Import Test : Weblogs

Future of the COPPER Blog

Matt Scales — Thu, 03 Aug 2006 15:20:01 GMT

The first round of Carnegie cluster work has come to an end this summer. For many member colleges, a second three year period of SoTL cluster work will begin this coming fall. Many of the COPPER cluster colleges have been accepted into the second round, and several of us will continue to work together. We will also be welcoming new schools to our community.

At this point, aspects of the upcoming cluster structure, goals, and online tools used by the new community are still to be determined. Much of this work will take place during the fall semester. What role this site will play, if any, in the emerging cluster will be decided during this process. It may be that a new blog, wiki, or a combination of online tools will be created to both serve the communication needs of our community of colleges and also serve as a link to others interested in our work.

For now, this site and it’s over 200 pages of ideas, resources and conversations will remain available. You can continue to visit and make use of the blog, as well as add comments. Occasional entries, particularly related to existing themes, may be added from time to time. However, the practice of providing updates and new entries to the site on a regular basis over the last two plus years will be put on hold for the time being.

Many thanks to all those that have contributed their entries and comments to the COPPER Blog during its lifetime, or have taken the time to visit the site and view what we have to offer. We hope the time spent with us has been worthwhile. As Blog editor, the process has been a unique challenge and opportunity.

Don

Searching the Blog

Matt Scales — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 19:55:00 GMT

A recent comment on our blog raised the issue of locating entries should one wish to view them in the future. The COPPER Blog has no traditional "Google-like" search feature in which one can insert key words and pull up related documents. Nevertheless, there are several easy ways to locate a particular entry or pull up information if one is interested in exploring the site’s resources on a variety of topics.

1. Categories - With a few exceptions, all of our blog entries are assigned to one or more topic categories. Categories represent the site’s archives and can be accessed on the right hand side of the home page. Clicking on a category link such as SoTL, Learning Communities, Educational Question of the Year, or Doing Too Much will bring up all the entries archived under that category from our over two years of postings. This is helpful when doing a search in an area of interest. In addition, if you make note of the assigned category at the end of any entry you are reading, it can serve as any easy way to retrieve that material at a later time.

2. Home Page – The COPPER Blog home page http://middlesex.blogs.com will contain most of the messages posted in the last few months. You will see links to the most recent messages on the top right of the page, but by scrolling down the page further other entries will appear. Once the messages are no longer visible on the home page they must be accessed through the archives or via a direct link (see below).

3. Bookmarks – Each blog entry has its own unique web address or URL that can be used to go directly to that message and its accompanying comments. Clicking on “permalink” immediately below the entry will open a web page that displays that entry and its comments. Simply bookmark or add the link to the favorites list in your browser and you can return directly to that post in the future. By copying and pasting the entry’s address into an email you can share the post with other friends and colleagues that may find the material of interest.

4. Date – If you are searching for an entry and do not recall the category, you may be able to locate the post using the date archives that are located down the right hand side of the home page. There you will see a calendar of the current month with direct links to any days on which a message was posted. This is followed by monthly links from the last ten months of postings. If you recall that you read an entry late last fall, simply clicking on November or December will bring up all the posts from those months.

If all these methods fail, feel free to send me an email at margulisd@middlesex.mass.edu with some basic information about the post’s content and I should be able to locate it and forward its web address to you. Happy searching!

Cooperative Blogs for Online Communities

Matt Scales — Tue, 07 Jun 2005 22:00:22 GMT

The following information and presentation was created for use by the iCohere hosted Online Community Workshop (June 7-30), but is open to anyone visiting the COPPER Blog.

The COPPER Blog serves a cluster of educators from eight colleges involved in the Carnegie Foundation's Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Campus Program. All dated entries on our site are posted down the center of the page with a comments feature following each post. The 10 most recent messages are available by scrolling down the page. On either side of the entries are lists of relevant links. Links on the right side of the page include recent posts, recent comments, and links to our archives organized by category and month.

Feel free to browse our site before or after the following presentation. You can add comments to any post that you wish. Any questions or comments regarding this presentation can be posted in the comments section at the end of this message.

To view and hear the presentation download the file below. Once the file has downloaded, open or double click on it to begin the presentation.

Note: This presentation has been created using "WebTalk." When the presentation begins you may be prompted to install the program's player (Crazytalk) which is a quick process. I think you will find the program somewhat different from a straight PowerPoint presentation and worth the effort.

Blog Presentation: Download CommunityBlogs.exe

Thanks to Albert for his help with the narration.

