Before our Zoom session on Tuesday, June 23, continue to look for OER and other no-cost materials for your course, using the backward design process if it is helpful.
Post a comment below with responses to following questions by Monday, June 22, at 6pm:
- What OER and other no-cost materials have you found and/or plan to use in your course?
- How do these materials support the incorporation of asset-based pedagogies (e.g., trauma-informed pedagogy, culturally sustaining pedagogy, open pedagogy) into your course?
- How do the materials address these two principles of universal design for learning (UDL)?
- multiple means of engagement
- multiple means of representation
I have found some great online materials on the BMCC OER site that I haven’t used before. I really like the Writing Spaces book, Readings on Writing, and I will probably use some sections of this. I also really like the intention of Entering the Conversation, as an open and evolving resource, although I see that the execution is still going through a process.
Since my theme is identity for the Fall semester, I looked for some documentaries I might use to start conversations. I found Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am in Swank. I also found some great videos in Kanopy, and I need to keep refining my choices. Blind Justice: Women and the Law, Blacking Up: HIp Hop’s Remix of Race and Identity, and Drawn This Way all deal with different aspects of identity, and are divided into useful timed sections. I usually only share very short videos, because I think it makes more sense for a writing class. However I do really like the idea of having students create digital stories, short videos of their own.
As for incorporating asset-based pedagogies into my class, just by the fact that these materials are free, they are already taking into account the students’ situations more than other more expensive options. Readings on Writing has a friendly, conversational tone, and it open up possibilities for integrating sources that the students are already using such as Wikipedia, and the importance of including their own voices. The videos and films I selected all deal with inclusion and equality, and could be good conversation starters or could add to discussions started by the main readings in my English 101 course.
I’ve chosen both written and video material here, and I would like to add some visual work such as graphic memoir and some audio work such as podcasts to show students options of how they can present their work. Since this is a composition class, they will have to learn to write a 5 paragraph thesis-driven essay, and how to use MLA style formatting as per the course guidelines. But within this structure, there is also scope to work within different media and to show how writing is almost always a part of video, audio and cartooning, as well as other forms. I’m keen to help students take their work into a larger forum, by creating a group work that is public. This could be a website, e-zine, or e-book that we create together. If we can find a way that this could be useful to other English Composition classes, that would be even better.
I clearly can’t write as beautifully as Yolanda 🙂 but I will be very concentrated and I will filter my thoughts out. I will say this seminar was an eye opening for me. Thank you all for making me part of this. Starting from creating a learning base syllabus, which will be more welcoming for my students, using open pedagogy and UDL and reading all the beautiful materials to be a better educator, is already a good a start.
I plan to use some of the Khan Academy materials for my Chem course and I think It will be a good start for now and then I will explore the library for my material.
Using Khan Academy videos for Chemistry will give an opportunity to my students that have never taken chemistry before to learn things from the scratch. This will give a good opportunity to those to catch up with the rest and also to not slow down the learning process of those who are advanced.
Also, listening to a video with colorful illustration will engage students more.
Hi Ingrid, Thank you for the compliment, and I think you write beautifully also. Your post is concise and has great content! I agree that this course has provided excellent tools to help us all be better educators, and I’m really grateful for it.
I’m glad that you mentioned the Khan Academy. One of my students introduced me to it, and it has some wonderful free material. I think the more we can embrace these multimodal and interactive materials, and perhaps make some ourselves, the more our students will pay attention. When information sparks our imaginations, it is much easier to learn.
I’ve been using Khan Academy for a decade! It’s a great resource.
I plan on using the TED video on the history of why x is used as the unknown. This is something I usually share in my f2f classes. This video is culturally relevant/sustaining in how it reveals the contributions of Middle Eastern, North African, and Spanish scholars in the development of algebra as we know it today.
https://www.ted.com/talks/terry_moore_why_is_x_the_unknown?utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare
I recommend khan academy videos to my students every semester. When teaching online, I search for the appropriate khan academy videos and post them in blackboard.
My main project right now is writing my own set of IBL notes for each course that I teach. These materials will be zero cost to the students. I will make an effort to include more images in these notes, such as the cuneiform tablet images that I found on the Met website this morning. I teach ancient Babylonian numbers, so showing the students a visual image of an artifact containing calculations using these ancient numbers would help them relate to it visually and historically.
