we know if we are being too chummy, or not chummy enough? How do we know if we are being too critical or not critical enough?  For now all I can say is Practice Makes Perfect.  One line of wisdom I remember from my mentor is, "As long as students know you care about them and you learn to care about your students' success more than your lesson, you will be a successful teacher."

Post 362: What do faculty want from an online faculty newsletter?

Post 362: What do faculty want from an online faculty newsletter?

The boss made me administrator of the English/Literature Shared space Faculty Forum.  It was an informal teacher forum where teachers were allowed to socialize and no Deans hung out there and no higher up administrators had access to the website either.

In order to keep the rest of the faculty apprised of the going on of the English/Literature Shared Faculty Forum website, I was assigned not only as the administrator of the website, but also I was the newsletter writer for the faculty newsletter.

Every month, I would keep the faculty up to date on current events regarding different faculty family lives,  the Program Director who had everyone's phone numbers would fill me in on all her interesting telephone conversations with faculty.

I made the shared website and the newsletter informal, fun and newsy. I used a lot of clip art to brighten the text and I used a yellow text background for the newsletter itself.

Structure of the Newsletter

Introduction to the purpose of the Newsletter

Fun Contest Announcements and rules

School Policy Announcements

Departmental Announcements

Webinar/Prof. Development Announcements

Faculty/Family Announcements

Conference Announcements

Interesting Faculty Conversation Announcements

Interesting Course Lead News about the different classes in the shared website

I was to scour the website to see what people were talking about, and then write down what those conversations were about.

For instance, there was one faculty member who liked to constantly change her rubrics, so she and other Course Leads and other adjunct faculty would experiment with different DQ grading rubrics to see which was most effective.  I published what they did and I published which rubrics they liked or disliked.

Other faculty talked about different ways they dealt with difficult students and I published their conversations in the newsletter too.

My Program Manager and I both created the newsletter together. She would also help create the threads and it was her idea to come up with the fun contests.

I then asked for faculty volunteers to tell me about conferences, webinars, that they had been to or knew about so faculty would contribute to the newsletter as well.  Month by month, it was fun to do the newsletter and my boss and I had fun making the department feel like a family.

I was creating this newsletter on top of my regular teaching load and on top of my Course Lead duties at the time. Despite the work, for me the most rewarding part of working at AMU (besides the students) was networking with colleagues.

Do you and your school have a faculty newsletter? What do you include in your newsletter?

Post 361: Faculty Fun on our Faculty shared Website!

Post 361: How can a shared faculty website be structured?

When I was with American Military University, we used the shared faculty website as a place to socialize, keep track of each other's family events, upload suggestions for improvement for Course Leads, Course Leads would also post the latest changes to their classes, faculty would exchange the latest best practice trends, talk about ways to deal with difficult students, tricks to faster grading, conference paper calls, and shared grading samples--nobody ever had the nerve to post a sample of their grading paper in the five years I was with that shared faculty website!

Our boss at the time used to call us all the time to check how we were doing. It was not like talking to a boss at all. It was more like talking to a family member. Then if we had interesting news to impart, our boss would post (with our permission of course) that bit of family news to this shared faculty website.  Because she put in so much time to get to know us and create and maintain this website, I used to have fun coming to this website to relax after a long day of grading papers.

Right before the boss left, she made me administrator of the shared faculty website so for 3 years after she left I was administrator of the website!  I was on the website for 8 years total! I sure miss it now!

Having a shared faculty website with a devoted boss who maintains it creates a feeling of belonging and community to the entire department.

Here is how our shared faculty website looked like:

Faculty Newsletter posted under this thread. Check it out! The ECALM newsletter is published by yours truly, Yvonne Ho! Look out for this month's edition!

October Edition ECALM Newsletter

November Edition ECALM Newsletter

The English/Literature Department loved reading my newsletter. The newsletter was for faculty members who did not have time to come over to the shared website. The newsletter was a compilation of the best parts of this shared website!

The Dean loved the faculty newsletter and so did all the other faculty members! In fact, it was the most memorable thing faculty remember most about me is my newsletter!

Silly Icebreaker Contest
Post your funniest or silliest icebreakers that you use on the welcome page or during 1st week when you introduce yourself to your class. The funniest icebreaker will win 1st prize Starbucks Coffee gift card from me (boss, Program Manager)

**What do you see outside your window?***

** If you were stranded on an island, and you had one item to bring, what would you bring?**

**If you were President of the US for 100 days, what reforms would legislate?**

It was the boss' boss who finally decided on the winner of the contest. For many years after the contest, I used these icebreakers in my Welcome message and introduction posts to students who loved these icebreakers as a way to become acquainted with each other during the first week of class.

Christmas Ugly Sweater contest
Post a picture of your Christmas Ugly Sweater under this thread. I (boss, Program Director) will reveal the first prize as a Christmas gift surprise! :)

(I saw some really UGLY Christmas sweaters that year. I won the prize too! I did not put this fact on my resume! Winning the Faculty Christmas Ugly Sweater Contest just does not look professional:)

Share Graded papers here:
Post under this thread a sample of your grading so all the teachers of the Writing/Literature department would be on the same page.

Student errors
Discuss any student errors you find in papers and any fixes you made as well as any grammar explanations you used so we can all use those explanations.

Professional Articles to Read
Post any articles that you find interesting that serves a professional purpose.

(One faculty member posted "How You can tell you are working in a toxic workplace")

(Most others posted articles from Faculty Focus)

Faculty Accomplishments
Post any awards, publications or conference presentations you have done. You can also post videos, attachments etc.. We love to see what our fantastic faculty is achieving!

(In this space, faculty posted their trips to conferences, they posted what it felt like to do presentations and how nervous they were, they posted their actual PowerPoints for us to read and use, and they posted links to publications they had. One faculty member posted a picture of her Biography of Shakespeare book that had been translated into Chinese!)


Current Webinars/Professional Development classes
If you find any good webinars we can all attend, please post them under this thread. Have you taken any interesting Faculty Development classes? What did you learn from those classes? Any fun tips to share here?

(I learned a lot of shortcuts to grading papers. I learned about the latest Web 2.0 gadgets from faculty experimenting with technology here, and I used to grade links to my Screencast videos for other writing teachers to use under this thread. Because so many threads dealt with technology, I started a Web 2.0 thread)

Web 2.0 Thread--Share the latest teaching technology tricks under this thread

(This thread inspired me to find time to find fun Web 2.0 apps to use in the classroom. I remember I was the one who discovered Storyboard That which The Creative Writing Class used for their multimodal composition assignment app for storyboarding! I believe that students to this day use this app in that class too! )

Teaching Best Practices
If you find any tricks of the trade or best Teaching Best Practices, post under this thread. Share any teaching resources under this thread too!