Communication Difficulties

Matt Scales — Sun, 29 May 2005 15:35:08 GMT

1. If you've attempted to visit the COPPER Blog within the last week you may have noticed that the page has loaded more slowly. I've been notified by our host (Typepad.com) that there have been some technical difficulties which they are in the process of correcting. Hopefully, we'll be back at full speed before long. In the meantime be patient, the page will appear on your screen. I've often found it helpful to click on the link again or use the browsers "refresh" button and the site seems to load more quickly the second time.

2. For COPPER cluster members, the closing of AAHE has also meant the termination of the WebCenter and its online tools, which included our listserv. The listserv was used for general e-mail announcements and Blog updates. We may be receiving a set of new online tools when the details of our future organizational home are ironed out. In the meantime, we will attempt to create our own e-mail list in order to maintain ongoing communication. The Blog has not been impacted by these transitions as it does not rely on the WebCenter for its functionality. In the short term, we will post any new community news on this site.

Summer Hours

Matt Scales — Wed, 25 May 2005 15:30:00 GMT

Although the spring semester is over for many of us the COPPER Blog is open for business over the summer. Feel free to visit, add your comments, and send material to me for posting. As was the case last summer, the rate of new posts may slow down a bit, but I'll try to make sure that something new is available on a weekly basis. Good luck with the end of the semester (or quarter) and during your vacation and the holidays as well.

Feel free to browse through the archives by category or month (located on the right side of this page) and reply to any entries of interest. If you have contributions that you would like posted send them to me at margulisd@middlesex.mass.edu.

Over the summer and in a more focused fashion next fall, we'll be addressing the COPPER Blog Educational Question of the Year and plan to offer postings by guest respondents.

Keep the Comments Coming

Matt Scales — Fri, 29 Apr 2005 16:52:53 GMT

While this week was set aside to provide Jan Arabas the opportunity to host a discussion of her SoTL research project on the Blog, this discussion is still free to continue in the days and weeks ahead. Thanks to Jan for making productive use of our collaborative online tool. We also appreciate those who have contributed to the discussion thus far or have visited the site to read the thoughtful and informative comments.

All posts on our COPPER Blog (there are now 160 of them) retain an active "comments" function. That means that should you be browsing through the site archives (they are organized by category and date) and wish to comment on an entry that was published some time ago, you can and are encouraged to do so. A fresh link with your name and the title of the entry will be immediately posted to our "Recent Comments" list so that visitors to the site can easily view the original post and your new comment. It's a great way to revive a topic or discussion from the past.

If you ever post a comment to our site and wish to edit, revise, or even delete it, feel free to contact me at margulisd@middlesex.mass.edu and I'll be glad to make the desired changes.

Holiday Hours

Matt Scales — Thu, 16 Dec 2004 18:33:08 GMT

As finals and the holidays approach for most of us, the Blog will remain open for business 24/7. Feel free to visit, add your comments, and send material to me for posting. As was the case in the summer, the rate of new posts may slow down a bit over the winter break, but I'll try to make sure that something new is available for you at least once a week. Good luck with the end of the semester (or quarter) and during your vacation and the holidays as well.

We have some new plans for the Blog for the spring term in addition to maintaining many of the topics that have been ongoing. Valencia Community College will be hosting the Blog early in the term to get us off and running.

Take care,

Don

Best of the Blog: A liberal arts education wrapped up in a blog

Matt Scales — Mon, 13 Dec 2004 11:00:00 GMT

The following post from April 2, 2004 received feedback indicating the featured site provided an interesting and potentially useful resource. It's being republished as one of the "Best of the Blog" entries.

Scenario: You're teaching an interdisciplinary liberal arts course. You give your students the following assignment:

"Visit the blog Arts and Letters Daily, read all the postings and follow all the links for each day of the semester, and keep a journal summarizing your findings."

Question: How much credit do you give for this assignment? 10% of the course, 30%, perhaps full course credit? Feeling generous, how about a four year degree? Actually, as you'll see, the assignment would be virtually impossible to complete.

While Weblogs are often the product of individuals, a number of organizations have adapted a "blog style" web page offering frequent updates of information, ideas, and links. One such site, Arts and Letters Daily, produced by The Chronicle of Higher Education, is loaded with references and links to a rich variety of articles and resources that might be useful to teachers in various disciplines. The site adds new content six days a week.

I had trouble pulling myself away from this blog - there is so much to explore. Might this be a site that we can use with our students?

