LEM: Semester Project / Student Choices

Because I used my existing courses to do the Learning Environment Model design challenge for today, I decided to put the post here. Unlike the LEM challenge I did yesterday (see post), this time I did the drawing first and then wrote the narrative to accompany the drawing. The semester project has a lot of elements I cannot capture with the modeling tools, but I tried to surface the key aspect of the design challenge for today, which is the element of student choice. You can see that multi-stage choice process running down the middle of the diagram. See below for a narrative to explain that choice process.

LEM Semester Project Drawing

(or click on image for larger view)

Exploration/Planning. What I tried to show here is how there is a brainstorming process that happens in the first few weeks of the class in which students brainstorm and plan their semester writing project (downward arrow flow on the left of chart; this process can last for up to 4 weeks), and then they create the project through an iteration of writing stories and revising for the rest of the semester (11, 12, or 13 weeks, depending on how many weeks they spend on the planning process — the writing process is on the right side of the chart). 

Project Choice. Each student creates either a Storybook Website or a Blog Portfolio. The Storybook consists of a set of interrelated stories on a topic of the student's choice (see Storybook Archive for examples), while the Portfolio consists of a curated section of the student's class blog, containing their best stories. I started offering the Portfolio option a couple years ago when it became clear that there were always a few students who were not really enthusiastic about their Storybook project (for all kinds of reasons); the Portfolio is a way to create the same type of semester-long writing project with the flexibility of choosing new topics/styles every week. The challenge, then, is how to help students choose which type of project will be best for them! As a general rule, it has turned out that about half of the students choose Storybooks and half choose Portfolios.

Iterated Choice. As students go through the 2, 3, or 4 weeks of planning, they are pondering a big choice, which I show in the middle of the chart; there are three vectors as it were that they can follow as they go through this iterated process. Since the Storybook is an entirely new kind of idea for most students in the class, I ask them to spend some time in Week 1 and Week 2 exploring Storybook possibilities. Then, after they get feedback from me about the Storybook topics they have proposed (I focus on connecting them with useful online resources), they can decide if there is a topic that grabs them... or not. If they really don't have a topic that grabs them, they can start their Portfolio in Week 3. If they do have a topic that they are excited about, in Week 3 they start planning how the Storybook would actually work (stories to include, styles to use). They then get feedback from me again, and again they choose: if things are not falling into place, they can start their Portfolio in Week 4. If the Storybook plan is going well, then they build their Storybook website in Week 4.

Writing Project. By Week 5 of the semester, everybody is engaged in their writing project. The Storybook and the Portfolio have the same writing "experience" — writing, feedback from me, feedback from other students, revision, more writing, more feedback, more revision, and so on. The difference is just the content (semester-long topic in Storybook versus weekly topics in Portfolio) and the medium (Storybook is a separate website while the Portfolio is a labeled section of the student's class blog). Everybody ends up on their own schedule since they might start the writing part of the project in Week 3 or 4 or 5, and any give story might require one or two rounds of revision. By the end of the semester, a Portfolio might have as many as six stories in it; a Storybook might have as many as four stories plus an introduction — but it varies a lot; there is no fixed requirement about how many finished stories each student might write.

Themed Portfolios. One really nice surprise that happened as a result of the students exploring the Portfolio option was that they started creating something like a Storybook inside their Portfolio, pursuing a theme over several weeks or even over the whole semester. That was not something I suggested, but the students started doing that on their own... so now I also suggest that in my comments on their Portfolio stories! Unlike the advance Storybook planning, these Portfolio themes evolve in an ad hoc way as the students react to the stories they are reading for the class or as they discover through their own writing a style and/or character that they use to connect their Portfolio stories.

As you can see from all the elements in the drawing, there is a lot that goes into this process, and I'll return to this drawing with more narrative in future posts... which will probably help me improve the drawing too! But for now, I am really happy with how this version of the drawing surfaces the element of student choice and how there is an overall learning process that the students can share together while each going through their own discovery process to launch their own project.

