1114
D2L
DISCUSSION BOARDS |
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NOTE FOR SPRING 2014:
There is no use of D2L--and no discussion board classes--in our
semester's 1114 sections.
Discussion boards also are known as
bulletin boards (hence their nickname "BBs"). Discussion boards are online pages
for posting messages to other people - in this case, your classmates - and reading
their responses. You are not all online at the same time
(so they are not like a chat room or instant messaging). Instead, you post messages
anytime in the week that you want, before the week's deadline whenever you
want--and
read them whenever you want--like you would add a message on a corkboard or
refrigerator. Why explain this so basically? If you are computer
savvy, you may already know this; but typically, 10-30% of students in a
beginning class have never used discussion boards.
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What are the basics of using the bulletin
boards?
What do you have to do? You generally must attend one discussion board
per week, with two messages of 200+ w. each (which makes a weekly grand total of
400+ w. per week). In these discussion boards, you will use "prompts"
(questions) to write one message each week - about the readings and about
general matters concerning our course. The other message each week will be
responses to other students. Full instructions are on the discussion board
web site.
How do you sign up? If you have registered for the course, you are
already signed up. If you are not registered for the course but want to be
a part of this term's discussion boards, please email me with a request for me
to add you.
What is the due date for each week's discussion boards? It is
Thursday midnight. In actual practice, I accept whatever
discussion-board messages and email homework I find when I look at them. I
look at them once a week sometime between Fri. noon and Sunday evening.
How long is discussion-board class supposed to take?
Our discussion boards replace Friday classes. The total
time they take each week is supposed to be about 50 minutes. Because I am
unable to determine your BB attendance time by the clock, I have a minimum word
count of 200+ words per message (400+ words per week). If your BBs take
you longer than 50 min./wk., then write and skim-read faster.
How do you start?
(1) Start by going to the IHCC D2L web site and sign
in: The web site is at
https://inverhills.ims.mnscu.edu/shared/login/index.htm
(1)
To sign in, you'll need your Tech ID # (e.g.,
00001234) and your IHCC password. If you do not know what these are, there
are instructions on the sign-in page to help you.
(2) After you've signed in, find the name of our
class and click on it.
(3) Once you are in our class's D2L web site,
click on "Discussions" (just below the IHCC logo and name).
(4) Then read the starting messages in "USING
THESE DISCUSSION BOARDS."
(5) Once you've read the starting messages,
scroll down on the beginning "Discussions" page to "Week 1" to get started.
How can you
make up discussion boards?
Please write discussion board
(bulletin board or "BB") make ups by following these four steps:
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Add the messages you need (the
ones you are missing) to the
real BBs in the week(s) you need to add them.
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Then copy just your own messages
(not other people's), box and all (or as much of the box as you can get copied:
i.e., all the info in the box). (Why? This is
so I can see that you have put each message on the BBs before sending them to
me.)
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You must copy BOTH MESSAGES in a
given week and Set, even if you have credit for one of them, as I do not keep
track of which message you have finished and which one you have not.
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Then paste each message onto a
sheet of paper that you give to me in class, properly titled with your name on
it.
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