The twenty-three discussion forums in EduCat are duplicated in the set of pages accessed through the Course Homepage. They are provided for convenience, allowing you to prepare and edit your initial responses to the prompts prior to posting them on EduCat.
Many of the forums offer several prompts from which to choose. You must respond to at least one of these, though you are welcome to respond to more than one. Nor must you confine your responses to the prompts; you are free to write about any aspect of the material that interests you. Whatever you decide, your 200-word initial contribution should offer some thoughtful reflection and analysis rather than simple statements of fact.
In addition to your initial post, you must file at least two 100-word responses to other students’ posts. Again, you are not limited to two responses nor to the 100-word minimum. Feel free to engage in as much discussion as possible, and to challenge each other to think more deeply about the material.
Students will have until 11:55pm each day, Monday through
Thursday, to post at least one 200-word response to the assigned discussion prompt,
and until 11:55pm the following day (Tuesday through Friday) to post the two
100-word responses to other students’ initial posts. Each discussion assignment,
then, consists of two parts overlapping two days: Day 1: respond to prompt, 200 words Day 2: respond to one student’s first contribution,
100 words; respond to a second student’s first contribution, 100
words
This means that by the end of the first day of a typical week you
must post a 200-word response to that day’s prompt (1a). By the end of the second
day you must post your two 100-word responses to the previous day’s student
contributions (1b) and your 200-word response to the
new prompt (2a), etc.:
These are minimum requirements.
Students are encouraged to participate in multiple exchanges with multiple students
at any time during the week. The more you participate, the richer will be your
engagement with the books. Bear in mind, however, that credit for participation is
contingent upon meeting the minimum requirements and
deadlines; there is no “catching up” once a deadline has passed.
Each of the twenty-three discussion assignments is worth 2% of the final grade, for a total of 46% (i.e., 23 x 2).
Students are strongly advised to read the assigned books over the weekends. This is a full-semester course crammed into little more than a third of the usual time, so expect to be busy.