(Many faculty loved this thread because they told me they learned many shortcuts to grading papers, which for writing teachers takes the most time.)

Best Student Sample Writing Papers

Under this thread, we posted our best student papers so that we could model best writing to our students in our classes.

Family/Births/Current Events
If you have a birth in the family, a new pet, a birthday coming up, or any other fun family event post under this thread.  And don't forget to phone me  (boss, Program Manager) with happy news for me to post here!

(This thread was very popular--everybody posted everything from the death of their pet, to the birth of their children here--it was like a Facebook feed. This kind of thread gave our online departmental community a feeling of family and belonging.)

Fun Gossip /Goofball Jokes Thread
If you have any fun gossip scoops about anyone, just give us the scoop here! Also, you can post scoops about your favorite celebrities, your favorite movies, your favorite anything! Give us the scoop right here!

(This thread was definitely THE most fun! It was fun to see the kind of pop culture different faculty members were into!)

Holiday Vacations
If you have just taken a vacation over your summer one month break, post those fun vacation photos under this thread.

(I loved the goofy holiday photos I saw here. One faculty member posted a picture of himself totally drunk in front of his favorite bar at 1AM in the morning!  It is always fun to see another side of faculty to humanize them! )

Faculty News/School Initiatives
If I (boss, Program Manager) have any new school initiatives to post, I will post them under this thread. Make sure you read these announcements as soon as you come to this website.  I will also post any upcoming faculty meetings under this thread.

My favorite was taking part in the Provost Faculty challenge where each year the Provost would post a teaching challenge. One year, the teaching challenge was to find a 'unique' way to use the forums to engage students. This was a school wide challenge spanning many departments. And it was a member of our department who won the challenge too! We posted her picture under the Faculty Accomplishments thread!

Course Lead News
If I (boss, Program Director) have any Course Lead news, I will post under this thread.
 (I found this thread to be useful because all full time faculty were Course Leads, and we had to keep up with the latest school initiatives that were unique to Course Leads. I remember one initiative was for us to concentrate on finding OER sources for students to reduce textbook costs for students.)

Full-Time Faculty News
Post Full Time Faculty News and Full Time Faculty Meeting Schedule under this thread.

(I considered myself very lucky to have been full time faculty since most positions in my field are adjunct positions. I paid very close attention to Full Time Faculty News because I wanted to keep my job. In this post, boss would post committee positions to volunteer for as well as other school projects such as fixing the accreditation time sheet for classes which was a schoolwide project.)

Part Time Faculty News
Post Part Time Faculty News and Meeting Schedule under this thread.

English Department Classes 

(I either taught these classes or was CL--this is not a complete list of classes but your department can list all its English and Literature classes on the website so faculty can exchange suggestions with the Course Leads on suggestions or changes to the class, or make corrections to the class. Course Leads were expected to check in on the website to check for adjunct messages and improvements)

ENGL 101 Freshman Composition English
Post any suggestions for ENGL 101 under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Boss posted to every class thread: Course Leads must have multimedia projects in their assignments)

I taught ENGL 101 very often so whenever I found any dead links or errors or inconsistent information/directions, I would post to the CL here and the CL would answer me right away.

It was from the ENGL 101 CL that I learned about irubrics. We all used to have long discussions about how to use the irubric, what to include in the DQ irubric, and also we had discussions about how to grade DQ forums itself. Many threads on that subject.  We did those discussions under this thread since ENGL 101 was the most commonly taught ENG class in the school.

ENGL 102 Critical Thinking
Post any suggestions for ENGL 101 under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Boss posted to every class thread: Course Leads must have multimedia projects in their assignments)

Joe Shields Course Lead--ENGL 102 Welcome post.
Joe was a great CL and we used to argue about the best way to peer review papers. Should the peer review occur in the forums or should we give students a quiz? I said peer review. He said quiz. Being CL, he won.  The CL makes the ultimate decision and only the Program Director can supersede him.

ENGL 225 Business Writing
Post any suggestions for ENGL 225 under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Virginia Smith Course Lead--ENGL225 Welcome post

Boss posted to every class thread: Course Leads must have multimedia projects in their assignments) 

ENGL 498 Senior Seminar Capstone
Post any suggestions for ENGL 498 under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Yvonne Ho Course Lead Welcome Message (ENGL 498 CL)--Every CL had her welcome message under this thread)

As Course Lead for ENGL 498, I would post the latest changes to the class. I also asked suggestions from the other adjunct teachers of the class to help improve the class.  They told me to lower the number of sources required from 20 sources to 10 sources and I did just that!  I loved working with my adjuncts! That was fun!

Literature Classes

LITR 221 American Literature since the Civil War
Post any suggestions for LITR 221 under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Annie Hanes Course Lead Welcome Message

Boss posted to every class thread: Course Leads must have multimedia projects in their assignments) 

LITR 222 American Literature After the Civil War
Post any suggestions for LITR 222 under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Jan Smith CL--Welcome Message

Boss posted to every class thread: Course Leads must have multimedia projects in their assignments) 

LITR 201 World Literature before the Renaissance
Post any suggestions for LITR 201  under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Boss posted to every class thread: Course Leads must have multimedia projects in their assignments) 

LITR 202 World Literature After the Renaissance
Post any suggestions for LITR 202  under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Boss posted to every class thread: Course Leads must have multimedia projects in their assignments) 

LITR 368: Asian American Literature
Post any suggestions for LITR 368  under this thread. If there are any corrections or broken links you want the CL to know, post under this thread.

Yvonne Ho CL LITR 368 Welcome message

As Course Lead for LITR 368, I used to post the latest changes to LITR 368 so that others who taught my class could be kept up to date on these latest changes.

Boss posted to every class thread: Course Leads must have multimedia projects in their assignments)

How many of you have a shared website for faculty? What other threads should I include?

Post 360: Grading Papers Physically and Electronically

Post 360: Grading Papers Physically and Electronically

When I taught at CSUN in the ESL program, I graded papers physically. Students would hand in their ESL papers and I would then sit at my desk with a stack of papers and grade with my green pen. I would use editing symbols that I give to students in their syllabus, and I would leave comments on how students can improve their verb tenses, grammar, essay structure, thesis statement and paragraph structure as well as their content.

For me, grading physically took a lot less time than grading digitally wtih track changes. I had a teaching colleague who used a digital pen to grade his papers electronically so he was able to grade in a similar manner as grading physically. There are many programs that use digital pens like Microsoft Surface or WACOM.  I just wish I had the money to buy those programs!

For me, grading elecgtronically meant using track changes in Microsoft Word. It may take me 2 minutes to mark up a face to face paper, but a good 10 minutes to use track changes grading a similar paper with similar amount of errors.

