Courses tagged with "HumanitiesandScience" (469)

Gender Through Comics: A Super MOOC is a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) coming Spring 2013 that examines how comic books can be used to explore questions of gender identity, stereotypes, and roles. This highly engaging learning experience is designed for college-age and lifelong learners. The course, led by Christina Blanch of Ball State University, uses a study of comic books incorporating highly interactive video lectures, online discussions between students, and real-time socially driven interviews. Interviews with the comic industry's biggest names such as Terry Moore, Brian K Vaughan, Mark Waid, as well as others address questions of gender representations and constructions involving both men and women. To purchase the required materials for this course, please visit the Comixology page for Gender and Comic Books. View a video teaser about Gender Through Comic Books

Effective communication skills are recognized as the number one skill desired by employers (Job Outlook, NACE, 2012). This course focuses on the basics of business writing, starting with the fundamentals and understanding your audience before transitioning to two common, but very important business documents: the cover letter and the resume. This course combines discussion boards and exercises, as well as peer review, to focus on core skills in a collaborative and dynamic environment.

Do you want to sound like a native Spanish speaker? Get started by improving your accent. This course provides a practical introduction to Spanish pronunciation for students at all levels. It is taught in English and designed to provide an auditory and visual approach to learning pronunciation. Students will listen to audio files recorded by native speakers and then record themselves pronouncing the same words or phrases. In addition to playing back both recordings to compare the auditory differences, students will have an opportunity to view and compare visual sound waves of both audio recordings. These techniques will help learners assess and improve their pronunciation. Although it will be necessary to some extent, discussion of theoretical issues will be kept to a minimum with the emphasis being on accent reduction.

Introduction to Openness in Education provides a broad overview of the ways in which openness impacts many areas of education

Digital Media One is a four-week online course designed for students who want to learn digital media. This may include artists, designers, or photographers who would like to build a Web site or Web portfolio to showcase their work, as well as students who would like to learn more about the curriculum of Peninsula College

This course is an exploration of visual art forms and their cultural connections for the student with little experience in the visual arts. The course includes a brief study of art history and in depth studies of the elements, media, and methods used in creative process and thought. This course will teach students to develop a five-step system for understanding visual art in all forms based on description, analysis, meaning, context, and judgement. The Open Course Library (OCL) is a project to create 81 openly-licensed high-enrollment general education college courses & lower textbook costs for students. The Art Appreciation course was developed by Christopher Gildow (Cascadia Community College), published originally with OCL, and is showcased here with his permission.

In this course, we will study the emergence of the major civilizations of the ancient world, beginning with the Paleolithic Era (about 2.5 million years ago) and finishing with the end of the Middle Ages in fifteenth century A.D. We will pay special attention to how societies evolved across this expanse of time

Algebra+ is a 10-week online course designed for students who have successfully completed high school algebra but who placed into pre-college level mathematics at their local college or university. This course is for refreshing their math skills with a review of pre-college level algebra. After successfully completing this course, the goal would be to retake your college

Writing History is a survey of historical thought, philosophy, and historiography. This course will survey the questions, methods, and debates historians have engaged in over the years and around the world. The course will also address best practices to researching and writing history.

This course familiarizes students with creating instructionally focused interactive media. The tool used in the class currently is Adobe Flash. Topics to be covered include fundamental programming concepts (variables, variable types, code re-use, commenting code, and basic control structures) in addition to the fundamentals of the flash environment (animation or

This course provides students with a theoretical and conceptual understanding of the field of game design, along with practical exposure to the process of creating a game. Topics covered include iteration, rapid prototyping, mechanics, dynamics, flow theory, the nature of fun, game balance, and user interface design. Primary focus is on non-digital games. The course instructor recommends purchase of one or more textbooks or other course materials. Please see the details below. * Challenges for Game Designers, by Brathwaite & Schreiber. [Required; estimated cost $16.50] This book covers a lot of basic information on both practical and theoretical game design. It will be referenced heavily throughout the course. * Tabletop: Analog Game Design, edited by Costikyan [Required; free as PDF download] This is a collection of essays on tabletop game design and analysis. * Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, by McCloud. [Recommended; estimated cost $12.50] While this book refers to comics, many of the lessons within it can be applied to game design and other forms of art. It also is written in a comic book format (which makes it fun to read). * A Theory of Fun for Game Design, by Koster. [Recommended; estimated cost $15.50] This book shows the similarities between game design and education. It also incorporated good discussions regarding the concept of Flow.

