This term I’m teaching an ENGL 1102 course themed Digital Rhetoric and Interaction Design. It is a subject that has interested me since my corporate days at HBO cobbling hbo.com together. I’m interested in discussions about how we use the tools and interfaces that we embrace so eagerly (at the moment I’m struggling to make my iPad keyboard respond with proper keystrokes.) As a website designer I’ve been guillty of assuming that ways in which I negotiate information and pursue tasks is in line with the ways in which (unknown to me) users work through the content I’ve presented. [Read more…] about Adventures in Digital Rhetoric, part the first
The Quick Write and the Coke Machine …
… or, How I Learned to Love the Google Doc
This semester the subject of my English 1102 course is “The Rhetoric of Digital Media and Interaction Design.” I’ve wanted to teach this for a while: not only does it allow me to flex my DH muscles in a way I haven’t in the last few semesters, but I also believe there is a real need for Georgia Tech students to understand how and why they respond to digital media and how they can become better developers of well-crafted software.
Early indicators suggest that I’ve struck a nerve. This is the first semester I haven’t lost a single student in the drop/add period and I’m still getting emails asking if I’ll consider a course override. Several students have come up to me at the end of class and actually squee’d – something I haven’t experienced at GT at the start of Shakespeare-related courses. I’m working to incorporate as many meta-lessons as possible, encouraging students to break the tools and texts we’re using. And so the breaking has begun. [Read more…] about The Quick Write and the Coke Machine …
Toward a better research project
This week my ENGL 1102 students will begin presenting their short research projects. I’ve used this assignment twice before, but this time there are a few new twists. The project still involves the development of a class-wide knowledge base designed to help students better grasp the context of medieval and early modern culture and society, and is designed to reinforce best credible research practices. But whereas the past two iterations involved a complex of technological platforms and communication modes (oral presentation w/ PowerPoint or Prezi-based visual aids, complementary wiki entries, visceral Twitter feedback) this time I’m trying to streamline the process and experience. Students choose from this list of topics that relate to either Elizabethan or medieval England (as identified in the second tetralogy.)
Respite from the Grading Trenches
I took time off this morning to consider why the heck I’m teaching this stuff: “Once More Unto the Breach, Or, Why Teach Shakespeare to Georgia Tech Undergraduates.”
And now back to the trenches.
Report from the Grading Trenches, Dispatch Two
As you’ll know if you’ve read the last few posts that my ambitious course plans for the semester have prompted me to think more carefully not only about the feedback I give, but how I give that feedback and how fine-grained I can make that feedback without driving myself to distraction. Here at the Writing & Communication program we’ve been talking a lot about better approaches to assessing multimodal assignments, since composition here is defined as encompassing more digital forms than traditional essays.
[Read more…] about Report from the Grading Trenches, Dispatch Two