GOAL:
Provide awesome service to course leaders & learners for the January SoW semester
REVIEW COUR
COURSE ANNOUNCEMENT
In case you haven’t noticed, sign-ups for School of Webcraft and P2PU courses <http://p2pu.org/course/list> have officially opened!
We have a lot of great courses this cycle, so if you'd like to learn more about subjects including PHP, JavaScript, Ruby on Rails, Usability - then head on over to the School of Webcraft<http://p2pu.org/webcraft> at p2pu.org<http://p2pu.org> and check out the open courses list <http://p2pu.org/webcraft/course/list> .
There are also great courses available which don't have a focus on web development - If you're interested, please check out all the other P2PU courses
How do I sign up?
It’s pretty simple: there’s a big APPLY button next to each course listed. Click on it once you find the course you’re interested in, and follow the application instructions.
Each course is different and have defined sign-up tasks to measure your motivation and check on any required skills you need for participation. You may only be considered for your course once you complete the sign-up task, so read the instructions well before you submit.
Just because you can become a “member” of the course, does not mean you are a part of the course yet; you must go through the official application process and your course application must be approved by the course organizer. You will be notified if you are accepted or if the course is too full and you are unable to participate fully. If you are not able to participate you will still have access to all course materials.
Courses begin following the 26th of January (a Wednesday), and sign-ups will close sometime before then, depending on the course.
Happy course shopping until then!
Modifications to Course Creation Process
Interested people can no longer submit proposals through the google doc. they're now directed to the http://p2pu.org/create-draft-course-panel page
Google form now updated (with minimal text) - https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dEdtSFFDeUM3MzBVTzhBd2E4anRwU0E6MQ#gid=0 << Any feedback on better wording for this would be appreciated.
MATT TODO: I can't update the Drumbeat copy of the FAQ can you make sure that all references to proposing a course are changed from the Google Spreadsheet and refer to http://p2pu.org/create-draft-course-panel
HOW?
0) Communicate the change in registration date
1) Finalize the School of Webcraft January course list - waiting
2) Help course leaders get ready for Jan 26 - orientation, matt's also making a blog post based on the email i sent course proposers. (the point of the orientation is to mirror participants experience with p2pu, helps organizers understand the platform and p2p culture)
3) Make the registration process easy for learners - any specific info should i include in the announcement email / blog post?
4) Update the School of Webcraft landing page http://p2pu.org/webcraft/
5) Guarantee a smooth first week of classes - part of the orientation, how to administer courses, build community
DETAIL:
0) Communicate the change in registration date
- Many learners are unclear / don't know that registration has been pushed back to Wednesday
- We're getting questions about it on Twitter / mailing list
- How confident are we that we'll be ready by start of day Wed? MEGA CONFIDENT!
1) Finalize the School of Webcraft January course list
- OBJECTIVE: Have course list finalized by Monday, Jan 10
- STATUS? Most proposed courses are now on P2PU. A few webcraft courses will not open by the 12th because its organizer is not fully prepared. This is ok! There is a large list ready to go!
- 19 SoW courses are currently listed here: http://p2pu.org/webcraft/
- There may be more. Some p2pu courses may not yet have been tagged "webcraft" - find them under course list : p2pu.org/courses
- TASK: Reach out to webcraft community and make sure all draft couses have been created on p2pu.org ?
- ASSIGNED TO: PIPPA - reached out waiting on response
- TASK: Someone with P2PU admin access needs to tag.
- ASSIGNED TO: PIPPA - all related courses are tagged already
2) Help course leaders get ready for Jan 26
Craft email / blog post for SoW course organizersASSIGNED TO: PIPPA for first draft. MATT to help edit / polish.
Let's craft an email and blog post that provides clear step-by-step instructions on what course leaders need to do next. Outline below. Better email with links sent.- Email copy below
- Pippa: can you add as blog post as well? So that it appears on Planet Drumbeat & Planet Webcraft?
- Make sure Course Leaders know to be selective in terms of letting applicants in. ?: http://p2pu.org/general/node/11464/forums
- What should SoW course leaders do next?
- a) Sign up for a Course Design Orientation session
- http://p2pu.org/general/course-design-orientation
- QUESTIONS
- This page asks four questions at the bottom. Where / how do course leaders provide the answers?
- Answer: You answer the questions as part of "signing-up" for the orientation. I've added some text in the sign-up task field on the course home page.
- If I was a course leader, I'd find the current process of signing up for a Course Design Orientation session a bit confusing. Does "signing up for a session" just involve adding my name to the "When is Good" form? Does someone get back to me? How do they know how to contact me?
- Just wondering -> Alison Cole manages this for other P2PU courses. Could ask her to provide instruction / guidelines - and fwd to webcraft community.
- As far as I can tell - no one has had issues signing up for the orientation. I haven't received requests via non-intuitive/incorrect pathways. Everyone seems to flow in nicely and simultaneously idicate their availability on whenisgood.net.