Project Nominations: a special post for #Rhizo15

Today was a big day in my classes: the students turned in nominations for their favorite projects this semester, and I tallied up the results, putting the projects with the most nominations on a ballot for the students to look through and then vote on. It's kind of like the Academy Awards: it's really hard for students to choose just a few to nominate, and then, when the ballot is done, it's also very hard to choose from the ones on the ballot. I would call that a good kind of hard, though: too much wonderful stuff to choose from!

Here is the page listing the nominations in the two classes I teach, Myth-Folklore and Indian Epics: Favorite Projects of Spring 2015. For those of you who enjoy Pinterest, I've also created a Pinterest Board where I've pinned these projects: Pinterest Board of Favorite Projects. The Myth-Folklore class is the bigger of the two classes, and it also has a higher proportion of Storybooks to Portfolios; that's why there are 9 Storybooks listed for Myth-Folklore, instead of just 6 as for Indian Epics; I'll explain more about that below. Also, there are still two more weeks of the semester, which means that some new stories are still being added to the projects — some are done, but some still have one more story to go!

Here's a screenshot of the Pinterest Board. I like Pinterest because it gives me a way to represent something visually rather than just with a list of text links; same stuff, different representation:

I have two goals for event: the first is to let students who have worked really hard on their projects get some well-earned recognition from their peers, and the second is to create one last opportunity for students to see some really excellent projects. I was also thinking this nominations process might be a good way to introduce my fellow adventurers in #Rhizo15 to my classes, so I've included some information below about just what these projects are and why I am so proud of them!

Storybooks and Portfolios. In both classes, the students read traditional legends and epics, and they then retell those old stories in new ways. Each week, they tell a story in their blog based on the reading they did that week and, in addition, they work on a semester-long project. The Storybooks and Portfolios are those projects. Some students choose a specific topic to explore all semester long, collecting several related stories in a Storybook. Other students choose the best of their storytelling blog posts and collect them into a Portfolio section of their blog. All the students brainstorm Storybook topics at the beginning of the semester, but if they are not really excited about how the project is developing after a couple of weeks, they can opt for the Portfolio instead. It's totally up to the students, and both options offer great possibilities. In Myth-Folklore this semester, there were 32 Storybooks and 19 Portfolios, and in Indian Epics there were 20 Storybooks and 19 Portfolios. You'll see that there is a larger proportion of Portfolios in the Indian Epics class; this is because the content of that course is really new to most of the students, while in the Myth-Folklore class, students often have a very specific idea for a Storybook project right from the start of the semester based on their personal interests in mythology and/or folklore.

Websites and Blogs. As you can see if you browse around, the Storybooks are websites (almost all the students use Google Sites, although occasionally a student might use Wix or something other web publishing option), while the Portfolios are blogs (again, almost all the students use Google Blogger, although there are sometimes a few WordPress blogs). When students do blog-based Portfolios, they can comment on each other's work using the blog comment feature. For the websites, though, the students comment on a "Comment Wall" that each student creates at their blog. So, every student does have a blog, and all the commenting takes place using the blog comment space; the "Comment Wall" links on the nominations list are there so that students know where to leave comments for the Storybook author.

Connected Students. One of the biggest challenges I face is finding good ways to get the students connected. The classes are big enough (appx. 50 students in Myth-Folklore and appx. 40 students in Indian Epics) that the students don't all get to know each other. I am the only person who reads all the stories at all the projects; the students read each other's stories every week, but even so they don't get a chance to visit all the projects, much less read all the stories at each one. The way I build the class network is by having students comment on each other's work every week using a combination of random groups and student choice. Each week, I put students in random groups of three so the students comment in a kind of round-robin in their group, giving comments to two other students and getting comments from them in return. They also have a free choice each week, choosing a project to read either based on the title of the topic or because they have connected with another student in class in some other way (they are also reading each other's blogs each week in addition to the project comments). Once the projects really get going, there are also extra credit options for students who want to read more projects; some students are really enthusiastic and curious about exploring the other students' work, which I think is great — the more the students can connect, the better!