I find, however, the way I grade either way to be rather similar. Here is an infographic on the differences and similarities I find grading both ways.

Post 359: Face to Face vs Online Teaching Methods

Face to Face vs Online Teaching Methods

When you migrate your face to face class to online, you should have the same learning objectives and outcomes in both classes.

In other words, if I was teaching a face to face Freshman Composition class, I would have class lectures, group projects, class discussions, tests, exams, and papers. Similarly, when I teach that same class online, I would have these same elements just adapted to an online classroom.

Class lectures can be changed online to chunking video lessons, or written class lecture transcripts, discussions with students can be transferred to discussion forums, group projects can be transferred to wiki's, Google documents or forums. Papers, tests and quizzes can be done online under the assignment or test and quizzes portal.

Some classes are hybrid where teachers teach part of their class in a classroom, and some online so you get the best of both worlds. Many face to face teachers who have never taught online before should try experimenting with teaching a hybrid class to get a feel of what it is like to teach in an online classroom.

Here are some ways you can convert your traditional classroom elements into an online environment.

Post 358: How can we re-purpose the English/Literature Department?

Post 358:  How can we re-purpose the English Department?

Traditionally, the purpose of the English Department is to teach American and British Literature as well as to teach students basic writing skills, literary analysis, and critical thinking Some English Departments also have sub-majors like ESL and Applied Linguistics which was what I majored in.  Three new developments are occurring--more STEM related writing classes, more job related writing classes, more multi-ethnic literature classes, and more of a focus on Digital Literacy--such as learning how to write web content, blogs as well as teaching students Public Speaking skills.

In the many English Departments I have been in, I teach ESL, English Composition, Critical Thinking and American Literature.  For many years, my role was to teach the basic 5 paragraph essay structure, and help create ESL classes.

Now, there is a shift away from just teaching the standard academic essay or just teaching Literature. English Departments want to be more '21st century' or more job oriented.

More STEM-Related Technical Writing/Business Writing Classes

Instead of teaching more specialized literature classes, we seek to teach to a more diverse audience, to accommodate the needs of employers who want better writers, to teach different kinds of writing associated with different jobs--Business Writing, Technical Writing, Writing For Journalists, Writing for Science Majors,  Writing for Social Science Majors.

Even what we minor in as an English major has changed. It used to be if you were an English major, you majored in your Literature period--19th Century Literature English major, Medieval LIterature English Major--now the trend is to offer more STEM or job oriented minors to make English majors more marketable in the job market.

You now have minors like Technical Writing, STEM Writing, and Grant Writing.  In the school where I worked, they were putting together a minor in Technical Writing. Also, in the school where I worked, they put together a brand new Teaching English in the Disciplines class to help students of other disciplines learn how to write papers in their discipline.

At Michigan Technical University for instance,  they have a new degree program called Scientific and Technical Communications. This program has hundreds of majors that teach students how to write for STEM.  At MTU, Toby Fulwiler's English Department stepped outside the traditional boundaries of teaching literature to create a community of scholars with faculty of other departments by learning about the writing needs of other departments and by supplying classes to help students write not only academic essays, but also help students learn to write in the science, math, social science and engineering fields.

By making the English department more relevant to the 21st century, English Department Faculty are making the English major more attractive to the students of the Digital Age.

Diversity classes through Multi-Ethnic Literature

Besides offering STEM related writing, English Departments are offering more diverse literature classes by focusing away from the traditional Shakespeare classes, but looking to offer more multiethnic literature classes to teach students how to deal with diverse people in the workplace. Learning the culture and literature of other cultures helps equip students to know how to deal with different cultures when students go to work.

Now, English departments offer classes in Asian American Literature (my specialty), African American Literature,  Hispanic American Literature,  Gay and Lesbian Literature,  Transgender Literature, Women Writers, and many more diverse classes that did not exist when I went through the English department to become an English major.

My very favorite class to teach was teaching the Asian American Literature class, the Cultural Diversity class and I loved comparing Far Eastern cultural values with Western values. My students loved learning about different cultural perspectives which will help my students as they enter the workforce and encounter workers from other cultures.

Multimedia assignments focused on Digital Literacy

The last interesting development I have seen in English Department is the focus on integrating traditional academic research assignments in an English class with more 'multimedia' assignments with 'multimedia' being the new buzz word.

In the beginning of the 'multimedia' assignment movement, teaching students how to do Powerpoint presentations was considered cutting edge. When we assigned Power Point assignments, we required students to make a speech about their Power Point. We gave students pointers on how not to give a boring Powerpoint speech, but how to engage listeners and how to create a visually engaging Powerpoint slide with big enough font that everybody can see.


Teaching students how to write using multimedia is called multimodal composition. I will write in more detail in a later post about the advantages of teaching students multimodal composition in a Freshman Composition class. I myself love to integrate infographics into my blogging. If students can learn how to write on the web and create web graphics, they will truly be ready for the 21st century!

Post 357: How do I design a Writing In The Discipline class?

How Do I Design a Writing In The Discipline Class?

Normally, teaching writing involves teaching students how to do research, or teaching students how to do an academic research paper. A typical Freshman Composition class would teach students the classic '5 paragraph essay structure' model, however, a Writing In The Discipline class refers to writing assignments tailored to specific disciplines. For instance in psychology, you might learn how to write a case study while in a science course, you might learn how to write a lab report.

1. Look up other universities to see how they have designed their Writing In The Discipline class.

2. Become familiar with Writing in other Disciplines.

3. Taylor the class to the needs of your school/students.

4. Talk to your Dean on the needs of your school if you are unsure of the specific writing needs of your school.  Make a list of possible writing assignments from the sources below and ask your Dean which writing assignments best fits the school.

5. Talk to the Librarian of your school about resources in the school library on writing in other disciplines.


Writing in the Engineering and Science Fields 

  https://www.craftofscientificwriting.com/

This website has instructional videos on how to write technical papers, and how to do lab reports for the Engineering and Science fields.

Writing in Mathematics

https://www.craftofscientificwriting.com/

This website gives math problems to solve through learning different ways of writing.

Writing in Healthcare Professions

https://owl.excelsior.edu/writing-in-the-disciplines/healthcare-professions/

This website has hyperlinks on how to write different kinds of writing encountered in the healthcare profession.


WAC Clearning House Website

This website gives extensive information on the WAC (Writing Across the Curriculum), WID (Writing In the Disciplines) programs.

