Scraps of Consciousness: End of Unit 1

We have reached the end of Unit 1. I have posted my 'round-up' of the discussion in which I point out the three 'takeaway points' that I'd like you all to have gotten from the exercise. I won't repeat them, presumably you are here reading this because you've just been on the platform reading what I said there. (Actually, that's a good question. Do you check your Bloglines aggregator first or the platform? I always start with the discussion forum, myself. Reply in comments, please).

Here are some other things I'd like for you to bear in mind, in no particular order:

1. I expect specialized students students (in this case Gordon and Peter) to submit their short essays to me today (the last Friday of the unit), unless we have agreed a different date.
2. Please use the Assignment tool on the platform to submit your essays. You may send it to me by email attachment also if you feel nervous about whether or not it went through. But i assure you that the system works and I'd like you to use it.
3. Specialized students should recall that they are obliged to post a response to commenters at the beginning of the second week of discussion.
4. I have made this point before but it bears repeating: You have all subscribed to my blog, now you must do the same with your colleagues' blogs. This is important. If you do not aggregate your blogs you are missing a lot of discussion and, to put it plainly, you're probably not having as much fun as you might otherwise.

I thuoght that we had a very interesting free for all discussion in which a good deal of excellent points were made. I was frankly impressed, first, by Bill's very fine summation earlier this week and his incisive comments, second, by Jim's aggregation of the key areas of agreement, and third, by Owen's putting them in order. This is very much a strength of this mode of learning. I was enthusiastic about it before but I am tentatively more confident about how it will work in practice now. (See my post below about synthesis). There was a lot of self-synchronizing going on which really is how it is supposed to work.

That said, there are areas we need to work on. Perhaps the 'free for all' got a bit confusing to follow. Do not take this to mean I would like fewer interventions! More please! But if we are to make this more efficient we need to exercise a bit more discipline. I suggest:

1. When the 'presenters' make their first post they remember to 'Create Mesage'. Do not post it as a 'reply' to a previous message.
2. When commenters introduce sustantively new interpretation or evidence they take care to change the title of their post (ie., use 'reply' so it stays in the same thread but is distinguishable from the rest by the title). This way we can avoid having long chains of RE: XXXX. I found myself having to search through a lot of posts to find things I had recollected reading but couldn't remember exactly where.

A final thuoght. I spent the last two days attending a departmental event at Cumberland Lodge which is a large country house located in Windsor Great Park. I brought along my laptop in order to connect to the course. The connection, however, while wireless was not fast. It brought home to me the importance of broadband. For those of you using dial up I salute your patience and dedication. It works but it is slow. I appreciate your effort.

Do you have any ideas for improving how we work? I'm eager to hear them. Sound off in comments please.