Favorite Projects. That leads me to the big event of today: students nominating their favorite projects. As I mentioned above, one of my goals for this process is to give students a chance to see some excellent projects that they might not even have seen so far this semester! I'm always so curious to see which projects are popular favorites. Sometimes my own personal favorites get lots of nominations, but not always: everybody has their own likes and dislikes, and I think it's really important for students to get feedback from lots of readers, not just from me. One thing that makes me really happy is when I see students who were very hesitant writers get this recognition from their fellow students. Many of the students start off the semester unsure about writing creatively and hesitant to share their writing with others. When they find their voice and win over an audience, I am really excited for them!

You can probably see now why I feel so at home here in #Rhizo15: I believe very strongly that learning happens best by discovery (including self-discovery) and by sharing what we discover with others. I really want for my classes to be open-ended adventures in learning that are propelled by the learners themselves, and I've written elsewhere about why student-generated content is the most important content in my classes.

Meanwhile, if you have a few minutes to take a look at this semester's projects, I think you will be really impressed: just like every semester, I am so proud of what the students have accomplished this semester, and it's all a result of working together and sharing stories all semester long. Every semester is like this: so much goodness, thanks to the creativity and persistence of these wonderful students... Enjoy!

Storybook Schedule and the Free Passes

In last weekend's post, I promised something about Storybook scheduling and free passes, so here it is! I probably need to break this up into separate posts, but this will do for now. The Storybook is really the heart of my classes, so please forgive the long post. You can find related posts also with the Storybook label. Starting in Fall 2014, there is an alternative semester-long project, the Portfolio.


BRIEF DESCRIPTION. A completed Storybook website has a coverpage, introduction, and four stories — but it is also entirely possible to have a nice little Storybook with three or even just two stories. The Storybook schedule is flexible enough to accommodate these possibilities, and it also includes two "free passes" for students to choose when they need them. There is an archive of Storybooks for both classes, and the schedule I will be discussing in detail below is here: Storybook Schedule.


DETAILS. This is really nitty-gritty detail that pertains to this specific way of approaching a semester-long project. What I'm describing here is probably not directly transferrable to anybody else's classes, but the general principles involved — starting early in the semester, weekly additions to the project, and flexible scheduling — are general principles that can be applied to very different types of projects. Here's the Storybook Schedule page for the students, and I've commented on the weekly assignments below:

Week 1. Storybook Favorites. Students browse the archives of past projects and start to think about something they might want to do as their class project. Seeing what other students have done is so much more effective — and inspiring — than just reading instructions from me! It also gives them a sense of how important the Storybooks are not just now, but in the future. Next semester, after all, future students could be looking at the Storybooks they will now write and choosing them as favorites.

Week 2. Brainstorm Topics: Myth-Folklore - Indian Epics. This is a really fun assignment for me to read and reply to because it gives me a sense of just what the students are really interested in! One of my favorite parts of the whole semester, in fact, is reading and replying to this assignment, giving students lots (and lots and lots) of suggestions about online resources to use for the topics they are considering.

Week 3. Brainstorm Storytelling Styles. For this assignment, students choose their topic and start thinking about possible storytelling styles. While I written up some information about the wide range of possible styles, the most valuable resource here is the archive of past Storybooks, where students can see how different students have developed different storytelling styles in the past.

Week 4. Storybook Introduction. This is also the first piece of writing that students do for the class which will be revised; they receive detailed comments back from me to use in revising for Week 5. For some students, that comes as a real surprise; it is often the case that they have never, literally never, revised a piece of writing for a class since Freshman Comp.

Week 5. Revise and Publish Introduction. This is a really exciting week because the Storybook websites really start to take shape, having both a coverpage and a separate page for the Introduction.

Weeks 6-8-10-12. New Story. After the Introduction is published (and students get comments back from me on the revised version in order to do more revision if needed), it's time for the first story in Week 6, with new stories in alternating weeks: write-revise-write-revise, etc. If a student stays on the regular schedule, they turn in new stories during Weeks 6, 8, 10, and 12.

Weeks 7-9-11-13. Revisions. I've written another post about the revising process and the importance of feedback and revision in the overall flow of the class: Writing - Feedback - Revision. The feedback and revision process is an essential part of the Storybook projects, and the same weekly cycle is also how the Portfolio project works, too: write-revise-(revise)-write-revise-(revise)-and so on.