Alternate Forms/Formats that Mimic Professional Writing

Think of alternate forms/formats. Although the research essay is the most common kind of WID assignment, it's not the only format that students can use to learn about disciplinary writing conventions. If professionals in your field use any of these types of writing, consider using these formats to help students understand the thinking and writing of your discipline:

• Project or lab notebook
• Progress report
• Management plan
• Position paper
• Interpretive essay
• Casebook
• Review of literature
• Journal or professional article
• Project proposals
• Grant proposals
• Lab/field reports

Post 356: How do you improve writing in college courses?

How do you improve writing in college courses?

Research Questions: Should the teaching of writing be solely the responsibility of the English Department? Should Content-Area teachers who complain about their students having poor writing skills also teach writing skills in their classes?

Within the English department, who teaches writing? new hires? graduate students? Shouldn't the English department focus on teaching literature instead?

As English writing teachers, are you tired of other departments complaining about their students poor writing skills on the English department?

Online Teacher Forum on Teaching Writing

Online Teacher 1: You English teachers are not doing your job! My Psychology students can't write a coherent sentence!"

Online Teacher 2:  Don't you people in the English department have a remedial class or something, I am tired of reading rambling essays that say nothing! I want to focus on teaching my engineering class! The lab reports I get are nonsense! Students don't know how to explain a simple procedure or state a simple conclusion! I have no idea what they are talking about!"

Online Teacher 1: Well, here in the English Department, we have many writing classes. Why don't you tell us your writing needs so we can better teach writing?"

I have heard these kinds of complaints in both Online Teacher Forums and I have heard these issues discussed in face to face faculty meetings like the one below:

Here is a hypothetical meeting in an English department:

Everyone is assembled in the faculty meeting room. All English teachers, Literature teachers, Writing teachers, everyone from the department of English/Literature are waiting for the Dean to speak.

Dean sits down with a serious face and says, "We have been getting complaints from other departments that their students do not have good writing skills. The History Department for instance have history professors claiming their students stay on one main idea in a history essay so that professor cannot understand what the student is trying to say.  Other departments are having much the same complaint. Others complain "their students do not have good paragraph structure, essay structure and make many grammar mistakes".  So, I ask all of you, what can we do to improve our writing classes?" The Dean looks expectantly at all his colleagues.

Writing Teacher 1: Why is it always on us to improve writing? Why can't those other departments also teach writing or have their own writing classes?  I think it is called Writing Across the Disciplines. In this program, all the different content area teachers integrate writing skills in their content area classes.

Writing Teacher 2: Well, we can develop a class for teaching writing history papers to placate the history department?

Dean says, "It is not just the history department who is complaining, I have a list engineering, social sciences, math, all are complaining."

Writing Teacher 3 scratches head, "I heard at another school they instituted a Freshman Composition class where they teach students how to write papers for different majors. They call it Writing in the Disciplines class. Students are taught how to write a business proposal, a position paper, a legal memo and a science lab report all in one class."

Dean listens to all these suggestions and then says, "Why don't we do both? Why don't we reach out to other departments and teach their teachers how to teach writing AND we can teach a course in teaching students how to write in the different majors!"

Older tired writing teacher says, "Isn't that a bit ambitious? And who has the time? And besides aren't all those beginning writing classes done by the new hires anyway? Who wants to be bogged down in grading more junior writing papers anyway?"

Dean says, "We make the time.  We have to make writing our central priority. Our English department is not just about teaching Literature. We need to change our attitude towards the importance of writing. From now on, all of you no matter how senior you are will be teaching writing and finding ways to make these complaints go away."

Older tired writing teacher says, "Sure, but how do we get those content area teachers to teach writing when they don't know how to teach writing? And those teachers will say we are not doing our job by dumping writing skills on them, and they will say they don't have time to teach writing and teach their content too!"

Dean says, "We teach them that's how! We give them writing workshops on how to teach writing as a process. Anybody want in?"

Younger ambitious adjunct 1 says, "I am in. I'll design the Writing Workshop.

Younger ambitious adjunct 2 says, "I'll design the Writing In the Disciplines class."

Younger ambitious adjunct 1 says, "I'll give those Writing Workshops with you, Dean."

Dean says, "Yes, if we all work together and reach out to other departments, we can get the whole university to teach wriitng."

Older cynical teacher says, "How are you going to get Admin to buy into this?"

Dean says, "We will prove our approach works. That's how."

After the meeting, the Dean circulates this memo email to the entire department:

How do we improve student writing?

1. Make writing an essential part of our curriculum.

2. Create workshops to teach professors of different departments how to teach writing and how to integrate writing into their curriculum without taking time away from teaching content area.

3. Teach Content area teachers to smoothly teach writing skills to complement content area learning.

4. Create a separate Freshman Composition Writing class that focuses on teaching incoming Freshman how to write papers in different majors.

5. I will be meeting with  each Department Head in future weeks to discuss their writing needs. Anyone want to volunteer for this committee?


6. Volunteers also needed to help design the new writing class!

So our approach is two-pronged, establish a Writing Across The Curriculum Program and design a Writing In the Disciplines class!

End of Email from Hypothetical Dean

The book by Art Young and Toby Fulwiler, Writing Across The Disciplines discusses how  the Michigan Technical University tackles this very problem. I will discuss this book in my next blog post.

How does your English Department handle complaints from other departments about student writing skills? Do you have a Writing Across the Curriculum Program or do you have a Writing In The Disciplines class or both?  Or does each department have their own research methods class?

Post 355: Book Review: Pop Cultures (Part II) Bollywood or Indian Pop Culture

Post 355: Book Review: Pop Cultures (Part II) Bollywood or Indian Pop Culture




The book, Pop Empires Transnational and Diasporic Flows of India and Korea by S. Heijin Lee, Monika Mehta and Robert Ji Song Ku discusses the rise of Bollywood or Indian movie industry in India and in the West.

Kristen Rudisill, an Ethnic Studies Professor at Bowling Green University writes in her essay, Expanding Diasporic Identity through Bollywood Dance in London talks about the popularity of Bollywood dance among British Asians in London.

As one can see from the above Bollywood Dance video, a Bollywood dance sequence is complicated, elegant, exquisite with beautifully dressed Indian women and men dancing together, singing, and having sentimental romantic scenes. Western audiences are drawn by the sentimentality of the Indian love scenes and the happy dancing couples.

At Bollywood Dance Schools like the Kalaria Honey Dance Academy, young British Asians are inspired by Bollywood movies to learn Bollywood dancing so they can dance just as gracefully as the beautiful Indian dancers in the Bollywood movies. At the local store, the Kalaria Bollywood Dance workout video is sold out. (Rudisill,180).

Not only do the young British Asians want to dance like their favorite Indian star, they also want to dress like them sparking an interest among the young in Indian fashion and clothes. Every year, the academy has an annual dance performance where dance students dress up in authentic Indian clothes and dance to the music of their favorite Bollywood movie.

