For this course, I’m asking you to keep a journal of your reflections on what you hear in each class. Generally,I’ll suggest a prompt at the end of each class for you to consider. I have no required length, but expect that a couple of pages is a reasonable goal.
Even though you’ll be exposed to a lot of content during this course, the purpose of the journal is more about the personal relevance of what you hear than a demonstration of mastery of content. Because it’s ungraded, you will only get out of it what you put into it.
This website has a section for you to post your journal entries. You may choose not to do so and instead email me your entries. That’s fine. If you’re posting entries on the site, you may wish to write them first in a document before posting, just to give you the chance to refine your thoughts. In fact, writing your journal entries in a single document and then pasting individual entries into the site will enable you to keep your entire journal in one place.
A lot of academic work is based on the idea of solo performance. That’s the easiest way for an instructor to assess an individual’s mastery of material. But this course is different. You should feel free to work together and, for posted journal entries, comment on each other’s work in a helpful fashion. After all, a key premise of this entire course is that all work of any impact happens when we work together.