"Why I Blog" - One Student's Voice

Matt Scales — Fri, 19 Nov 2004 11:00:00 GMT

While our COPPER Blog is intended to function as a collaborative tool, blogs have been used in a variety of ways, in particular as individual online journals. It's in this capacity that they are often used by instructors in a variety of classes. Many people use them as interactive personal diaries. One student (a member of my online class) who is an active "blogger" shared her motivation for keeping a blog. With her permission, that reply is reproduced below (note: LJ refers to LiveJournal a blogging site):

I've been blogging (keeping an online journal or web log) for nearly two years now. I currently have four blogs in use--a completely private journal, a locked journal for my original writing which serves as a sort of writer's group, a more "fannish" media-based journal, and a public blog where anything and everything goes. I've found that most bloggers have more than one journal and often separate them by usage as I do. In January of this year I was wondering why people blog and I ended up posting the following which I think sums it up pretty nicely:

"Why we do it. I’ve been thinking about the nature of blogging and why we do it. Now, I have a few journals, two of which are public, and I read a lot of others. I’m basing my opinions here on the things I’ve read in these journals and on my own thoughts. Some people blog for their friends. They have a limited readership (or Friends List) and they use their journal to pass along information. It’s basically a continuation of their normal conversations. Some people seem to blog for an audience. They feel a need to update frequently, to be funny or insightful, and they seem to have some guilt if they can’t do these things. One of the things that bothers me in reading these journals (and, oh, LJ is full of them) is that these people don’t seem to have any fun doing this. I really wonder why they even bother. Then there are your fannish blogs, much like my LJ, which tend to concentrate on one area of your life only. They’re used for tv and movie reviews, posting your fanfiction, and otherwise indulging in your habit. Fandom bloggers seem to be pretty damn happy. Then, finally, there are those like me. My blog is public, sure. Some people I actually know have access to it. But I don’t blog for them or for their entertainment, I blog for me. I used to fill a one inch thick 8-1/2x11 hardback journal in less than a year. Blogging online is just a quicker extension of the same thing. If there’s anything I want to remember or think about or learn about myself, I do it here. Whether you read or not, whether you’re entertained or not, I don’t care. My blog is an exploration. It’s all about me, baby."
--Tammy (online MCC psychology student)

Welcome University of Wisconsin System Cluster Members

Matt Scales — Mon, 20 Sep 2004 21:48:44 GMT

Our COPPER weblog is an open website which allows for the posting and discussion of ideas and resources on a range of teaching and learning issues in support of our SoTL community. While we always welcome interested visitors, we are particularly intrigued by the opportunity to colloborate with another cluster. This can be a unique opportunity to share common concerns and challenges, and learn from one another. The blog is an informal space so feel free to view what is here, comment on any posting (new or old), and send any ideas for original entries to me at margulisd@middlesex.mass.edu. You will find the last ten messages available by scrolling down the page. Earlier postings can be accessed by clicking on the links to topic categories, or chronologically by month (both available on the right side of the page). Feel free to contact me with any questions you may have. Don Margulis COPPER Virtual Facilitator

End of the Semester Resolutions

Matt Scales — Fri, 07 May 2004 10:01:00 GMT

"Part of being a teacher is a more or less constant regret at not being able to do more, or have a greater influence on one's students." Poet and Professor Joseph Duemer reflects on the end of the spring semester and his goals for the summer and beyond in his blog Reading and Writing. As your semester comes to a close do any of his thoughts echo your own?

The Invisible Adjunct

Matt Scales — Fri, 23 Apr 2004 10:00:00 GMT

There's a touch of sadness to this blog as the author, a history adjunct, says goodbye to readers of his site (and to the life of a teacher). He appears to have used the blog for about a year to share his thoughts and experiences regarding the life of an adjunct, as well as to comment on an assortment of other topics. Might his experiences resonate with many of the part-time faculty at our colleges as well? The Invisible Adjunct

A Passion for Words

Matt Scales — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 10:00:00 GMT

What is the origin of the word BOONDOGGLE, or FLABBERGASTED? What is the meaning of FLOCCINAUCINIHILIPILIFICATION? If you love words you'll enjoy Michael Quinion's web site World Wide Words which features an impressive 1400 pages filled with "English words and phrases—what they mean, where they came from, how they have evolved, and the ways in which people sometimes misuse them." I learned that it's best not to BLOVIATE when teaching.

Daypop - A Unique Search Engine

Matt Scales — Fri, 09 Apr 2004 10:00:00 GMT

Looking for current news and information to support your teaching, or to simply to satisfy an interest? Look no further than Daypop, an online current events search engine. Daypop monitors items from over 59.000 newspapers, online magazines, and weblogs. The site also features a list of the top news stories of the day, the top 40 topics on weblogs, and the most popular weblogs.

Buried Cities and Lost Tribes

Matt Scales — Fri, 26 Mar 2004 10:30:00 GMT

Rick Effland an Anthropology teacher at Mesa Community College teaches a course with the intriguing title "Buried Cities and Lost Tribes." He also has created the Rick Effland Blog which serves as a resource for students and interested readers.