Kalaria teaches Bollywood dancing while promoting Indian culture. The second generation British Asians start to love listening to Indian music, wear Indian fashion, eat Indian food, to the delight of their first generation Indian parents. Both British Asians and Westerners love to perform Bollywood dances at social gatherings in London.

I know my parents would have been thrilled if I and my brother had taken such an interest in Chinese culture when we were growing up. However, I do remember my aunts and uncles singing Chinese opera at home and then performing Chinese opera in public and my parents and I would go to these Chinese opera performances.

I highly recommend Pop Empires to anyone teaching Asian American Studies. It provides an interesting look at both Korean and Indian popular culture. If you want to know how to watch Korean and Indian movies on American TV, the last chapter of the book goes over which cable providers broadcast these movies, but you have to read the book to find out :)

Post 354: Book Review: Pop Empires (Part I) Korean Pop (K-Pop)

Post 354: Book Review:  Pop Empires  (Part I) Korean Pop (K-Pop)






The book, Pop Empires Transnational and Diasporic Flows of India and Korea by S. Heijin Lee, Monika Mehta and Robert Ji-Song Ku discusses the trends in Korean popular culture and Indian popular culture. Korean popular music is referred to as K-pop and the Korean movie industry is referred to as Haiyu. The Indian movie pop culture industry is referred to as Bollywood. In this post, I will discuss Korean popular culture in Pop Empires Part I and in my next blog post, Pop Empires part II I will discuss Bollywood--Indian pop culture.

S. Heijin Lee writes an interesting essay analyzing the rise of South Korean rapper, Park Jae Sang (PSY)'s viral hit song, Gangnam Style. PSY has become a worldwide senssation with this song. Lee writes, "No Korean pop star has penetrated the American market like PSY has" (97).

Lee continues to state that PSY fits the Asian American male stereotype as the geeky comical Asian American male not to be taken seriously as PSY  video shows the Korean rapper doing comedic rap dance moves.

In September of 2012, a Mother Jones article explained PSY popularity, "PSY is the Asian man who makes it' because he fits neatly into our (American) pop cultural milieu wherein Asian men are either kungfu fighters, Confucius quoting clairvoyants, or the biggest geeks in high school. The article further situates PSY among popular Aisan male figures as Long Duk Dong and William Hong, the former having entered American consciousness as a foreign exchange student in the 1984 teen comedy Sixteen Candles...This Asian male stereotype also emphasizes the foreignness of Asian males..." (99)

However, when PSY danced with MC Hammer, American audiences accepted PSY as a legitimate rapper and not just as a comedic fool in Gangnam Style. In addition, Dancing with MC Hammer gives PSY a 'cool' factor he would otherwise not have with American audiences.

PSY satirizes the modern consumerism of Gangnam, a wealthy South Korean version of Beverly Hills where many wealthy Korean people live and where many plastic surgeons practice plastic surgery. Many fans of PSY go to these plastic surgeons so they can look just like their favorite Korean pop stars.

PSY comedy is successful because it plays on the expectations of the viewer. In one scene, PSY is lying on the beach as one would expect any rich Gangnam resident would be, but then the camera pans back and you see PSY actually in the sandbox of a children's playground. In another scene, PSY is with a beautiful Korean woman of his dreams and the camera pans back, and you see PSY in a busload of middle-aged women.

PSY is not without his controversies, but you would have to read Pop Empires to get the rest of the story. Suffice it to say, that before reading this book, I had no idea what K-Pop was. This is a great book to introduce students to K-pop and to the values of modern South Korean culture. It is also a great book to have to give students an introduction to the Asian American experience. In my next blog post, I will discuss the second half of this book which is about Bollywood--Indian movie pop culture.

Post 353: Book Review: Ethnic Studies:Critical Fundamentals by Prof. Tim Messer Kruse

Post 353: Book Review: Ethnic Studies:Critical Fundamentals

In this time of George Floyd riots and 'Kung Flu' Coronavirus Asian American stereotypes, it is important for students to understand the importance of the role of systemic racism in the US. Why is it so easy to think of Asian Americans as the virus? Why is it so easy to think of African American men as thugs? Why is it so easy to think about all Hispanics as 'illegal aliens'? or to think of all Native Americans as 'savages'? Whose point of view is this anyway? Who is the one making all these stereotypes that we all buy into?

The book, Ethnic Studies, Critical Fundamental by Prof. Tim Messer Kruse, a Ethnic Studies Professor at Bowling Green State University, explains how systemic racism has played a major role in American history, American Law, American entertainment and the very fabric of American society. Kruse also discusses the Theory of Race, Race theory, the intention of race, the role of slavery, the great march westward and how that decimated the Native American culture, land appropriation, processes of racialization, and how bias influences modern day prejudices against many ethnic groups.

As I read the book, I never realized just how prevalent systemic racism has been through time and how the theories of race is prevalent even today and how systemic racism shapes the national narrative even today.  It explores the concept of 'white privilege' and ignorant European Americans have shaped how we all think of different ethnic groups from a Eurocentric point of view. I think every American should read this book, because for minorities, it is empowering, and for European Americans, it is eye-opening. I highly recommend everyone read this book! And it is only 20 dollars! A great Deal!

Kruse-Messer, Tim,  Ethnic Studies, Critical Fundamentals. Bowling Green University Press.

Post 352: The Importance of Having Student Moderators in the Online Classroom

 The Importance of Having Student Moderators in the Online Classroom

I once taught a Literature class where I let students be the moderators for each week. In the beginning, I had trouble convincing students to volunteer to be student moderators. Just like with student groups, nobody wanted to be the first 'guinea pig'.

As a result, I assigned different students and different student groups based on alphabetical order to moderate the forums each week.

After the first couple of weeks, students began to enjoy the experience of having fellow students moderate the forums. The student moderator would place the announcements in the forums, place topics for students to follow and then was responsible for answering all the students in the threads for that week.

Once students got used to the process, the hard work for me was over. I just sat back and watched my students enjoy each other's company and teach themselves the course materials. It was truly more relaxing for me because the pressure was off me to create lectures each week.

Instead, I guided the students, make sure the student moderators and other students stayed on topic, I presented some valuable tidbits on the topic, but I did not have to be the major presenter.

In the student evaluations, students wished more of their classes had the student moderator experience.  Scott Warnock in his book, Writing Together, says that student moderator activity is a great collaborative teaching experience for online students.

Only a few students complained and preferred that the teacher also participated because they felt that too much student moderator activity meant the teacher was just being lazy and not doing their job. But overall majority of students loved the experience of being student moderator and being taught by a student moderator.

Post 351: Language Exercises For The French Online Classroom

Post 352: Language Exercises For The French Online Classroom

When I was teaching French online with AMU, we used Rosetta Stone online language program in conjunction with our online classroom.  I had a great time teaching French since I majored in French in college and lived in France for several years making my French as fluent as a native speaker.