My teaching approach using these materials supports trauma-informed pedagogy in that students are invited to be active participants in their learning. Instead of passively having math “done to them” in a way that may trigger K-12 traumatic experiences with mathematics, I am using an open approach where the notes I write and resources I provide help the students create a portfolio of their learning. This portfolio should include both writing and images. I encourage students to be creative in the presentation of their portfolios; some decorated their portfolios with creative art and designs. This final portfolio allows them to keep an artifact that represents their cumulative learning during the semester, which was created and designed by them, which they can use in the future for reference as a textbook that they created and put together themselves. This ownership of learning, I hope, will help some students heal from the trauma inflicted upon them in the past where they may have been shamed for thinking too creatively or needing to understand the mathematics fully before memorizing formulas and repeating them back. The students share their work with each other as they are creating it and offer each other feedback in Blackboard discussions. In this way, the learning process is an open environment, as they are all coming together in a collaborative community to support each others learning and growth.
I am attempting to integrate the UDL principles of multiple means of engagement and representation by giving students materials in a variety of formats: written, visual, video, etc. I am considering asking the students to complete a learning journal in each module, and I feel that giving the students an option to do this either as a voice recording or in a written format will help to address UDL principles. I am also considering allowing the students to do oral exams or video presentations for some activities, rather than focusing exclusively on written work.
I also use Desmos.com with the students as a visualization utility.
I’m planning to use three different Economics textbook located in CoreEcon (https://www.core-econ.org/) titled “The Economy”, “Economy, Society, and Public Policy” and “Doing Economics”. All three textbooks are written from a heterodox perspective presenting a critical analysis of capitalism and addressing and discussing social and environmental problems that are largely missing in standard textbooks. This type of heterodox approach is what is needed to incorporate asset-based pedagogies into the teaching of economics. In addition, these materials can be useful in addressing “multiple means of engagement” and “multiple means of representation” because they discuss the contributions of different schools of thought to our understanding of the economy. In addition to CoreEcon I also found an OER source of no free material at https://opportunityinsights.org/course/ . Opportunity Insights is a project that offers free materials (including complete set of lectures in PPT and videos) for a whole (semester) course in introductory economics that seeks to “train the next generation of researchers and policy leaders on methods to study and improve economic opportunity and related social problems.” What impressed about the material is that it “increased gender diversity in Economics: 49% of the students who took the course were women, higher than in any other undergraduate Economics course taught at Harvard in the past academic year (among classes with at least 20 students).”
As with any introductory course, SOC 100 covers a lot of topics without much depth. For this reason, I will likely assign an OER textbook (for some weeks, at least) to give students an overview. I think the OpenStax textbook, which seems like the most popular one available, will probably work best. However, as I have done even with the textbook I’ve used for the last few years, I will supplement this with other readings, videos, etc. For example, in my sessions on social class, gender and race/ethnicity, I will most likely use articles from the news (such as the NY Times 1619 project and some of their excellent articles on gender) and/or from research institutes like Pew, as well as possibly some book excerpts. I will also use videos (some that come to mind are Race: The Power of an Illusion, available on Kanopy, or one or several of the many excellent Frontline documentaries) and Ted Talks (I particularly like Alison Goffman’s and Michelle Alexander’s). I am not sure if all of this technically counts as OER, but it is all freely available,
Sociology as a discipline lends itself to asset based/culturally sustaining pedagogy and I think that in particular the supplemental texts and videos that I choose will help to really connect the course material to students’ lived experiences and the world that we are living in today. I also feel somewhat liberated by the UDL concepts of multiple means of engagement and representation, and plan to expand my syllabus to include more video, podcasts, interactive websites, etc like some of those listed above and others that I continue to look for.
The two textbooks in music history listed on BMCC OER website are quite good, so I will use one or both of them as reading/listening materials for my course. YouTube remains a great source for musicians because I can always find videos on music teaching, studies and performance. There are also some videos on TED that might work for my course. For additional resources I will also list websites teaching music theory and ear training, such as musictheory.net and teoria.com.
The videos from YouTube and TED allow me to incorporate a wider variety of materials addressing music in different styles and in various ways. The music theory/ear training websites will provide students opportunities to further their studies if interested. Through a mixed use of all the resources mentioned above, I am able to present course materials in different format—video, audio, images and texts.