- b) Check out the Course Design Handbook
- c) Establish a "sign-up task" for your course
- This will be used to help you asses whether applicants are a good fit for your course
- Documentation on how to set up a good sign-up task is included in the Course Design Handbook.
- QUESTION:
- Do we have examples of good previous SoW sign-up tasks we can point to?
- I would look at some of the current courses () and as always, any course John Britton has run. He has magical course design powers.
- d) [What else?]
- What else can course leaders be thinking about to get ready?
- Over-relying on TokBox video chat seemed to be a major source of problems last semester. How can we avoid that this time around?
- Design for graceful fall-back on text only chat (IRC client is part of every course by default)
- there's plenty of info int he handbook that discourages video conferencing for groups 6+. forums and chat are the big ones we're pushing
- furthermore, organizers are asked to have experience using their chosen tools and must be aware of their capacity AND must provide instructions on how to use the tool to participants AND run a test session with participants when the course begins
- e) Get ready for blast off!
- Your course will begin the week of Jan 26
3) Make the course application & registration process clearer and easier for learners
- Craft an email / blog post with clear step-by-step instructions on what happens next:
- When will registration open?
- Wed, Jan 12
- QUESTIONS
- Is this a 100% firm date?
- Have we clearly communicated the change of date to the mailing list?
- Can someone write a blog post about the change in registration date?
- Need to clearly communicate to potential learners:
- 1) What courses are available
- 2) When they start and when they meet
- 3)
What the sign-up task is - 4) Make it easy for them to ask questions of the course organizer before applying.
- 5) You'll hear back on whether you've been accepted into the course by: [date?]
4) Update the School of Webcraft landing page http://p2pu.org/webcraft/
e.g., Remove "propose a course" button. [pippa-task for p2pu-dev]Update text. Pippa's implemented date changesSwtich from emphasis on proposing courses to applying for courses done, maintained that you can still propose a course"Take a course" date is incorrect per recent discussion (should be 12 Jan) done
Add a nice image if possible. [Matt to email to Pippa for inclusion with text]!Question: Why not leave propose a course button? People will come to the site, and see that courses are currently running (unable to sign-up). Letting them suggest other courses would be useful.changed course suggestion link from google form to P2PU site. This manner of proposing courses has not been very easy to work with.
5) Guarantee a smooth first week of classes
To be included in the SoW Orientation session - next two fridays
- What did we learn from user feedback last semester?
- Try to avoid TokBox unless absolutely necessary (video chat)
- Make it easier for people who come into courses late or miss something to catch up later
- Clarify expectations - State your own expectations and approach (telling learners what they can expect from this course) and ask all participants to articulate their expectations and goals.
- Short into - tell us about yourself.
- What do you expect to learn in this course?
- What do you expect to share with others in this course?
Email Copy: Email to course leaders
Thanks for organising a course with Peer 2 Peer University (P2PU.org), the free, online learning community partnering with Mozilla to create the School of Webcraft. We're really excited to be able to present your course as part of our January round of free, participatory learning about open and standards-based web development.
Before we can remove your course from draft status to open your course to applications from learners, we need to make sure that you and your course are prepared.
What Should You Do Next?
A) Join the Course Design Orientation
Participating in the Course Design Orientation is a great way to find out more about facilitating peer-learning and to ask questions of past and present course organisers. Run by Peer 2 Peer University, this orientation provides general guidance about designing and managing learning groups.
Sign Up for the Course Design Orientation on P2PU.
B) Start refining your Course Design
As a general guide for organising P2PU courses, please read the Course Design Handbook. You should pay particular attention to the Course Checklist which provides an overview of the minimum information required to run your course.
For further examples of Webcraft courses, "For the Love of $" organised by Dan Diebolt is a well-prepared course design. His sign-up task is well-defined and he has prepared clear information about the proposed weekly topics, tasks and readings. The course also refers to openly licensed materials where available.
Priority One: Define a Sign Up Task
Sign up tasks help you determine which applicants have suitable prerequisite knowledge, motivation and an understanding of how the collaborative nature of peer learning works. All of these qualities are important for a positive peer learning experience.
To inform people about the peer-learning process and the P2PU project we recommend that you ask them to watch this video about P2PU and ask them to respond. For example, you can suggest that they define a personal learning goal and how they want to help their peer learners.
The technical tasks that you set need going to be relevant to the topic and prerequisites of your course. For specific advice on what type of tasks to set we suggest that you ask the School of Webcraft community via the p2pu-webcraft discussion list.
Priority Two: Map out the weekly topics
Creating a weekly course plan in advance is informative for both you and the course participants. Over the next two weeks you can refine the plan and add more detail, but at this stage it is helpful to define what topics will be the focus of each week's activity.
As P2PU and School of Webcraft operate in a peer-learning manner, you should ask for feedback on your course plan from both the Webcraft community and the peers you accept into your course. This allows you to collaborate on the structure of the course and to make adjustments where required. For example, one week may have too many readings and articles assigned to it and as a group you may choose to either make certain articles a lower priority, or you may choose to extend the course time.