The Rosetta Stone program taught foreign language by not focusing on grammar, but on teaching students through matching images to words in the target language.

Students learned the most common actions, I walk, He drinks, They sleep, first by being exposed to images of people eating, sleeping or drinking in the target language, so the students learn right away, Je me promene, Il boit and Nous dormons (I walk, He drinks, They sleep) right away.

To complement what students were learning in Rosetta Stone, the French Course Developer created forum exercises, assignments, readings to go along with the Rosetta Stone curriculum.

In the forums, I would ask students in French, Where do you walk each day? To accompany the common actions students learn in Rosetta Stone.  Or What do you drink in the morning? Or What time do you sleep at night? to go along with the Je me promene (I walk), Il boit (He drinks) and Nous dormons (We sleep) images in Rosetta Stone.

In the French only Forums, students only had to write one or two sentences especially if this was their first time learning French and all they knew were the images they were being exposed to in Rosetta Stone. Sometimes, I made the questions silly like, Portez-vous des pyjamas au supermarche? (Do you wear pajamas to the supermarket? or we would have role play scenarios like, "What would you wear if you met the French President at a fancy French party in Paris?" or "What would you order at a fancy French restaurant in Paris?. Students would have to answer these questions in French based on what they were learning in Rosetta Stone.

Besides asking questions in forums, we also designed English forum topics where students discussed cultural topics about France and Francophone countries. Students loved these forums because they could express themselves fully in English and learn about another culture.  We talked about French Art, French music, French historical heroes,  French Literature, French Food, French movies and TV shows etc.. and other aspects of French culture. We also compared French culture to American culture which students enjoy and I got to share my travel stories of the times I traveled to and lived in Paris.

In the assignments, we had vocabulary building exercises, students could write about a paper about a cultural topic they discussed in the forums, and we had pronunciation practice exercises for students. We would have a native speaker of French record themselves asking a question and answering that question like, "Comment ca va? Je vais bien merci. Et vous?" (How are you doing? I am fine. And you?) Then students would repeat the question in French and then answer the question.

I created French videos using my linguistic background to teach students sounds they were having trouble with so that they could have better pronunciation in French. Mainly, American students had trouble with sounds in French that do not exist in English like the French way to say "r" which is between the English 'g' and the English 'k' but not quite.

We also had verb drill exercises where students would write out the conjugation of a certain number of common French verbs that they learned in Rosetta Stone so students practice how to conjugate verbs.

We gave French quizzes each week based on the grammar students were learning in the class. Since Rosetta Stone does not teach grammar rules, then we covered grammar rules in the class readings and tested students on these grammar rules in the French rules because students complained that Rosetta Stone did not have enough grammar for them since RS uses The Natural Approach where language is taught by exposing students to comprehensible input of the target language so that if a student is exposed to enough of the target language they will learn the language in the same way children learn their native language.

We also used Google map and had students look at Paris in real time and students would describe their favorite Paris scene or the scene from their favorite Francophone country.  For me, I would show them the scene of the Champs Elysees filled with McDonalds and talk about how American junk food is everywhere around the world. Many students were surprised at how many hamburger restaurants there were in Paris. They loved seeing the way Paris looked in real time. And it was like taking a walk with my students using Google map.

What other French online activities do you have in your online French classroom? Do you have them read French newspapers? watch French movies?

Post 350: Why Faculty Should Have A Shared Space To Share Teaching Ideas

Importance of Having Shared Faculty Space

Shared Faculty Space comes in many forms--Shared resource website, Common Folders, Teacher Forums, My Yvonne Tips For Teaching Blog, Virtual Teaching Circle and Facebook Newsfeed.


Shared Website Resource Folder--Common Folders

Sometimes this means access to a shared website where teachers can all share teaching resources. The resources can be uploaded to the shared website in folders where other teachers can then access these resources for their classes. Individual teachers can create these teaching resources and make them accessible to other teachers through the shared website.

When I worked for UOP and for AMU, we had a shared website to share resources. At UOP, I remember logging into a website and I was able to share other teacher's rubrics and/or use their rubrics to make my own rubrics for my UOP classes.

At AMU, we had different called Common Learning Space where teachers in all departments created Resource Folders.  I kept a resource folder of 54 of my writing videos that I made available to all  AMU teachers and I used these writing videos in all my writing classes.  These Common Folders were inside the LMS. Ask Tech Support where the Common Folders are located in your LMS.

Resources included: e-books, video links, web site links, learning modules created by colleagues about the same topic you teach etc..

Collaborative Teaching Tools

You can use collaborative tools like wikis, eportfolios, or Google documents where teachers can collaborate in real time on teaching projects or help each other build a class.

In Google Documents, you can create a document with comments about how to change a class or what content to put in the DQ forums. Then, invite teaching colleagues to comment on the content of your DQ forums in real time. The other teachers who teach your class can then submit suggestions on how to improve the DQ forums and thus giving other teachers a feeling of ownership to the class.

With this blog, you can have multiple teachers comment on blog articles, write blog articles for the blog talking about best practices and giving other blog writers suggestions on how to improve teaching, best practices, or topics for future blog articles.  In this blog, I welcome other teacher comments on my articles or even better suggestions for future blog articles.

Teacher Forums

When I taught for UOP, this was the first time I was introduced to the fun world of online teacher forums. It is like a huge water cooler faculty room for online teachers just like the Chat cafe ungraded forum for students in an online classroom.

When I used to teach face to face, I enjoyed eating in the Faculty cafeteria and then hanging out with other faculty in the faculty lounge. We would all talk about the latest gossip (math teachers dating English teachers kind of gossip) or complain about the xerox machine constantly breaking down and running out of paper.

The UOP Online Teacher Forums served the same purpose. I learned from other UOP teachers better ways to make rubrics, create better writing assignments, engage students in forums, and grading shortcut tricks. I also learned how to purchase a cheap instructor telephone (Tracfone) for business calls and how to get free telephone numbers online from other teachers.

At AMU, our English/Literature Department created a similar webspace where teachers could talk, let down their hair, share resources, share best practice teaching tips, talk about family, death and just become good friends with our colleagues.  I learned when a colleague had a baby, had a dying relative, a new pet, or a pet who died. We all learned to care about each other beyond just being teachers and we learned to see each other as people with lives outside of teaching.

We would give tips to each other on how to handle problem students, or to brag about our awards, or commiserate about long grading hours or constant server break downs.  I remember I enjoyed that forum so much, the boss made me administrator of the AMU Teacher Forum.  I even wrote a newsletter about this fun teacher forum at AMU.