I’ve been exploring the OER commons, Merlot, HowlRound etc. for ESL materials and I’m very pleasantly surprised! I was afraid that the grammar and writing sources would be too difficult for my students but I was able to find an abridged “portrait of Dorian Gray“ with worksheets that Is very accessible, and also something called PDX Journeys, a novella about an ESL teacher and her very diverse class that includes not only text and lots of follow up activities and exercises butGraphic representations within the story such as the teachers pro/con table for her career decisions. It lends itself to lots of different essay topics; for example, the first chapter deals with her assumptions about a new office mate she assumed was being rude until she finds out that he’s actually deaf. I’ve also found Englishclub.com that has videos and jokes about misunderstandings and online grammar exercises with immediate feedback, which is the kind of thing I was not sure I would find to substitute for the online component of the textbook that we normally pay for. Another site called college ESL writers: applied grammar for success, has lots of very useful parts but I would have to pick and choose carefully because it also moves too quickly from basic to advanced issues and also there are bits I would disagree with such as calling the use of the singular “they“ incorrect (eg “Someone left their book on the desk”), not to mention its use as a non-gendered singular. This is obviously the kind of thing that is currently in flux and is certainly not something that I would teach in the old way, any more than I would spend a lot of time on the use of “whom.”
I was sorry to see that SnagFilms is no longer up and running as of this May, as that looked very promising as a source for independent films. But there are plenty of other sites for that kind of thing. On HowlRound I found an interesting piece about a puppeteer who is reworking the punch and Judy genre to deal with the violence and misogyny of that long-standing cultural icon, which certainly in the past has been beloved of many generations of children. That ties into themes which I very often use in class of sharing folktales and fairytales, and discussing for example how they have been changed over the centuries from quite gruesome to possibly too saccharine. Students have a lot to contribute from their own cultures on this unit, and the idea that we can honor and preserve but also consider evolving our traditions is fruitful.
I am made painfully aware of the kinds of difficulties that many of our students face, since I’m having so much trouble with the iPad and have to do all of this with voice dictation – Apologies for any weird mistakes that I have failed to pick up!
Vanessa, I enjoyed reading your post and found many interesting ideas here! It’s interesting how the “they” pronoun issue, while I’m not opposed to it, could cause some confusion for a beginner or intermediate learner, btw.
By this point I think most of my course material is OER/ZTC compliant, with a couple of exceptions covered under Fair Use. I have PDF copies of all my short stories (by Melville, Conan Doyle, Wilde, Kafka, James, Hemingway), short nonfiction (Poe, Woolf, Stevenson, Wilde, Benjamin, Orwell), one play (Chekhov’s Seagull, sourced from the University of Adelaide), one novel (Dracula–more on that later), and I’ve compiled PDF packets of poetry roughly covering historical periods from Early Modernism to the Twentieth Century. A few of the nonfiction pieces will form the basis for student contributions and collaboration: Poe on poetry writing; Woolf on metaphors for gender roles; Stevenson on “Books which have Influenced Me” (expanded, of course, to include all media, since few students read); Benjamin on collecting; Orwell on textual alteration. I’ve got those exercises sketched out, though I’m still in the air about platforms to employ if we’re stuck teaching online.
I’ve been able to plunder LibriVox.org for excellent audio versions of nearly all my readings (sometimes I clean them up a little using an audio editor) and have put many on Blackboard. I’ll mirror the content on WordPress, and might record a few readings myself. This might also make a good student exercise, especially for some of the shorter poems (perhaps early on when we’re learning about rhythm and rhyme). I’m hesitant to expand this to include video clips (it’s easy to go overboard, and I don’t want students to think of other media as a replacement for reading), but I’ll likely include a production of The Seagull. One of my in-copyright texts, Eunoia (still not sure how to replace this!), is a good opportunity to show some videos about “constrained writing” and the various experiments its author undertakes. There’s a good CBC interview/animation I’ve been using during this unit for a few years.
I still need to decide on a format for our Dracula text, which I’d like to make available for group annotation. It’s freely available everywhere, but I want us to work from a common source. I want students to read it (and, ideally, everything) in hard copy, so I’m conflicted here. I suppose a Kindle-type e-reader would do (and I know you can annotate and export as text), but I want to avoid having students “read” an entire novel on their phones. My guess is that most simply won’t read a long text unless I find some way to get hard copies to them. I could just run an edition-agnostic class that encourages them all to find copies of the novel at their local libraries. I’ve found a great model at http://www.draculaproject.com, and I’m thinking about simply contacting the proprietor (the code used on the site is copyrighted but no indication about her extra-textual additions). This is the spot in the semester where my small groups would need to work collaboratively on adapting a single scene. I mentioned hypothes.is in my instructions, but I haven’t decided on how best to host the “sandbox” and then have them share the results. Maybe just our common area on WordPress.