As you can see, the Storybook project is over in Week 13, two weeks before the end of the semester: students on the regular schedule add their last story in Week 12 and revise it in Week 13. There are no Storybook assignments for Weeks 14 and 15, and that's where the flexible schedule and the free passes come in!

Free Passes and Alternate Schedules. For students who complete the Storybook on schedule, there is no Storybook work in Week 14 or Week 15. I call those "free passes" because they get credit for a Storybook assignment in those weeks, although there is nothing they need to turn in. Those two weeks off are compensation for the fact that the Storybook is extra work compared to the Portfolio since the Portfolio contains stories that come from the weekly storytelling blog posts, while the Storybook stories are written in addition to the weekly blog post assignments.

Instead of staying on track and taking Weeks 14-15 off, though, most students end up going on an alternate schedule, missing a week or two (or more) earlier in the semester. The first two times that they miss turning in a Storybook assignment, the free pass covers the gap in points, and the schedule just moves up to adapt. That sounds kind of confusing, but in practice it's very simple. If a student doesn't get their Introduction turned in during Week 4, they turn it in during Week 5 and remain on the "one-week-off" schedule. Similarly, if a student stays on schedule up until Week 10 when the third story is due, but they don't get the third story turned in that week, they turn it in during Week 11 and remain on the "one-week-off" schedule. If you look at that schedule - One-Week-Off Schedule - you will see that there is no free pass anymore in Week 14, because the student has used those points to cover an earlier missing week.
If they are on the Two-Week-Off Schedule, that means they have used both free passes, and they have Storybook assignments still due in Week 14 and in Week 15.

The way I accommodate the flexible scheduling and free passes in the Desire2Learn Gradebook is by creating a Gradebook item called "Free Passes" and by using a text item which reminds students of what they have due that week for their project. Here's a screenshot of what that text item looks like at the end of Week 10:

As you can see, most students actually end up on an alternate schedule (one or two or more weeks off the regular schedule) by the time the semester reaches the end. And that's great: the whole idea of the flexible schedule is that it is something students really need to accommodate their complicated lives! The Portfolio also has a flexible schedule, but it does not have the free passes. Instead, students can use extra credit to make up for any missing Portfolio assignments.


HISTORY. The flexible Storybook schedule is something I have had in place since the first year or so that I started teaching online. I noticed that sometimes students got confused about just what they had due, so starting in about 2010 or so, I began using the text field in the D2L Gradebook to give students a reminder about what schedule they are on. The free passes are something new for Fall 2014, which is also the first semester that there was a Portfolio option; the free passes are my way of compensating students for the extra work involved in the Storybook compared to the Portfolio. I always had what were essentially "freebie" Storybook assignments in Weeks 14 and 15, just revising the Introduction and then doing a final revision check. Now, though, it is so much more useful to really acknowledge them as freebies and let students take advantage of that when they really need them, rather than just getting a break at the end of the semester. So, I've folded those final revisions into the process of adding the last story, and now the students have the free passes for whenever they need them during the semester.


GOALS. My overarching goal is for the students who choose the Storybook option to end up with a project that they are proud of. The flexible schedule is designed to keep the students always moving forward so that in any given week they can make progress on their project without worrying about a lack of progress in the previous week(s).


GENERAL THOUGHTS

Overall, I am extremely happy with how the Storybooks are working. Adding in the Portfolio option was clearly a good choice, both for students who are looking for a semester project that requires less time than a Storybook project and also for those students who, for whatever reasons, are not ready to commit to a Storybook project topic by the time Week 4 of the semester rolls around. Because of the success of the Portfolios this semester, I am hoping that more students will choose the Portfolio option in the future. Exactly because it is different from the Storybook project, it offers the students some really good opportunities.

