Teachers of OO, you have my respect.

[Blackhawk]

I'm working on an online course right now. I just submitted a large, peer-reviewed assignment. The idea was to teach another person some portion of the content of the class, whether that was through an article, a video, a presentation, or whatever else (they're intentionally vague on the specifics of the medium to allow for creativity.) It's important to address and adequately explain to the reader/listener at least three concepts out of the 15-20 the class has covered. Since it is peer reviewed, we're also required to grade three of our peers' assignments.

The first I was assigned to grade was a Powerpoint assignment. It wasn't too bad, and I gave it the rough equivalent of a low A. It was tough to grade given that slideshows aren't intended to stand on their own. They're intended to support a presentation. The instructions are to give the author the benefit of the doubt in such things. That means I had to assume that the missing 75% of the content was properly addressed in the speech that would accompany it, and that brief three-word summaries of some of it was just reinforcement, not a self-contained attempt to pass information. I graded based on the idea that as long as the content was mentioned, it was explained, which is... off.

The second was a short story in which the author attempted to use narrative to explain some of the ideas. It was about a girl who wanted to write a short story (so meta!) and how she used the techniques. Unfortunately, the author wrote two and a half pages (in a largish font) in which the girl explored, essentially, every single concept in the first three weeks of the four-week course. Most concepts got a single sentence, and none got a full explanation. It was little better than a list. A reader who didn't know what she was talking about would have gotten absolutely nothing from it. And yet it was obvious that the author had really worked at it, and the examples she gave showed that she actually did understand what was being discussed. It met almost none of the fairly specific criteria for content, so the grade was about a 50%, and that was with me being generous. But I felt awful for it, and ended up writing her a detailed explanation of what was behind each section grade along with suggestions on how to address it. My feedback was probably longer than her entire story, was as supportive as I could make it, and I still felt like I was kicking a puppy.

The third was a summary in slideshow format that was the size of the 1970s World Book Encyclopedias I had growing up. It would have taken hours to read, let along grade. The summary was probably longer than the class! I backed out of that one.

The second attempt at a third was a four paragraph summary of the course. Only one paragraph had anything to do with the course. The other three were phrased... awkwardly, and yet coherently. Alarm bells rang. Sure enough, a quick google later and I was flagging it for plagiarism. Whole sections of Wikipedia articles had been copy-pasted with only a word or phrase here or there switched around.

So, teachers of OO. I have no idea how you could put up with this day after day.

[Kraken]

Heh. Wife has worked as an adjunct professor (primarily online) at several area schools, and she's learned that the quality of the students defines the quality of the class. She stopped working for one whose students consistently struggled to achieve high school-level mastery, and where plagiarism was not struck down by lightning, as it always should be.

That sounded like I think you're going to a bad school; not so. You are the kind of thoughtful and engaged student that makes a class work. The sad thing is that the instructor has to spend most of their time on the laggards.

[Blackhawk]

It's a free online course. Nobody has to have credentials or test scores to get in. Most of the time there is little to no interaction between students. There is a forum for the course, but very few people participate (I do try to pop in and give input every couple of days.) As a self-study course, I've found it to be fantastic and would recommend it in a heartbeat. It's best as guidance for your own study, and all it really involves is short recorded video lectures followed by quizzes. There is a significant amount of optional additional reading, and there are optional additional interviews with experts each week.

These peer-reviewed assignments are for the 'honors' certificate, which is optional and costs a small fee (I think $50.) I don't feel any need for the certificate (it doesn't really mean anything - it won't get anybody a job or a raise), so I'm not paying for it or receiving it, but I'm still doing the extra work. I'm there to learn the material, and I've learned from doing the extra assignments. It's important enough to me to do the work, or I wouldn't be investing the time.

[Jeff V]

History teachers of the Octopus Overlords have my particular respect because history classes always start with the Greeks, and they have the most delicious octopus recipes...

[dbt1949]

Years ago my wife taught about reincarnation at the local John Brown University.