I’m happy to share that we have an e-book of Eunoia, Adrian, which you can access here: https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/bmcc/detail.action?docID=760209
Thanks, jean! This is great news. I think I can safely say that I have a zero-cost course now. So once I get my fall course assignments I can log in to CUNYFirst and make sure it’s listed as ZTC?
I am struggling. Regarding the questions regarding “Asset based Pedagogies” my own two-week modules: 1) A Deeper Understanding of Love in Artistic Expression through the examination of 3 – 5 scenes from opera/musical theater will directly address the universality of emotion regardless of style or period. And it will address culturally sustaining pedagogies and trauma-based pedagogies. This is true, unless I simply don’t understand the basic concepts we’ve been talking about and 2) Asking the students to present a piece of music of their choosing and their background, from which I will assign them a classical composer based on the “tenor” of their offering. This too, under the bast of circumstances will be culturally sustaining and could be trauma-based. In regards to the the first module listed above, I would examine the Orpheus myth using Orfeo by Monteverdi YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/_7Wo-3DtI34 and compare it with Black Orpheus: https://bmcccuny.kanopy.com/video/black-orpheus academy award winning film that can be accessed from the Library’s website data base KANOPY which is contemporary Rio de Janiero. We DID NOT receive clarification last week regarding Youtubes and whether they are open access. With a link they must be, NO? The issue with Naxos (which is the library database) is that it’s hard to find an excerpt that is useful. Finding the entire opera is possible. Multiple means of engagement would include: 1) reading the synopsis of all the excerpts 2) listening to all the excerpt 3) writing a defense of the particular excerpt that you are assigned (whether or not it’s the excerpt that you want to defend as the most, Oh…I don’t know….a) interesting, b) effective, c) twisted, d) dysfunctional these break out groups would include one person assigned each of the five excerpts for comparison’s sake. The second break out group would be comprised of only students assigned the same excerpt and as a group would create an alternate finale to the dramatic conundrum. Watching, listening, writing, comparing, defending.
What OER and other no-cost materials have you found and/or plan to use in your course? Here are some example:
o The Public Speaking Project: http://www.publicspeakingproject.org/psvirtualtext.html
o The New York Times newspaper’s free academic access via https://myaccount.nytimes.com/verification/edupass
o The Guardian newspaper: https://www.theguardian.com/us
o TED Talks: https://www.ted.com/talks
o Example of Doughnut Chart from Google Images Search, “Labeled for Reuse”: https://community.tibco.com/questions/it-possible-create-donut-chart-spotfire
o Example of Pie Chart from Google Images Search, “Labeled for Reuse”: http://www.datumresearch.com/
o Example of Chart from Google Images Search, “Labeled for Reuse”: https://www.flickr.com/photos/bike/17137188061
o Example of Line Graph from Google Images Search, “Labeled for Reuse”: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png
o KnightCite Citation Service: https://www.calvin.edu/library/knightcite/
o Databases on the BMCC Library’s Website: Academic OneFile, CQ Researcher, NexisUni, Opposing Viewpoints in Context
How do these materials support the incorporation of asset-based pedagogies (e.g., trauma-informed pedagogy, culturally sustaining pedagogy, open pedagogy) into your course?
o NexisUni allows students to sometimes access newspaper articles in their first language. NexisUnit allows students to access news sources from around the world.
o The Public Speaking Project in a virtual textbook that offers an assortment of virtual tools to help users improve their public speaking skills. A variety of speech professionals who are dedicated to providing free and low-cost instructional materials contributed their original work.
How do the materials address these two principles of universal design for learning (UDL)?
o multiple means of engagement:
* The databases I listed from the Library’s website usually connect to sources where the article can be read or heard.
* TED Talks often come with transcriptions in English and sometimes in other languages, and often with subtitles.
* NexisUni allows students sometimes allows students to access newspaper articles written in languages other than English
o multiple means of representation
* Incorporating images of, for example, charts and graphs that could be improved not only provides visual materials to go along with my discussion on presentation aids, but opportunities for students to talk about ways these specific examples could be improved, based on the information from our readings.