Even with the Portfolio option in place, I am seeing some students this semester whose Storybooks have gotten stalled out. It's not a widespread problem, but I think those few students might have been happier with the Portfolio option and would have ended up with something more satisfying than what they have with the stalled Storybook. One student switched over to the Portfolio even after she already had her Storybook up with one story in it (an excellent story... but her topic was indeed a lot of work!), and she ended up with a wonderful Portfolio. So, that was something I did not anticipate but was really glad to see, and I would like to promote that option in the future, especially for students who feel stuck with their Storybooks.

So, one thing I am thinking about doing next semester is to build in the Portfolio option as a choice right from the very start, so that students who want to commit to the Portfolio already in Week 3 or 4 can do so. If they do not find a Storybook topic that really interests them, the Portfolio should be an option they can choose already in Week 3. Another thing I need to do is improve my communication with people who are falling behind on their Storybooks. In the past, when the Storybook was the only option, it made sense to let people fall behind provided that they ended up with at least two stories in their project by the end of the semester. I did not really have an alternative to offer, after all! Now, though, the students who get four or five weeks behind on their Storybooks are not doing themselves a favor. They probably should switch over to the Portfolio so that they can still come up with a good writing project for the class, as opposed to the real risk of not ending up with even two stories in their Storybook. So, I am going to focus on the two free passes next time, and when people fall more than two weeks behind on the Storybook (the two weeks covered by the free passes), I will urge them to consider the Portfolio. I won't require the switch... but I'm guessing it would help the students to see the Portfolio as an option if they are feeling stuck with their Storybook.

One fun thing from this semester has been pinning new stories from the Storybooks to a special Pinterest Board for each class: Indian Epics and Myth-Folklore, so here is a screenshot of the current Indian Epics Board below. I like being able to keep track of the individual stories by pinning them this way, in addition to the class Storybook lists.

The Portfolio Option

One of the biggest new experiments for me this semester is the Portfolio as an alternative to the Storybook, and now that Week 5 is over, I can report on how that is going since Week 5 is when the students made their choice!

Update: Week 10. I continue to be really pleased with how this option is working! One student decided to switch from her Storybook to the Portfolio option because she was so pressed for time, and that ended up being okay too. I was a little worried about how that would work since she was switching in Week 7, but she had so many good storytelling posts to choose from by that point in the semester that it has gone really well!


BRIEF DESCRIPTION. Each student completes a semester-long writing project, choosing to do either a Storybook (writing on a single topic) or a Portfolio (collecting their best weekly blog posts). You can see the schedule of assignments for both projects, along with information I provide to students about choosing between the Storybook or Portfolio.


DETAILS.

I have always required that the students do a semester-long writing project with a fully developed writing process: brainstorming, research, writing, revising... and revising some more. LOTS of revising. Since I started teaching these courses back in 2002, that project has taken the form of a Storybook, in which students choose a topic and come up with a storytelling plan that suits their topic. You can see an archive of past projects to see the results: Myth-Folklore and Indian Epics.

Starting in Fall 2014, I am offering an alternative project: instead of a Storybook, students can instead choose to compile a Portfolio of stories chosen from their weekly storytelling blog posts. This is similar to the Storybook in that it is based on writing and revising, but the stories are not connected to one another. Instead, they respond to the weekly readings in the class, using whatever style the student happened to have chosen that week for their storytelling experiment. So, just as for the Storybook stories, students will be turning in a new story to me every other week, and I will give them detailed comments back; they then revise the story, I read it again... and the it is time to add a new story to the Portfolio. At the end of the semester, the students will have a set of four or five stories labeled as "Portfolio" in their blog, accessible via the label link. To see how this is going to work, here is one student's Portfolio for Fall 2014 (one story so far).

So, as the semester begins, all the students explore past Storybooks and go through the brainstorming process for a Storybook, which culminates in writing an Introduction in Week 4. Then, they decide which way to go: carry on with the Storybook or opt for the Portfolio instead. The Storybook brainstorming is productive for its own sake, and it is also very helpful in preparing students for the kinds of writing they are doing in their Portfolio also, so in no sense is the time spent on early Storybook work lost time at all. In fact, one of the first Portfolio-related assignments I ask people to complete is to look at existing Storybooks to brainstorm about all the possible styles they might want to explore in their Portfolio over the course of the semester: Portfolio Brainstorm.

