I am still introducing the 15 different Discussion threads found in Scott Warnock's book, Writing Together, Ten Weeks Teaching and Studenting in an Online Writing Course. Amazingly, all these 15 threads are found in Warnock's ten week English class. Now you don't have to include 15 threads in your English class, but his book gives you plenty of ideas for your English class that you can choose from to suit your class and school needs. You can also read Scott Warnock's blog entry on the subject of
Different Kinds of Message Board
Posts.http://onlinewritingteacher.blogspot.com/2010_05_01_archive.html
In this blog post, I will cover 4 more interesting discussion posts Warnock introduces in his book for your online English class.
What is a My Favorite Post Thread?
In the My Favorite Post thread, students are asked by the professor what their favorite post is out of all the posts other students have posted for that week. Students are required then to read all of their classmates' posts to determine which one of their classmates' posts are their favorite and then they are required to tell why that post is their favorite.
What is a Dr. LogoEtho thread?
Warnock pretends to be a guest speaker named Dr. LogoEtho. If you know about Aristotle's appeals, you know that the three appeals of Aristotle is ethos, pathos and logos which are the three pillars of what makes a good argument. Warnock will post a fallacious argument that lacks either logos, pathos or ethos and then ask the class why this argument is a fallacy. As his alter ego, Dr LogoEtho, he can also be sarcastic, ironic, use bad grammar and ask the class to correct his post to the proper tone. The class knows that Warnock is Dr.LogoEtho. I don't know if I could pull this off, but Warnock sure can!
Dr. Warnock also used the Dr. LogoEtho thread to play Devil's advocate and post counterarguments to well known arguments and take the opposite point of view of the experts or of the class to get the class to argue the other side and encourage students in the usage of counterargument argumentation. Or he would post really controversial topics just to see how the students would react to it.
I have done the same where I posted a post totally contradictory to what the class thinks and then have the class agree or disagree with that post. For instance, getting an F in a class is better than getting an A in the class because if you get the occasional F, you learn how to deal with adversity which makes you mature faster. Do you agree or disagree with that statement? Of course, I did not take on the Dr. LogoEthos persona but I have posted controversial or strange topics for students to ponder in my Critical Thinking class.
Dr. Warnock also used the Dr. LogoEtho thread to play Devil's advocate and post counterarguments to well known arguments and take the opposite point of view of the experts or of the class to get the class to argue the other side and encourage students in the usage of counterargument argumentation. Or he would post really controversial topics just to see how the students would react to it.
I have done the same where I posted a post totally contradictory to what the class thinks and then have the class agree or disagree with that post. For instance, getting an F in a class is better than getting an A in the class because if you get the occasional F, you learn how to deal with adversity which makes you mature faster. Do you agree or disagree with that statement? Of course, I did not take on the Dr. LogoEthos persona but I have posted controversial or strange topics for students to ponder in my Critical Thinking class.
What is a Student Moderator Thread?
In all these weeks, each week a student moderator oversees all these discussion threads. Warnock assigns different student moderators for each week's thread. Students then act as professors as they interact with students in their class in all these threads. The moderator then has to prepare for the readings of that week, the videos of that week and be prepared to offer advice and instruction on the topics of that week like a professor would. In this way, students learn leadership skills and they also appreciate how much work the professor puts in each week in the discussion forums. Warnock says he has his students volunteer which weeks they want to be moderator.
When I used to have Student Moderators in my class, I would assign my students alphabetically because when I left it up to the students which weeks they wanted to moderate, everybody wanted to moderate in Weeks 7 and 8 (the last 2 weeks of the class). Nobody wanted to be the first moderator for the first few weeks of the class, so in the end, I had the A-H students do the first few weeks and the I-Z students do the last few weeks, and for me that worked like a charm.
What is a Word Puzzle Thread?
The Word Puzzle thread is similar to the Grammar Games blog post I posted. I can't believe Warnock and I came up with the same concept regarding how to teach grammar online!!! I guess great minds do think alike!
In Warnock's Word Puzzle Thread and in My Grammar Games post, the professor would post an incorrect grammar sentence and the students have to correct that sentence. The sentence could be missing a comma, have a misplaced comma, be missing a subject, object or verb etc..and students have to find that error and discuss what grammar rules have to be used to correct the sentence.
Warnock, Scott. Writing Together: Ten Weeks of Teaching and Studenting in an Online Writing Course
No comments:
Post a Comment