* Incorporating TED Talks gives my students examples of presentations they can see, hear and read. We can use these talks in discussions about effective presentation techniques, as well as the visual, verbal and vocal aspects of a presentation.
Since the theme of my ENG 101 fall 2020 course will be “Self-Discovery and the Power of Voice,” I plan to use multiple modalities. Some of these I already have in my teaching arsenals while others I found using the OER site. I use readings from scholarly journals and online newspapers, like the New York Times and other outlines. I’ll provide the PDF versions and links for the academic/peer reviewed articles and the links for the newspaper readings. In addition, I’ll provide TED Talks, poems, music videos with song lyrics (I’m thinking of a song by Christina Aguilera, “The Voice Within”), and movies via Kanopy (“Some Girls – A Journey of Self Discovery for Latina Girls” by Raquel Cepeda (2017)) as avenues to introduce concepts to students and allow them the freedom to choose among these modes of expression when presenting their major projects, like their creative nonfiction narrative and their documented research project. I like using the idea of story telling to show them how that tool can be used in most, if not all, of their writings and creations. People love to hear stories and want to connect. The stories would allow for learners to write about what is relevant to them and even help them to build on their experiences and recognize their strengths.
To be specific, most of the journal readings, like “Reading Games: Strategies for Reading Scholarly Sources by Karen Rosenberg” (2007) and “Storytelling, Narration, and the ‘Who I Am’” Story by Catherine Ramsdell (2011), I found on Writing Spaces. Others, I’ve found on The Chronicles of Higher Education, Faculty Focus, and other university websites. I plan to continue reading and being informed on pedagogical concepts to help guide me in my approach to teaching and creating an inclusive, collaborative and strength-based learning environment for all learners.
The learners in my course will first need to understand that their voices matter greatly, and because of that, I need to encourage them to bring in their unique perspectives and background knowledge to direct the course, while keeping in mind departmental constraints. Since I hope the learners will be their own advocates and be self-reliant and disciplined, involving them in the course planning from the onset might enable them to understand that we are in a collaborative learning and teaching space, where we share ideas and offer support and valuable feedback when needed.
I’ve used multiple means of engagement for my course because of two reasons: I am easily bored, which means the learners will be bored as well, and we all learn differently. For those reasons, I use videos found on TED Talks and YouTube (as well as other platforms), written word, podcasts and other audio via NPR radio. Other than the written assignments and group work using Google docs, the students will have multiple avenues to submit the different stages of their assignments. For instance, for the Creative Nonfiction (CNF), the learners will use free-style poetry, which they need to write and present as an image and read out loud. Also, they will submit video/audio feedback (Voice Memo/Voice Thread) to their peers as I’ll be doing the same for them with 10-minute mini-lectures (via YouTube) and even course introductions using Flipgrid – 2 minutes (which they will be required to perform within the same limited time). The first exercise the learners and I will engage in involves adding to the course schedule and syllabus, I’ll leave it up to them – so, if they want to add an image or a music video as a way to understand/explore the theme, we can do that – accountability, collaboration and inclusivity are key to making them become more engaged in and inspired. {I can’t lie – I’m looking forward to seeing how all these plans will turn out!}
– What OER and other no-cost materials have you found and/or plan to use in your course?
I found Jove, YouTube, HHMI, TedEd and Ricochet Science videos, a couple of free university created free virtual labs, a free texbook, several NPR poscaststs such as ShortWave, ScienceFriday and Science vs.
– How do these materials support the incorporation of asset-based pedagogies (e.g., trauma-informed pedagogy, culturally sustaining pedagogy, open pedagogy) into your course?
They help represent the material in different ways to reach students with difrerent learning styles and different levels of background knowledge. They are free, thus saving student’s $ for other necessities.
– How do the materials address these two principles of universal design for learning (UDL)?
multiple means of engagement
Video, audio and text. All there.
multiple means of representation
Not very sure what that means.
I will probably use one of the OER textbooks the library has in it’s data base: Music: It’s language, history and culture by Douglas Cohen out of Brooklyn College. But I am also planning on using Educational TedTalks: What’s a squillo, and why do opera singers need it? (Ming Luke | TED-Ed)
https://www.ted.com/talks/ming_luke_what_s_a_squillo_and_why_do_opera_singers_need_it?utm_source=tedcomshare&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=tedspread
This TedTalk introduces a vocabulary and concept palette that is very inviting.