I'll surely have more to say about the Portfolio project as the semester goes on, but my verdict after the first week of Portfolio assignments is that it was a big success. I read and replied to all the Portfolio stories, and next week those will be coming back in as revisions, while students will also be getting feedback from other students this weekend, just as for the Storybooks. I'm really excited about that! In the old system, the students who were struggling and/or behind on the Storybook did not get any feedback from other students until their Storybook was actually online and ready to read. Sometimes that meant they were out of the student feedback loop until Week 6 or even Week 7. Now, with the Portfolio, they are going to be part of the give-and-get of student feedback this weekend, along with everybody else.

I'm so happy how this has gone so far, and I'll report back again later in the semester!


HISTORY.

I had been troubled by the fact that every semester 1 or 2 students abandoned their Storybook projects before the end of the semester. It was never more than 1 or 2, but it was a persistent problem. Not every semester, but almost every semester, at least 1 or 2 Storybooks never got finished, and I felt badly about that, since the experience was surely not very satisfying for the student. It also made me wonder, of course, just how many Storybooks students were finishing because they "had to" and not really because they wanted to.

So, this had been simmering on the back burner, but it was never really a big enough problem that I devoted a lot of thought to it specifically; I had other, bigger problems to work on, ha ha. But then, one day last spring, I had a BRAINWAVE. I can date it specifically to March 29 as I learn from this old Google+ post. It was kind of eerie to read that post now and realize that the idea was kind of a "birth of Athena" thing, because what I ended up doing is almost exactly what I figured out in that moment of revelation back in March. Freaky!

And here's how it turned out this Fall! In the Myth-Folklore class, the first time this option was offered, 7 students chose the Portfolio out of 48 students total. In the Indian Epics class, 7 students chose the Portfolio out of 32 students total. I really did not know what to expect, but I knew there would be more takers in Indian Epics because the reading load in that class is more demanding than in Myth-Folklore, so the students are pressed for time, and it's also the case that finding a topic for Indian Epics is more challenging, especially when Indian culture may be something completely new to the students, as it often is. So, that means 14 students out of 80 overall chose the Portfolio. I will try to remember to update this post every semester so that I can keep track of this over time!


GOALS. Since the semester-long projects are really the heart-and-soul of my classes, it's hard to list just a few goals; I have so many goals here. So, please look at the goals that I have listed for the Storybooks: TEACHING WRITERS. All those goals hold true for the Portfolios too, and I've reproduced that "teaching writers" graphic below.

As a special subset of goals, here is what I hope to achieve by offering the Portfolio specifically as an ALTERNATIVE to the Storybook:

• Choice. Give students a wider range of semester-long project options.
• Time Management. Help students who are facing serious demands on their time.
• Blogging. Provide students the chance to develop a "curated" section of their blog, featuring their best posts.

GENERAL THOUGHTS

I am glad that there are enough Portfolios in both classes that it is not going to be seen as stigmatizing in any way, although I am still worried about that. I am hoping to gather some testimonials from the students at the end of this semester about whether they are glad or not about having chosen the Portfolio. I think their testimonies could be very useful in helping students decide to opt for the Portfolio. I really think BOTH options are excellent, and I am delighted by both writing projects. If all goes well, the students doing Portfolios will have a good experience with that, and I can find a way to share that positive evaluation with next semester's students so that people will see that the Portfolio is a great option, one that every student might want to consider!

In particular, I was glad to see that some students who are strong writers DID choose the Portfolio option. I suspect they did so because they are feeling overwhelmed by their many obligations, so it just makes sense for them to choose the option that lets them build on the existing stories in their blog, rather than writing additional stories. So, as students read the Storybooks and the Portfolios, they will see strong writing in both types of projects, along with less strong writing, since in every class there is an incredibly wide range of writerly experience, writerly interest, etc. Luckily, though, it is not going to be the case that students will be associating the stronger writing with the Storybooks. There is a range of writing to be found in both types of projects and, of course, with the revising, both the Storybook stories and the Portfolio stories will get better and better, week by week, all semester long!

(thanks to Larry Ferlazzo for the graphic)