Online Language Arts/Humanities Course -- A Proposal
Cory Allen Heidelberger
Montrose High School English Department
Wednesday, March 24, 2004

Objective: To offer students in Montrose High School and other participating schools two online semester language arts/humanities courses.

Rationale: Students at Montrose and other small area schools have relatively limited choices of elective courses, due in large part to the scheduling constraints inherent in small schools. Courses taught entirely over the Internet do not have regular class meetings. Students in online courses can access course materials at any time-during study hall, over the noon hour, even at home. Online courses thus require no scheduled slot during the school day. Given the option of online elective courses, students would have greater flexibility in filling their academic schedule with relevant, desired courses.

Curriculum: Both online courses will focus on developing college-bound students' skills in persuasive writing through critical reading, critical thinking, and logical discussion. Students will read, discuss, and write essays on a wide variety of primarily non-fiction texts. Each semester course will concentrate on texts within a particular field. Possible semester concentrations (with possible authors/topics) include the following:

Survey of Philosophy

  • Socrates, Plato, Aristotle

  • Augustine, Aquinas

  • Machiavelli

  • Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Jefferson

  • Nietzsche

  • Gandhi, ML King

Current Political Issues

  • current legislation under consideration by Congress and the South Dakota legislature

  • Constitutional issues in the context of major Supreme Court cases

  • political candidates and issues in national, state, and local elections

Survey of Economic Thought and Practice

  • Smith, Friedman, Schumpeter

  • Keynes, Sen, Daly

  • production and distribution of wealth

  • concepts of economic justice

Globalization

  • Thomas Friedman, Wendell Berry

  • NAFTA, WTO, multinational corporations

  • free trade versus protectionism

  • the United Nations and national sovereignty

  • environmental issues

Logistics

Texts: Students will work either from an anthology textbook or, more likely, a combination of photocopied and online articles compiled and provided by the instructor.

Discussion: Students will conduct one-on-one and group discussions at various times with the off-site instructor by e-mail and postings on a course website maintained by the instructor.

Assignments: Students will submit all written assignments by e-mail. The instructor will evaluate assignments and provide feedback by e-mail.

Student Evaluation: The instructor can evaluate students entirely on the quality of their discussion of the assigned texts and their essays. However, the instructor can also offer online quizzes through his own k12.sd.us website.

Grades: The instructor will post and the students, their parents, and their schools can access all grades on the DDN Campus Web Portal system currently in use.

Computer Access: Students will obtain all course information and submit all assignments, questions, and discussion over the Internet. Each student should have regular access to the school's computer network and an individual e-mail account.

Cost: The school(s) involved may need to order one or two sets of textbooks, but, as noted above, texts will more likely be provided in photocopied and online form, so the cost of materials will likely be no more than nominal photocopy costs. Salary can be calculated as the appropriate fraction of a full-time instructor's salary shared among participating schools.

 

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