I am developing a segment of study which will include 1) reading of synopsis’ 2) listening to excerpts 3) dramatizing the libretto in break out groups 4) aurally defending an assigned excerpt whether it’s your favorite or not around the topic of “Love in Art between comparative styles and different periods.” Regarding specific musical pieces that i will use in a large two part module involving two different renditions of break out rooms, I will use as one of five opera/musical theater excerpts the Orpheus myth and will include this segment from Monteverdi’s opera
https://youtu.be/_7Wo-3DtI34
in comparison with the academy award winning film “Black Orpheus” which we can access through the library data base KANOPY
https://bmcccuny.kanopy.com/video/black-orpheus
After participating in break out groups that are comparative where all five excerpts are represented, we will then go to break out groups made entirely of individuals with the same assigned excerpt and perhaps, write an alternative dramatic ending.
The multiple means of engagement and representation are listed above and I hope that the more modern excerpts (i.e Rent or Hamilton) will address Culturally Sustaining and Trauma based pedagogies. If course, any of the twisted operatic plots will address Trauma based pedagogy. That is….unless I’ve missed the point entirely.
Among the OER materials, I will be using a variety of sources: I was already using smarthistory and metmuseum essays, and arthistoryteaching resources, but I will be adding several others.
For lectures, I thought some of the materials in the Modern Art class in the commons were useful, https://arh141.commons.gc.cuny.edu/
For instance, in week two, a useful way to approach the discussion of abstraction in art with an exercise based on two readings, linked to the Tate Museum and a brief magazine article. Likewise, some texts might be useful from the open source book: https://www.oercommons.org/courses/teaching-arts-since-1950, like the discussion of one work by a contemporary Mexican American artist on the subject of Mexican muralism, Chicano muralism, and the proposed building of a wall. Working an exercise to bring these topics together seems like an interesting challenge. I usually start the Modern/contemporary art class with a contemporary example to go back in time, but had ever thought about weaving together these topics, to discuss the transformations of traditions, their resilience and pertinence to the present. I am still looking though for a longer essay on muralism or Chicano Art. This could help also build the culturally sustaining pedagogy, in terms of thinking about street art in their neighborhoods, different forms of expression in public art (there was also an assignment on street art that could be rethought http://arthistoryteachingresources.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Street-Art.pdf).
However, I find that much that is available in the arthistory related commons/OER sites is not necessarily based on culturally sustaining pedagogy (or it is a not a priority). Therefore, I am looking for materials beyond: videos and databases from other institutions, like the Museo del Barrio, which just recently made available an archive of its exhibitions. This might give me options for different kinds of curatorial-research projects that might emerge from students’ backgrounds, even neighborhoods. This could also be developed into a project or discussion that connects to trauma and healing too in public art and monuments (especially considering the current destruction of monuments of conflicting historical figures and other approaches from artists who have been working to transform them, like Joiri Minaya).
Regarding multiple forms of engagement, I will be taking more advantage of images that can be downloaded and existing exercises. Regarding images: for instance, creating the personal timelime I require using openacess images, like Met images.
For existing exercises, for instance, from the National Gallery on Romare Bearden, https://www.nga.gov/content/dam/ngaweb/Education/learning-resources/teaching-packets/pdfs/bearden-tchpk.pdf
The section on collage was useful, as it combined several objectives: learning about context (how Bearden’s work is embedded in Harlem and places he lived) and reflecting on one’s own, doing formal analysis of a work of art in order to create one based on the students’ culture. This could be part of early exercises to build later on a project on art that is connected to the students’ lives.
This might lead to a project: curating an art exhibition based on their cultural knowledge. This could also be adapted from http://arthistoryteachingresources.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Curate-an-exhibition.pdf. For example, when discussing art and activism, show examples from Art in General, about their projects on community (timelines and exhibitions), so that they have an example of curatorial projects grounded in community-based art. The assignment could be based on employing different sources, from museums (like Metimages) and Google Arts, create an exhibition statement, think about placement, objects selected, and cultural relevance.
For the sake of simplicity in what becomes a very involved effort for the learner I have chosen to include Khan Academy course for biology on my OER materials
I have had success with these videos for the last decade and I believe the essential approach to time management (videos ~ 10 min) provides a digestible amount of content and it is designed to be consumed on the phone. In tandem with a virtual space this will allow learners to deep dive into material and build community with other learners problem solving areas of interest based on their choice and connection to the material. This will provide ample motivation and accessibility with little prior knowledge. I am also drawn to Khan Academy because it allows for engagement with a broad scope of disciplines enabling greater success in empowering with knowledge.