Faculty Newsletter

Having a faculty newsletter where faculty can keep track of each other, keep track of the latest trends in teaching, school policies, departmental policies, professional development opportunities, calls to research for conferences as well as keeping track of the teacher conversations in the Teacher Forum. I remember totally enjoying writing the Faculty Newsletter and acting as a Departmental reporter. As the Webmaster, I reported on the most interesting teacher conversations in the Teacher Forums.

Later, all of the faculty would compliment me on my newsletter and when I stopped writing the newsletter to become Course Lead, faculty thanked me for the newsletter for making them feel like family and giving them a sense of belonging since teaching online can be quite an isolating experience.Writing a Faculty newsletter is also another way faculty can come together and be family.

Facebook Newsfeed

On my Facebook newsfeed, I have all my UOP colleagues and my AMU colleagues all in one place. I also have all my ex-bosses from AMU on my newsfeed.  On Facebook, we can be even more informal than we are in the Teacher Forums at our schools.  We can exchange teaching trends, teaching job openings, commiserate about long grading loads/classes, rejoice when vacation comes just like our elementary students run outside for recess with such glee, and most importantly we talk about our family and lives outside of academica on our newsfeed!

I know one teacher who loves Arizona and the Arizona desert with his motorcycle, another teacher colleague who has constant spiders all over her house, yet another colleague who collects Pez and finally another colleague who loves to barbeque hamburgers and steak.  The teaching colleague who loves to barbeque steak is the same colleague I met who loves his hamburgers when I first met him at a Regional Faculty Lunch! :)

Having a virtual place where teachers can meet, share resources and get to know each other helps develop a sense of belonging to the school, lowers turnover and increases faculty morale and work productivity.

Post 349: Why Having a Multigenerational Workforce Benefits Everyone

Why Having a Mutligenerational Workforce Benefits Everyone

Many companies who restructure focus on hiring the younger generation under the false assumption that having only young workers will re-energize the company. Actually, if a company hires both older and younger workers, you get the benefit of the corporate memory, business intuition, business experience of the older generation as well as the latest trends, and technological know how of the younger generation. The more perspectives a company has the more successful a company will be.

Laying off older workers in favor of younger workers will also not benefit the company. In fact, having a multi-generational workforce adds multiple perspectives to any project. The older generation will know the older generation niche to sell products while the younger generation will know the younger niche to sell products and you need both to be successful.  Here are some other benefits of not laying off older workers and not just hiring younger workers in the work force:

1. Older workers provide younger workers with corporate memory of the company. In other words, an  older worker can tell the younger worker the history of a work project, the ups and downs of the project, and provide historical context to the company.

2. Having multiple generations in a workplace provides opportunities for more multiple perspectives as each generation has different opinions/perspectives/solutions to the same problem/project.

3. The older generation can teach the younger generation how they solved problems in the past and the younger generation can teach the older generation about the latest trends. So each generation can learn from the other.

4. Having many generations in one office forces both generations to learn to get along with each other. Older workers learn to respect younger workers and younger workers learn to respect older workers. These communication skills can be transferred from job to job.

5.The older generation can act as role models for the younger generation on how things are traditionally done and the younger generation can teach the older generation about technology.

6. Younger workers learn to get along with older bosses and also, older workers learn to get along with younger bosses. Each side learns to be patient with the other.

7. Older workers appreciate still being on the job especially if older workers are allowed to stay until retirement and then older workers feel rewarded for their loyalty to the company increasing older worker productivity.

8. Younger workers learn that they too will be awarded for their loyalty to the company so that when they too reach retirement age, they are still with the company so that will increase worker productivity.

9. An inter-generational workforce also fosters a sense of community and family within the company as all members of the company care and watch each other's backs which means less competition between workers and more cooperation between workers.

10. Fight against ageism by employing employees of all ages! Each generation brings unique talents to the table. The older generation can contribute their years long experience in growing a company, give hints on how to develop business intuition while the younger generation brings their technical know how as Digital Natives to the table. When you combine both, you have a vibrant school culture and/or a vibrant business culture.

Post 348: Benefits of a Numberless Rubric for Faculty Evaluations

Benefits of a Numberless Rubric for Faculty Evaluations

I remember I was being evaluated by a really tired boss. She said to me, "I wish I could evaluate you faculty with a numberless rubric."  I had no idea what that was, so she continued, "That way, instead of having faculty dread evaluations and dread hearing a low evaluation grade, I can simply focus on advising faculty how they can improve their performance, after all, isn't that what evaluations are for?" I remember she sounded tired. Tired of faculty defending how they teach. Tired of teachers getting offended by a low grade.  She thought that if the rubric were numberless, it would make her job as Faculty Evaluator so much easier, and so much less stressful.

She continued, "Imagine, Yvonne, if all I had to do was just simply tell you the improvements you needed to make in your classroom, rather than giving you a score, wouldn't that make it easier for you to focus on your improvements? And it would also prove that the administration trusts and respects its faculty by not giving them 'grades' which is for students." " But alas, it is not up to me. I am only a  junior boss and I too have to obey the higher ups."

It was at that time hearing how tired my boss was that I first thought about 'Numberless Rubrics' where the evaluator simply fills out a rubric of what you did right and wrong and then tells you what to fix. The more I thought about this concept, the more I liked it! After all, I am all for improving performance, while being not stressed!

Post 347 How to Avoid Plagiarism

How to Avoid Plagiarism

Forums

Put the forums into Turnitin.

Cut and Paste all forums.

Put into Word

Put Word into Turnitin

Then look at Originality report to see Plagiarism incidents.

Quizzes

Cut and Paste quizzes into Turnitin

Put on Word

Put Word into Turnitin

Then look at report to see Plag. incidents.

Assignments

Download assignment onto computer.

Upload assignment into Turnitin

Look at report for plag. incidents.

Redesign assignments

Make sure your assignment shows students have written multiple drafts.

You go over those drafts with the students.

You make sure your feedback is in the corrected drafts.

Students can use forum post as references so you know that draft came from your class.

Redesign assignments so that students have to work together on the assignments to promote collaborative teamwork.

Peer Review

Teacher should participate in Peer Review forum to give feedback on multiple drafts so you know it is not plagiarized from another source.

Have students give each other feedback on multiple drafts so you know it is not plagiarized.

Work with student one on one

When you have office hours, go over the student paper one on one the student errors so you know it is not plagiarized.

Get to know student text

If a student has barely coherent sentences in his forum responses and then suddenly he writes perfectly, then you know he has plagiarized or has had somebody help him on his paper.

In an online writing class, it is easy to spot student writing text since you read his posts all the time.

In face to face class, give writing exercises in class and see how students write in class. If student writes in class with barely coherent sentences and suddenly turns in perfect papers, you know he has had somebody help him or somebody wrote the paper for him.

