Saturday, October 13, 2012

Readings ramblings


One of the suggestions I routinely had for my professors while I was working on my Masters in Library Science was that they reduce the number of required readings and require students to find relevant readings to contribute. Mostly I felt that the readings were behind the times - some were seminal, but others were outdated, like an article from the 90s debating the merits of using email for reference questions.

So I appreciated Music for Deckchairs' view of changing the way we think about course readings. Michael Wesch wrote about using an interesting inversion of course readings a few years ago. At LOEX earlier this year I heard about the Medrano Project where students built a living textbook as part of the course, rather than pay through the nose for a regular text. A brilliant teacher at my own institution is currently doing a similar thing, having her Early Childhood Education students find journal articles to answer weekly essential questions in lieu of buying a textbook.

Participants in MOOCs do contribute readings to the courses, of course. I tried a couple times to start collaborative annotated bibliographies in MOOCs, but found few takers. I think we could have built useful, lasting resources. But I was just a lone voice in the wilderness, and the facilitators had supplied us with ample readings and activities already. No one saw the need to add to it.