Required Reading: Taking this Course

This is just a personal note to you to make sure you know how to succeed in this class. I finished my degree online and know that online learning can present both fantastic opportunities and real challenges.

In order to keep those challenges from creating disasters, I have posted a number of resources in the "Start Here" week above and you should consider this reading as part of your first week's homework: CCV Course Description and Syllabus: We are all responsible for knowing what is in there. I will keep this current and it will serve as the official syllabus for this course.

  • Top Ten Ways to Fail This Class: Tongue in Cheek -- but some valuable hints.
  • Intro Mini-Lecture: Let's see if these are helpful or annoying. I have been doing these for a few years in my online courses and most students find them useful; I hope these can capture the main points and provide some context for each week.
  • I will also include 3-5 Terms of the Week in each Week's summary.
  • Our final is not until the end of the course, but I do expect you to start using these terms in your posts, discussions, and papers. If you can look up these terms before your reading and put them in the beginning of each week's notes, they will give you reading a bit more meaning and relevance. And if you learn 40 or so new terms by the end of the course: How wonderful would that be! 
  • A note on the Weekly Calendar. In a perfect world - our weekly calendars would follow this pattern: Sunday - Wednesday: Reading/Viewing/Listening to course resources and taking notes. Tuesday- Thursday: Beginning to compose, post and respond in the week's Discussion Forum (First entry due by Friday night.) Friday - Sunday: Continuing Discussion Forum while composing, posting, and responding to your peers (Forums close on Monday nights.)
  • In weeks with essays - please do not write those the day they are due. You will do much better if you plan, draft, and then proof what should be college-level efforts. 
  • For your mental and emotional health - I do hope you take one day off from this/and perhaps all courses per week. Just make sure you schedule that so you also meet all your obligations. I will probably take one weekend day off each week to be with my family. Most often it will be Saturday.