If you suspect student has plagiarized, then you can ask student questions about topic of his paper and if student cannot answer, then you know he has plagiarized.

Accidental plagiarism

Most cases of plagiarism is accidental because students are not familiar with APA or MLA formatting.

Most of the time, it is a matter of you teaching him her how to format paper and to teach him the difference between direct and paraphrase quote.

You also teach him how much to quote and how much not to quote so paper is not all quotes.

I will go over more about this topic in next blog post.

Explain Originality Report to Student

Teach student where Turnitin is located.

Teach student what Turnitin score means.

Teach student how to read report.

Post 346: Be Patient with Panicked Students

Be Patient With Panicked Students

I get students of all abilities, interests and levels. Some students know right away from reading the syllabus what to do.

Other students have trouble uploading assignments, navigating the online classroom, logging into the classroom, submitting assignments, being late for assignments, not understanding directions, not understanding course material, or they have a family emergency.

Whenever I get a panicked student who is desperately trying to upload, submit an assignment or has any problem they alone cannot solve, then I get a series of panicked emails. Each email the student sounds more and more panicked.

As a teacher, I am patient with them.

Example: Teacher, I am one minute late after the due date and now the assignment portal won't let me submit! What will happen to me? I can't figure out how to submit the assignment. What do I do?

Example: Teacher, I was taking the quiz and was just about finished, but it all vanished! All my quiz questions and answers are gone! What do I do? Does it count?

Example: Teacher, I know I am late, but I had a family emergency. Can you let me hand in the assignment late? If I get a zero, I will fail this class! What do I do?

Example: Teacher, I cannot log into the class. I tried calling Tech Support, but got a busy signal over and over again. What do I do? If I don't log in by midnight, the computer will auto drop me from the class! What do I do?

Example: Teacher, can you reset my assignment, I pressed Submit and forgot to upload my assignment and now I cannot get back into my assignment to submit it again! What do I do? It's midnight. Will you take off points? Will I get a zero? Oh no!

Example: Teacher, can I send you a draft? I am not sure I understand the assignment. What did topic X mean? I don't want to fail!

Example: Tech Support says the entire server has crashed and they won't be able to fix it until tomorrow. Can you extend the deadline? Please?

I have other examples, but you get the idea. When I get panicked students, I am patient with them.

I answer their emails right away. I direct them to the correct Tech Support number.

I try to find the solution myself. I give them leg room. I reset the quiz so they can submit it. I reset the assignment they can submit it again.

But the key thing is that I am patient. I never yell. I never get angry at them.

I am calm. I am patient and I respond right away, sometimes in real time.

When I respond to panicked students in a calm manner without ever getting mad, and help students find the solution to their problem, the students are SO GRATEFUL.

If you can deal calmly with panicked students and help solve their problem, you will get the best End of Class Surveys from these students!

When I myself panic over a technical glitch, I too am eternally grateful to Tech Support for rescuing me!


How do you handle panicked students? What is the most panicked situation have you faced with online students?

Post 345: Why is Peer Review considered 'Authentic Writing'?

Post 345: Why is Peer Review considered 'Authentic Writing'?

Authenticity in writing is when we ask our students to write in their own voices to audiences outside of the classroom, for a real-world purpose. In other words, when students write in their own voices to an audience outside the teacher, then this is considered 'real writing'.

Scott Warnock feels the peer review exercise is the most authentic writing students do in his writing class. Scott placed his class in online peer review groups. Each peer reviewer had to not only peer review another students' paper, but they also had to account for all the previous students' peer review comments as well.  He likes to put 4 people to a group. "Regardless of modality (online or onsite), the peer reviews may be the most real writing students do in class. Writing to a real audience for a unique purpose to help another student's writing improve..is not only of value to the reviewee, but to the reviewer as well." (Warnock,77)

When students peer review each other's papers, then other students become the audience. Students are peer reviewing for the real purpose of helping others.  When they peer review online, they are 'publishing' their peer review for others to read on the net.

My students love the peer review exercises because they get to interact with each other and they are writing for a real purpose--that is the purpose of helping to improve other student papers.  Students who post their rough drafts early in the week gets the most feedback reviewers because the earlier the student posts, the more time other students have to give feedback.

Students who post later in the week get fewer reviewers and get less benefit from the peer review exercise forum. So, I recommend online teachers to tell their students to post as early as they can and to tell students their rough drafts do not have to be perfect. Even if they just have one paragraph, it is better to post something, than nothing at all. 

Sometimes students who post late are shy and are afraid their rough drafts are not 'good enough' for posting. I tell these students that they are all in the same boat with the other students that there is no such thing as 'not good enough' during the peer review phase of the writing process.  Once I convince the reluctant students to post, they are surprised at how many benefits they get when their rough draft gets feedback and commentaries from their peers and from me. 

When students write to an audience other than the teacher and are writing for a real purpose, this is considered 'authentic' writing.  I have taught many English writing classes using the Peer editing forum as the main forum activity in the writing class with much success!
  

Post 344: How often should faculty participate in Forum Discussions?

Post 344: How often should faculty participate in forum discussions? How muich time should faculty spend on forum discussion?

How much time should faculty spend on forums each week?

According to Scott Warnock in his book, Writing Together, online faculty should spend no more than 3 hours on discussion forum participation per week because that would be equal to the 3 one hour lectures he gives per week in his face to face class.

Remember your face to face class has to have the same learning objectives as the online class. The online teacher has to spend just as much time teaching the online class as he does the face to face version of that same class.

When I was working online, we were migrating making our online classes the equivalent of that same class face to face. We had certain metrics on a time sheet where we would count how many hours we spend in the forums, how many pages students read in a class, how much time students spend doing homework or reading assignments and all these activities had to be the same as face to face students taking that same face to face 3 credit class.

By making our online classes the same as a 3 credit hour face to face class, then the school would be able to get accreditation. Without accreditation, then people would think that online school is not legitimate. We worked very hard on our time sheets to make sure our online classes were just the same as face to face 3 hour credit classes.

How often should faculty participate in the forums?

Scott Warnock says that students should post 1:4. In other words, you post one time for every four students. The idea is the teacher should not dominate the forum conversation, the teacher is only supposed to be the guide. Teachers have to let students dominate the conversation so students can construct their own knowledge and be the masters of their own knowledge.

In the online schools I worked at, the rule to follow is this, if the class has less than 10 students, then you answer each and every student post. If the class has more than 25 students, then you answer every other student. Make sure you answer different students each week. You have to keep track who you posted the week before, and who you skipped, then the next week, you post to those students you skipped the week before.

I will go over how I grade forums in a time efficient manner in a future blog post :)