This course is designed to introduce students to the writing, reading, and thinking skills necessary for success at the college level. Upon completing this course, students will be able to: A. Compose essays demonstrating proficiency in developing and organizing ideas, using language effectively, and writing in standard edited English. B. Find, evaluate, and use sources appropriately. C. Demonstrate continued use and development of effective writing strategies in upper division courses. To achieve these outcomes, students will focus on writing as a recursive process that includes prewriting, drafting, editing, and revising. Emphasis will be placed on personal, reflective, and expository writing. Students will develop critical reading skills and use course readings to analyze specific writing techniques and strategies that can be used to improve their own writing. Students will also identify at least five personal grammatical, mechanical, and stylistic errors that recur in their work and find resources that assist them in resolving these problems. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License Written by Daryl Smith O'Hare Edited and designed by Susan C. Hines

This course examines the social, political, and economic development of the United States since the end of the Civil War. It traces the rise of an industrial and urban social order, the emergence of the U.S. as a world power, social and political reform movements, and recent transformations. Readings and written assignments focus not only on the major political events and economic developments of the period, but also the experiences of diverse groups, including women, African-Americans, immigrants, workers, and others.

The key learning objectives of this MOOC are: 1. Review, develop, and demonstrate their conceptual understanding and procedural skills with selected fundamental mathematical topics 2. Collaborate with peers to solve problems that arise in mathematics and other contexts 3. Create and use representations to organize, record, and communicate mathematical ideas 4. Reflect on the process of problem solving 5. Justify results using mathematical reasoning 6. Communicate mathematical thinking clearly to peers and to the instructor The learning objectives and course content align with on?campus versions of this type of course. We are building this MOOC around key concepts and skills in the nationally recognized Common Core State Standards for Mathematics, the ACT College Readiness Standards, and the SAT Skills Insight. Students successfully completing our MOOC will find their subject matter knowledge to be in alignment with the "typical" course offered by other U.S. colleges and universities. By using Common Core standards, ACT College Readiness Standards, and the SAT Skills Insight, we can also begin to develop post?test instruments that will assess the students' levels of proficiency

This course explores the concept of online reputation and its potential impact on participants

Build a personal life plan in a small group environment. Life Prep on Canvas Network is a course for self-discovery and goal setting. Progress through a series of short journaling exercises, engage in small group discussions, and get and provide feedback with peers as you build a personal life plan, revise your goals, and move toward your personal success. Plan on 2-3 hours of work per week and on being an active, supportive group member. Root your goals in your nature, beliefs, and values to move with clarity, purpose, and confidence.

Project-based lab course on advanced skills and strategies for integrating technology into the PreK-16 classroom. Optional credit offered.

In Marathon Training 101, 2011 IDEA Personal Trainer of the Year, exercise physiologist, and author of Running a Marathon For Dummies, Dr. Jason Karp, shows you how to take 26.2 miles' worth of steps to run a marathon, whether it's your first one or fastest one. This unique, four-week online course, which runs January 21 to February 18, includes videos, downloadable podcast workouts, "homework" training runs, and active discussions with other people just like you. It gives you everything you need to know to run a marathon, including: * The fundamentals of marathon training * The knowledge you need to select the right resources for your training * How to structure your very first 20-week marathon training plan * Shoe selection * Ten things you must do on marathon race day * Secrets of long runs * How to avoid injuries The course instructor recommends purchase of a textbook or other course materials. Please see the details below. Recommended materials: Running a Marathon For Dummies, by Jason Karp Where to purchase: www.runcoachjason.com/merchandise or Amazon.com Approximate cost: $18

MOOC MOOC is a massive open online course that seeks to investigate, disarm, dissect, reinvent, and get imaginative about massive open online courses. We'll be taking a look at what MOOCs are, where learning happens in (and not in) MOOCs, the idea that participants are pedagogues, how assessment happens in MOOCs, and why we're so interested in this latest educational strategy. MOOC MOOC takes place both inside and outside of Canvas, with Twitter chats, collaborative work in Google Docs, and more. Connectivist in nature, MOOC MOOC hopes to place learners alongside learners in an inspection of the nature of online learning.

This course will provide a generally non-technical introduction to learning analytics and how they are being deployed in various contexts in the education field. Additionally, the tools and methods, ethics and privacy, and systemic impact of analytics will be explored, presenting a broad overview of the current state and possible future directions of the field. Capturing and analyzing data has changed how decisions are made and resources are allocated in the fields of business, journalism, government, military, and intelligence. Through better use of data, leaders are able to plan and enact strategies with greater clarity and confidence. Data is a value point that drives increased organizational efficiency and a competitive advantage. Analytics provide new insight and actionable intelligence. Companies such as Microsoft, IBM, Google, and Amazon are investing heavily in technologies and techniques to help individuals and organizations make sense of and unlock the value within big data. In education, the use of data and analytics to improve learning is referred to as learning analytics. Software companies, researchers, educators, and university leaders are starting to recognize the value of data in improving not only teaching and learning, but the entire education industry. The growth of online learning and open online courses generates new sources of data for researchers and educators to better understand the learning experience.