In our current crisis, I believe tools which allow learning and engagement with a concerted focus on the essential are most effective. OER materials that meet an asynchronous schedule are highly valued now unlike before where engagement was based on synchronicity. I have decided to include freedom to choose material and content for learners to achieve universal course design principles. This will allow learners to play to their strengths and avoid added trauma or culturally uninformed pedagogy if they so choose to. Some learners may choose long writing exercises and case studies as their primary mode of engagement while others would choose problem solving in teams and providing analysis in dialogue with classmates. Technology allows engagement for those with physical or mental limitations. I really hope to eliminate the stigma to accessibility and create camaraderie.
I love the OER site, and it’s a resource I would have otherwise not found before. Until now, I’ve been (probably not in alignment with copyright laws) sharing content with my students outside of the assigned textbook to create additional context from differing perspectives. Even though business is often taught as fact, there is actually a lot of room for interpretation and analyzing situations. The best discussions come from the grey area — what would a student do if they were the manager? How would they make a decision? The textbook gives specific examples that are often hypothetical, and I’ve really liked finding options that bring real world situations, often concerning businesses and brands students are familiar with, into the conversation.
I will continue to use the feature length film “On The Basis of Sex” to help explain Equal Rights and Employment legislation, as well as a few related resources as follow up. In hopes that I would be accepted into the OER/ZTC program this summer, I scrapped my textbook-provided PowerPoint presentations and created my own, linking to videos and additional places to find information (which I will likely swap out for some BMCC Library resources) beyond the book.
These resources expose students to resources beyond what they may have interacted with before (educational videos that aren’t boring, podcasts, or publications like Forbes and HBR, which are great places to find relevant business news, outside of course content). They also incorporate asset-based pedagogies by being openly accessible without cost and across technological platforms (tablet, laptop, or smart phone). Especially exciting is the possibility to include diverse authors, voices, and commentary so that students can see themselves in the experts they hear from. They can understand through example their (previously assigned) textbook wouldn’t have incorporated or I wouldn’t have thought to include by nature of my own biases. This allows for more representation in the curriculum, as well as more equal access and fewer barriers to entry so we can focus on learning instead of hoop jumping!
I plan on using :
-Khan Academy
-Youtube
-Mycurvefit.com
-phet.colorado.edu/en/simulation/
Most of these websites are very common or intuitive enough to accommodate students of diverse background. Mycurvefit.com which I will be using for labs allows students to do graphs online without needing Microsoft or any graphing software.
The point of teaching Physics is to teach the student how to think and one can argue that one way to accomplish that is by inspiring the students in the good learning habits. By providing various means through which the students can access the same information , we guarantee a greater chance that our very diverse students will find a learning tool that best fit their background.
I am an adjunct lecturer in the computer information system department. I am teaching computer courses which most of are programming languages. I have created four folders under the course material of the blackboard. These folders are Lectures, complementary video links, exams and their answers, review and answers. under the course material I have uploaded all my lectures plus the link of the free online textbook. here is the link of this textbook: https://runestone.academy/runestone/books/published/thinkcspy/index.html
as you can see, in this textbook for each concept, there are video lecture, text lectures, examples and exercises with answers. Also, it provided the Integrated development Environment that students can write and execute their programs there. All of these are free of charge which normally they should pay for each of these.
What OER and other no-cost materials have you found and/or plan to use in your course?
For VAT 171 Remote Production/Editing I am still searching for material, however, it seems that a major ZTC component will be a series of Linkedin Learning tutorials on video editing (Adobe Premiere, Avid Media Composer). I also have collected a series of YouTube videos illustrating various filmmaking concepts (the 180-degree rule, Walter Murch’s 5 editing principles, etc.) and have created a few of them myself. I am also revising handouts with material compiled from freely available sources. Finally, I show various short films and clips from significant feature-length works, both fiction and documentary.
How do these materials support the incorporation of asset-based pedagogies (e.g., trauma-informed pedagogy, culturally sustaining pedagogy, open pedagogy) into your course?
My clips and examples are often in languages other than English (A bout de souffle), directed by women (The 13th) and/or persons of color (Get Out, BlacKkKlansman, El Mariachi). The hope is that material that often deviates from traditional “white” Hollywood will encourage students to produce authentic work.
