Building Connected Courses: Feed WordPress 101. This is the first in a series of posts meant as a guide for almost anyone to create a WordPress site that operates as a networked hub for content created elsewhere. This is the engine, the Jim Groom Syndication Bus that drives ds106, the Open Digital Storytelling course/community/space.
It is intended primarily for Connected Courses, which is intended to be offered in October-November 2014 as an open course in how to create open courses. I have built several of these sites in the last few years, after learning how it works with ds106, such as ETMOOC (Educational Technology MOOC), Project Community (The Hague University of Applied Science), Harvard Future of Learning Institute, rmooc (Thompson Rivers University), and most recently Thought Vectors in Concept Space (UNIV 200 at VCU). All of these sites are different, themes, pupose, kinds of syndicated content, but they are all are powered by WordPress and the Feed WordPress plugin.
Connected Courses site Are you ready to be syndicating? PBL-Online.org. Project-Based Learning: Success Start to Finish. Guided Discovery Problems. Developed by Ann Bykerk-Kauffman . Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences, California State University, Chico What are Guided Discovery Problems? Deep down inside, why are you a scientist? I'll bet you will answer, "Because it's fun!
" Through intriguing puzzles to solve, structured hands-on activities, carefully worded leading questions, crucial hints, and just-in-time presentations of information, guided discovery problems escort students step-by-step through the discovery process, giving them a tantalizing taste of the most delicious part of science. See an in-depth explanation of Guided Discovery Problems. Why Use Guided Discovery Problems? Guided discovery problems can be fun, which, all by itself, may be a good enough reason to use them.
As stated by the National Research Council (2000, Inquiry and the National Science Education Standards: A Guide for Teaching and Learning (more info) , p. 116-120): Understanding science is more than knowing facts. Resources. How to Create Context-Rich Problems. Creating a context-rich problem is more than just adding realistic elements to a traditional problem. The design of a context-rich problem helps students to develop an expert-like approach to problem solving. Careful selection of a learning goal, a context and appropriate complexity characteristics will facilitate this process. Decide on the goals of the problem Context-rich problems help students to apply discipline specific knowledge thus moving beyond novice skills of memorization.
Decide on an outcome you want students to accomplish rather than the content you want students to learn. You may want to start with a traditional problem you have used before (or one from a textbook) and build that problem into a context-rich problem by adding context and varying the degree of difficulty. Provide a context for the problem The context gives the students a reason to want to solve the problem. You are . . . Determine the level of difficulty or complexity.
Experiential Learning Center at De Anza College. Community college students come to class with varied background and skills, and so continuous assessment becomes particularly important for any instructor. In Scenario-Based Learning, students have many informal opportunities to compare their skills with peers as they solve complex problems, but there is little opportunity to record these lessons learned in more traditional, formal ways.
Some may say, "So what? Why is formal testing important? As long as the students are engaged, I'm satisfied! " Assessment is the process of documenting that learning has occurred. A primary goal of the Scenario-Based Learning project is transparency around assessment.