Hello! I'm Marianne Boretz, your teacher for this class.

Online classes suffer from an important handicap in that we can't see or hear each other!  So I've decided to do this video so that you can tell I'm a real person!     

 I also want to tell you a little bit about the way I teach online. 

Personally, I don't think most people learn very much from reading texts without discussing them. There's something about the process of trying to say or write what you think, and hearing or reading what others have to say, that helps to clarify your thoughts and increase your understanding, thereby developing critical thinking skills. In this way you increase your powers of analysis -- you become a better reader, writer, and thinker. 

Interactivity: So that's why my online classes are as interactive as I can make them. That's why I'm doing this video. But video might be a little heavy on the technological end. I know that as recently as last semester I assigned a video and several students said they had no video access. What could I do? Fail them? So not knowing your video capacities, my main vehicle for interactivity will be our class discussions.

Communication:  One of the most important things you can do as on online student in this class is to communicate! If there’s anything you don’t understand, if something puzzles you, if a link doesn’t work, let me know! You can email me, use the personal message system or use the Online Office  located in Discussion. I’ll usually respond within 24 hours. I’ll even call you if you want to talk.

Schedule: A “traditional” class has a schedule – a time when you are expected to be in class. We have a schedule too, as you've perhaps seen if you've browsed around the site. But the schedule does not include times when you have to be online. This class is asynchronous. That means there is no set time when we are all together online.

Flexibility:   It doesn't matter what time you log on! You may do your work at 3AM if that’s what you like.  But you should try to check in often to see what's going on in discussion, to see if you have a private message or if there’s a new announcement.

Deadlines:  In spite of all this freedom, there are deadlines, and you should meet them.  Sometimes people think that an online class is a static thing: I mean, there it is on the Internet so why not skip a few weeks then log on to the site and do the work whenever you feel like it. That's not the way it is!  You need to be organized and motivated enough to be on time with your assignments.  You must schedule time to do your reading, discussion, and homework assignments regularly so that you do not fall behind. Though I can cut you some slack if you need it, falling behind has a snowball effect -- it gets worse with each succeeding day and usually ends up in disappointment on my part and yours.   If you take more than a week off, you may not be able to login when you come back because I may have dropped you.

Work: There will be assigned readings, discussions, quizzes, and assignments just as in a "regular" class. More about these in the syllabus to your left, which is where you should go now after you've looked over the classroom layout which I describe below.