Participation

The course applies a co-creation approach that relies on your active participation both in-class and online. 

1. Review the assigned materials and comment on how it relates to learning objectives and your personal experiences.
2. Bring in new content and persuade others on why it is relevant.
3. Critically evaluate content and comments so that we develop better shared understanding of the material.

Class participation

Class participation is mandatory and will affect your grade – you are expected to attend every class meeting.

If you think you have a legitimate reason for missing a class, please communicate it to the instructor in advance. Note that any assessment deadline will not be changed if you have a job interview or some other personal matter.

Grading class participation

Plan on making a substantive contribution to the class discussion during the term. Quality is more important than frequency. Quality means having the courage to form and express a reasoned opinion. It does not matter if you are right or wrong – it is the process of reasoning that is valuable.

Preparing for a class

Read the material prior to each class so you can respond to the following:

1. What are one or two key points you took away from each assigned reading?
2. What are one or two summary points you learned from the set of readings of the session?
3. If you were facilitating today’s discussion, what question would you ask your fellow classmates?

We will start each session with the above opening questions. I will ask for volunteers but I may also call on people at random.

To earn full credit for participation, you should be prepared to give thoughtful answers that reflect your own ideas as well as the assigned materials. An additional important aspect of class participation is completion of in-class assignments and contribution to break-out group activities.

Online participation

A key approach to facilitate learning is to co-create content with the instructor and actively engage on an equal footing with others. As part of this, you need to create at least 3 new posts and 6 comments in ‘Blog’ on this website.

Create 3 new posts relevant to the class:

• Write about a paragraph per post. The post should be readable in one ‘screen’.
• Apply class concepts, terms, and theories in your posts.
• Ask questions, propose new ideas, provide explanations and examples backed by analysis. Do not post stream of consciousness or simply recount and summarize news releases.
• Include a picture or some kind of visual if possible. It will grab the reader’s attention. To add an image, use ImageInject, start a new post and scroll down until you see the ImageInject box.
• Don’t post copyrighted material – however, it is acceptable to paraphrase the material and link to the original source.
• Use”Student blog” as the category for your posts so that they appear the ‘Blog’ section of this website.

Comment on 6 existing posts to provide thoughtful critique or added insights:

• Respond to a discussion question with your own analysis.
• Do not agree (or disagree) without providing a reason.
• Provide additional examples to illustrate your argument.
• Question the logic and analysis of the post.

Grading online participation

At the end of the term, the instructor will count and review every post and comment. About 1/4 of the grade is for meeting the quantity guidelines above. The remaining 3/4 grade is for the quality of participation. Quality is judged by the depth and insights of the posts and comments and the quality of the interaction your posts receive from other students.

Follow the schedule in your posting and comments. You must complete the online participation requirement to receive a grade for the course.

How to post and comment

To check your access:

1. Log in to MIS Community by clicking “Log In” at the top left corner and use your Temple AccessNet id and password.
2. At the top, you should see your name listed under Blog Authors. If you do not see your name, contact the instructor.

To create a new post:

1. Log in to MIS Community and navigate to the class site.
2. At the top, hover over “New” and click “Post”.
3. Type your post.
4. Use a descriptive title – this is important if you want to encourage people to read your post – think of a newspaper style headline.
5. Select the “Student blog” category on the right. Do not add new categories.
6. Select or create new tags. Categories are for the kind of post you are making – tags are for the actual content of your post. They are similar to keywords. The tags are displayed in the “tag cloud” – the more a tag is used the larger the word appears in the tag cloud. So it is useful if you pick existing tags.
7. Tags are critical – we are using a very unstructured medium – they provide a way for others to find your content.
8. When ready, click “Publish” on the right hand side.

To edit a post:

1. Log in to MIS Community.
2. Come back to the front end if you see the Dashboard by hovering over the name of the course at the top and then click Visit site.
3. Find the post you want, and click Edit next to your name.

To comment:

1. Log in to MIS Community.
2. Come back to the front end if you see the Dashboard by hovering over the name of the course at the top and then click Visit site.
3. Find the post you want to want to comment on, and click Leave a comment at the bottom of the post.