Weekly Work

Each week, there are tasks for you to attempt. Sometimes there is a choice of which tasks to do; in those cases, I’m not looking for the number of these that you complete, but that you push yourself out of your comfort level. What’s more, it’s OK if something doesn’t work ‘perfectly.’ The reflection on the process, both your fails and your successes, is the important thing.

Weekly work should be completed and logged by the end of the relevant week. Dr Graham will provide ungraded feedback on this work in order to help you grow. There are three ‘consolidation’ weeks in the schedule, where you’ll prepare a ‘consolidation document’ that will be graded. Late work can be accepted only through arrangement with Dr. Graham.

If you miss a week, or something comes up let Dr. Graham know as soon as possible so that arrangements can be made. I want you to be successful; if something comes up we can adapt accordingly. If you do not let me know, then I cannot help you.

Evidence for Your Weekly Logs (ungraded work)

I am looking for the following kinds of evidence (each week will specify what needs to be done):

• logs/lab notebook entry that keep track of what you actually did
• reflection on that process
• engagement with the materials and your classmates (which might be demonstrated many different ways)
• evidence for your growth as a scholar over this course

At the end of each week by Sunday evening, you will provide to me through a form that can be found on each weekly page the links to your evidence for me to consider.

I will return feedback to you within two or three days. I will write you a short note giving you my perspective on what you’ve done (using the lens of the learning outcomes), and offering advice. This weekly work is to help you grow. It is not formally assigned a grade, but it does provide evidence of your growth against the learning outcomes, and your engagement with it does play into your eventual final grade.

Consolidation Weeks (graded work)

Every fourth week (that is, at the end of each module) you will submit a ‘consolidation document’. Consolidation weeks give you the space to try something again, or finish doing something that you had to put aside earlier. This document is where you can show me that you’ve taken my feedback and considered it and adapted/adopted accordingly. These are short documents; they can reuse materials (suitably edited) from your journal and note entries. Show evidence by linking to your repository materials. I would like you to suggest an overall grade for the module for you, based on how your work matches up against the learning outcomes for the course (see ‘grading’ below).

• Module 1 consolidation document: due at the end of week four; may be submitted in the following week if you notify me in week four.
• Module 2 consolidation document: due at the end of week eight; may be submitted in the following week if you notify me in week eight.
• Module 3 consolidation document: due at the end of week twelve; may be submitted in the following week if you notify me in week twelve.

The Exit Ticket

You will produce an ‘exit ticket’ for me at the end of the course (open format) reflecting on where you started and where you’ve gotten to, and you will indicate how you feel you’ve done against the learning outcomes. You are required to explicitly tie your exit ticket to evidence collected in your weekly work. The exit ticket is a summary assessment exercise that will pull all the different strings together into a strong cord. Everyone’s journey is different. Digital methods are more a matter of practice and time than they are of aptitude.

If you’ve never done digital work before, it might be that you never quite manage to get as many of the tech things working as you might’ve wanted: but you now know what you didn’t know before. That’s a win. You might be a computer science minor and the tech materials don’t present you with much challenge: but figuring out how to tell the compelling story was very difficult for you but you’re better at it now. Your ‘exit ticket’ will explain to me your particular context, and it will point to the evidence that demonstrates how you’ve moved along from where you were at the beginning to where you are now.

If I agree with your assessment, then that is the grade you will receive (thus, you have the opportunity to override the percentage breakdowns below).

When I have disagreed in previous courses this has been, 9.5 times out of 10, to raise the grade: y’all are too hard on yourselves. If I have disagreed and felt that you’ve overstated things - if you were the 0.5 out of 10 - we would talk and come to an agreement.

The Exit Ticket should be submitted within one week of the last day of the fall term.

Grading

Remembering the learning outcomes,

…5/5 would be an A, 4/5 would be a B, 3/5 would be a C, 2/5 a D.

Percentage Breakdown

I am required by the University to provide a percentage breakdown.

Consolidation documents = 75%
Final Exit ticket = 25%

I reserve the right to adjust those percentages to take into account the particular circumstances of the student.