How do the materials address these two principles of universal design for learning (UDL)?
multiple means of engagement: Taking my cue from strategies presented in the video “Universal Design for Learning in Higher Education,” I will allow students to do a deeper dive into the material by providing, for instance, a playlist of relevant videos, as an extension of what I show during class. I will also focus on the post-education goals of students by offering material on various filmmaking jobs (cinematographer, sound recordist, editor, etc.). (Most students start the class wanting to become directors, but soon realize that a career in editing can be equally rewarding, for example.)
multiple means of representation: Students watch videos (all of them captioned or subtitled) and read the handouts and articles. All LinkedIn video tutorials come with transcripts. During the course of the semester, students write, film, and edit three projects each.
For the CC BY licensed chemistry text, the two listed on the library website, OpenStax and LibreTexts will certainly find a place in my classes as source of OER/ZTC. I referred my students who had difficult to purchase the required text to the free text all the time. But bring students one step further to the platform of OER and learner centered forum with open pedagogy contents are something new I am learning from the Seminar. The topics from my Blackboard discussion board can be the first step extended to the OpenLab site, where they can learn to cite the contents of the open texts to build up their skill inline with the learning outcome required for the chemistry course.
Thanks to all who have shared the resources they have found so far. I’m finding it fascinating to explore these new sites and hoping that I’ll be able to find the materials that I need to develop my course further. LIN100 Language & Culture comprises 6 different units and these are some of the possibilities for each of the units:
1. Language & Linguistics
http://www.youtube.com The Floating University Steven Pinker: Linguistics as a Window to Understanding the Brain | Big Think https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-B_ONJIEcE&t=2270s
What is Morphology? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqAtAqGqU28
http://www.tedtalks.com Bee Dance Language – the linguistics behind animal language. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pb1lRI-YePU
Language Varieties
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6EQdJy24JrQ Linguists on African American Language: John Baugh
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCd5W4gwJsI. WIKITONGUES: Caroline speaking Gullah and English
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XB4GxsKSz-s Linguists on African American Language: Arthur Spears
African American Vernacular English | Morgan Gill | TEDxYouth@RMSST. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNjhB1DW_-s
First Language Acquisition https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2XBIkHW954 The linguistic genius of babies | Patricia Kuhl
Contemporary Language Use
http://www.tedtalks.com https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQjoZmj1NlQ Linguistic Imperialism
Some of the OER resources that I am interested in using to teach Critical Thinking for ESL are:
1) a series of educational videos from Youtube called Crash Course in Media Literacy, a Complexly production, Youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD7N-1Mj-DU;
2) The transcripts from Crash Course in Media Literacy, from https://nerdfighteria.info/v/9iUjvNtgWAs/;
3) The article,
“How Intelligent Do You Have to Be to Raise a Child?” by Lisa Drexler, initially published in New York magazine, January 24, 2016
https://www.thecut.com/2016/01/how-intelligent-to-be-a-parent.html
4) Episode from NPR’s “The Hidden Brain,” June 1, 2020, “Justifying The Means: What It Means To Treat All Suffering Equally”
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/01/866768837/justifying-the-means-what-it-means-to-treat-all-suffering-equally
The use of all of these support open pedagogy as they are freely available media but also sufficiently scholarly. The series of Youtube videos on Media Literacy presents course concepts and lessons in a way that is accessible yet not overly “dumbed-down.” The first couple videos of the series of 10 gives a brief history of media, distinguishing it from “the media” and starting all the way with the invention of writing, and Socrates. While every content creator has its agenda, I find these videos to be sufficiently objective, and have created self-quizzes, reflective questions, and tasks to “apply” lessons from the videos. I can direct my students to the show’s transcripts at the other site for more English comprehension support.
To jump to the last one, (4) I was excited to hear this NPR podcast recently in which the host interviews the utilitarian philosopher Peter Singer. Singer’s ideas already appeared in the course textbook that I used to use, in the course unit on ethics and the moral compass. In this interview, Singer outlines a utilitarian argument for why the economic damage done by the drastic business shutdown in response to Covid19 may have, by putting so many people out of work and thus out of health insurance and in poverty, actually caused greater damage to the public health than the virus alone. With my ESL students, listening to this podcast for homework and then re-listening to a portion of it together would expose them to Singer’s ideas, expose them to academic English aloud, and I can create good student-centered tasks from the podcast.