Class Blogs:

I am a strong proponent of the use of technology in education, as I often find it to be an invaluable tool for not only addressing diverse learning styles, but also interactively engaging students in the learning process and opening up the world of the classroom beyond the four walls in which we sit. However, I also encourage students to challenge its perceived benefits and draw their own conclusions. For example, I have regularly used class blogs since 2005, in nearly all of my classes. I have become convinced that when students have access to this highly interactive, public, and less formal mode of writing and collaborative discourse, they are often better able to articulate the connections they make between class discussions, readings, and the ideas generated by others. Furthermore, class blogs also provide a conducive and relaxed atmosphere in which students get to know one another outside of the classroom, thus assisting in the formation of a more cohesive group of students within the classroom. Students are also encouraged to dialogue with one another and work out questions, issues, and concerns online, which then often fosters deeper conversations within the classroom.  

Below are some recent examples of my class blogs, each of which can be accessed by clicking on the title of the class. 

ENG 201 - Reading and Writing About Texts Fall 2008 - George Mason University	Close analysis of literary texts, including but not limited to poetry, fiction, and drama. Emphasis on reading and writing exercises to develop basic interpretive skills. Examination of figurative language, central ideas, relationship between structure and meaning, narrative point of view, etc.
ENG 101 - Composition Fall 2008 - George Mason University	Intensive practice in drafting, revising, and editing expository essays of some length and complexity. Study of the logical, rhetorical, and linguistic structure of expository prose. Methods and conventions of preparing research papers.
Reviewing the Arts Spring 2008 - Columbia College Chicago	This is a course in applied critical writing about arts and culture, with an emphasis on “re-viewing”: first, in the traditional sense of reviewing the arts through written accounts and second, in the contextual sense of re -viewing the arts in an attempt to illuminate the way in which art both informs and reflects society and culture.
Introduction to Cultural Studies Spring 2008 - Columbia College Chicago	This course introduces students to the terms, analytical techniques, and interpretive strategies commonly employed in Cultural Studies. Emphasis is on interdisciplinary approaches to exploring how cultural processes and artifacts are produced, shaped, distributed, consumed and responded to in diverse ways.
Popular Cultures Spring, 2008 - Harold Washington College	This course introduces students to the terms, analytical techniques, and interpretive strategies commonly employed in Cultural Studies. Emphasis is on interdisciplinary approaches to exploring how cultural processes and artifacts are produced, shaped, distributed, consumed and responded to in diverse ways.
Reviewing the Arts Fall 2007 - Columbia College Chicago	This is a course in applied critical writing about arts and culture, with an emphasis on “re-viewing”: first, in the traditional sense of reviewing the arts through written accounts and second, in the contextual sense of re -viewing the arts in an attempt to illuminate the way in which art both informs and reflects society and culture.
Introduction to Cultural Studies Fall 2007 - Columbia College Chicago	This course introduces students to the terms, analytical techniques, and interpretive strategies commonly employed in Cultural Studies. Emphasis is on interdisciplinary approaches to exploring how cultural processes and artifacts are produced, shaped, distributed, consumed and responded to in diverse ways.
Literature and the Culture of Cyberspace Fall 2007 - Columbia College Chicago	This course explores literature through the lens of cyberspace culture and engages issues such as virtual and shifting realities, the (re) construction of identities, and the fluidity of space/time inherent in the literature of cyberspace. Students also explore how cyberspace culture both informs and reflects the reading and writing of contemporary literature. Authors studied include Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Jorge Luis Borges, William Gibson, Jeanette Winterson, Shelley Jackson, Michael Joyce, and Stuart Moulthrop.
Reviewing the Arts Summer 2007 - Columbia College Chicago	This is a course in applied critical writing about arts and culture, with an emphasis on “re-viewing”: first, in the traditional sense of reviewing the arts through written accounts and second, in the contextual sense of re -viewing the arts in an attempt to illuminate the way in which art both informs and reflects society and culture.
Cybercultures: Theory Spring 2007 - Columbia College Chicago	This seminar course explores cyberspace, the most powerful and frequently inhabited site within contemporary culture and current and burgeoning theories that help inform our understanding of cyberculture/s and the relationships that exist between machines and humans, as well as those between society and technology.
Reviewing the Arts Spring 2007 - Columbia College Chicago	This is a course in applied critical writing about arts and culture, with an emphasis on “re-viewing”: first, in the traditional sense of reviewing the arts through written accounts and second, in the contextual sense of re -viewing the arts in an attempt to illuminate the way in which art both informs and reflects society and culture.
Writers Portfolio Spring 2007 - Columbia College Chicago	This capstone course assists students in developing their body of written work (whether written in or out of class, published or non-published) into a portfolio aimed towards showcasing strong examples of their writing.