This week in LIS 201

Week 14: SECOND MIDTERM EXAM

EXAM ON TUESDAY, DECEMBER 02

READINGS BEFORE DISCUSSION

• None.  (Not yet, anyway.)

HOMEWORK BEFORE DISCUSSION

• Begin work on your multimedia book review.

DISCUSSION MEETING

• Continue to screen the remainder of the slideshow presentations and discuss them.
• Discuss strategies for multimedia book review project.
• Graded paper #2 handed back to students.

ONLINE OVER THE WEEKEND

For your last online activity, you will reflect on your own online experience in this course.

• The "hybrid" or "blended" course approach of LIS 201 -- combining in-person lecture, in-person discussion section, and online activity and writing -- is an increasingly popular mode of educational delivery in higher education. Do a web search and see if you can find a few other examples of hybrid/blended courses, either at UW-Madison or at other universities. How do these examples differ from our approach in LIS 201?
• Think about your own experience with this course. For example: Did the online portions connect with the in-person portions? Did you feel that you were a more effective student in the physical world or the virtual world? Were you able to learn more about your fellow students from online or offline (face-to-face) interactions? Do you feel more comfortable now with online resources like blogs and wikis than you did before taking this course? Should UW instructors increase their use of online components in courses, or should we proceed with greater caution?
• Finally, think about the substantive material from the lectures and readings on the information society that you've worked with all semester long. Did the course lectures and readings bring a better perspective to your own online experiences, both in this course and in your personal life? Or another way of thinking about it: would online course components work differently in a course that wasn't all about the online world of information?
• Write up your findings and your reactions on your discussion section weblog. Be honest, it's OK.
• Comment on at least one other student's posting.
• You must finish this online activity before next week's lecture.