If you’ve noticed, I changed the name of the blog this week to the “YourSpace Project”. You probably get the famous web site that the name comes from, but I changed the name to better reflect the purpose of what this site is all about: additional content related to topics we’ve discussed in class, an online class repository of information, and a place for you to discuss and ask questions about various class topics. In the next week or so, I’m going to send the URL out to all my old classes and ask them for input. Now that I’ve got about two months worth of content under my belt now, it will be interesting to see what their perspectives are on all this now that they have actually completed most of these courses.
I cleaned up the links to the left, and added arrows so you can tell everything apart. The WordPress style I am using crams everything together, unfortunately, so I needed to invent something to make it more readable. Hopefully they will add some space between links or some sort of bulleting function in the future.
I’ve also added a link to the Threat Level blog run by Wired magazine. They cover online privacy and security issues, as well as politics and use (or perhaps abuse) of the Patriot Act. I know I say it a lot, and it probably sounds trite at this point, but I find these issues fascinating, and you try to become as well-informed about these subjects as you can. After all, you are just a number to your bank, and so is your bank balance. They have no way of knowing whether you really, truly have $10,000 in there or -$.10, and you need to be aware of what bad guys do online to protect yourselves.
I’m also hoping to get back to the “bad PowerPoint” subject we were discussing in the COM 110 class I taught last month. There are some more interesting avenues to explore there, and I hope they can help you as you develop your own presentations throughout your cohort program.
As we discussed in class the other night, there are some changes made to the homework this week. Please note the following:
The “PowerPoint Presentations” Excel case assignment on page 158 is no longer the homework required for Workshop 4.
The new homework due for Workshop 4 is the “Theme Park Admissions” practice exercise on p. 150. Please verify that you have completed all the steps before turning in the assignment, as there were two tables that we did not finish in class. Your completed assignment should have a column chart on one worksheet, a pie chart on another worksheet, and two stacked column charts on two more separate worksheets for a total of four worksheets within the spreadsheet.
If you wish, you may still complete the “PowerPoint Presentations” assignment and turn it in by the end of Workshop 5 for 100 points extra credit (an extra 10% of the final grade). Next week, I’ll have your grades printed off for you so that you can determine whether or not you want to do the extra credit.
If you have any other questions, feel free to ask me.
During my last course, I learned about this web site called SlideShare where you can post PowerPoint presentations that can be embedded in blogs and accessed online without needing to use PowerPoint. If you go to this link, you can see them there. I’ve also updated the postscript posts and embedded the presentations in there.
I just wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed teaching this class for the first time and that your enthusiasm for the material and in your participation was a big part of that. I know that most of you will be wrapping up your coursework this summer and fall, so I hope to see you walking through your graduation ceremonies later this year.
Best of luck to all of you in your future endeavors, whether within or outside of Indiana Wesleyan University. Please feel free to continue to visit this site for some of the links to academic resources if you wish, and do not hesitate to contact me if you need anything in the future. This has been a wonderful class, and thank you for being such good students.
I sincerely wanted to come up with an April Fool today, but I couldn’t think of a good one. I’ve already been caught a couple of times today, which I guess is very gullible of me.
Instead, I think I’ll pass along this funny story that I’ve heard a couple of times from Pastor Greg Laurie of Harvest Ministries:
I heard the story of a man who was down on his luck and desperate to find work. As doors kept closing to him, he got the idea of going to the city zoo to seek a job feeding the animals.
The manager at the zoo had no such openings, but seeing how big this guy was, he thought of something else. “Say, our gorilla died the other day, and he was one of our most popular attractions. If we got you a special gorilla suit, would you put it on and imitate him for a few days until our new gorilla arrives? The pay is great.”
When you need a job, you need a job. The man was so desperate for work, he agreed.
After a few hours, he really got into the part—beating his chest and shaking the bars. Huge crowds gathered to watch. Maybe this won’t be so bad after all, he told himself. Besides the good money, he could take naps in the sunshine and had all the bananas he could eat.
But that afternoon, as he was swinging on a trapeze as part of his gorilla act, he lost his grip. His momentum carried him over a tall chain-link fence into the middle of the lion’s den. The huge lion, seeing this intruder in his domain, gave a ferocious roar. The crowds were mesmerized.
Still trying to hide his identity, the gorilla-suited man backed slowly away, hoping to climb the fence and return to his own cage. The lion, however, had a hungry look and began stalking him step by step.
Finally, in desperation, the gorilla hollered, “Help!”
The lion immediately spoke in an annoyed whisper. “Shut up, stupid! You’ll get us both fired!”
Just a reminder, because our course is an elective, we may have to move around the building (as we found last week). The room we met in for the first two workshops is now occupied by a core group. Last week we met upstairs in room 200. Make sure before you go to class to check with the front desk to make sure you have the correct room assignment.
Tonight should be an interesting class with a lot of speaking and make-up speeches. There will be a lot of opportunities to try different techniques “on-the-fly” as we did last week. I’m looking forward to seeing the progression throughout the night.
Additionally, here is a question to think about before class: do you think it would be effective to be videotaped so that you can see your performance as demonstrated in the Speaking Effectively video? I know that it might seem incredibly embarassing and potentially vulnerable, but I think that there could also be a great opportunity to see yourself as your audience sees you. We won’t incorporate it into this class, but it’s a technique I would like to use in the future for course development.
Actually, there’s a redundancy in that title. RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication”, and whenever you’re on a web site and see that funky orange icon to the right, you know that web site syndicates its contents. Most often you will see these on blogs (blogs, short for weblogs, are online diaries… you’re reading one right now!).
However, with the explosion of the blogosphere (which is a fancy way of saying that people spend too much time at work reading and writing on blogs), I guess people got tired of having to waste time visiting 60 blogs during the day and only wanted to know when there was new content to view.
I was asked by the university to pass this information along. So, here you go:
Please remind your students: As of March 01, 2008 all students now have an IWU email account. This will be our primary means of communication with students. Please tell you students that it is crucial they check this account on a regular basis. Instructions can be found at http://myiwu.indwes.edu.
Instructors used to get your personal email account that you gave to the university when you registered. However, now all we get are your myemail.indwes.edu accounts. So, if you want to receive emails in the future from your instructors, you might want to book mark the MyIWU site and check your email daily.
Actually, there’s a redundancy in that title. RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication”, and whenever you’re on a web site and see that funky orange icon to the right, you know that web site syndicates its contents. Most often you will see these on blogs (blogs, short for weblogs, are online diaries… you’re reading one right now!).