Syllabus

... part of George North's and Teacher Explorer Center's Web site at UNO ... Updated: September 22, 1999

WWW Site Development for Educators

EDCI 4993-604, Fall 1999
4:30 to 7:15, Wednesdays

Syllabus
and in class activities for September 22.

Why do you want to print this document? It is linked to many other important documents -- your printed copy is linked to the death of trees.

Your Home Page -- Links to Explore -- Search the Web -- more than

visits.

Important Dates	\| eMail -- \| George \| Emma \| Attendance \| Check Your Mail \|
	\| Top \| Texts and Resources \| Course Description \| Objectives \|
	\| Evaluation \| Grading \| Who is George North \| Class Web Pages \|

Date	Description
Prior Weeks	11 class meetings left -- not counting this one!

This Week Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22 Wednesday, September 22	Questions? What will we have time for today? I want to talk about FTP, so that you may start copying your web pages to the server ... and to the rest of the world! Look for some more stuff to do later. House Keeping Check Wednesday, October 15 for info about your mid-term exam (in 3 weeks). Tell me -- What is the Statue of Anne? What was last week's picture? Anybody remember the browser wars? New Word virus hits Net. What is Y2K, aka the millenium bug? More unconventional notebooks! Tell me what you know about copyright laws and the web. What do I need to start building my own web site? Can I use an existing site to help start mine? Where do I find graphics to use on my site? How do I contribute to my web site -- FTP Ask me about complexity and reuse. This week Everyone will build learn about FTP -- finally? Everyone will "teach us" what they already know about their own web site project. You need to tells us what you will do, and why you think it is important to do it. You will come to know how to do this as time passes. Lab Assignments NONE Every week Bring a floppy disk to class ... one that you use on your own computer at home, school, work ... from the computer you plan to use to develop your own web site. Send me (gnorth@mac.com) an eMail message using this Attendance link. This is how I will know for sure you were in class. The text of this eMail should be your guess -- What is the picture of the week? Assignment Due by 4:30, Sunday September 26: There is no written assingment due for next week! If you haven't responded to the Bonus assignment about Copyright laws and the web, this is a good time to do so. I will extend deadline for submitting comments to end of class next week. Things to keep in mind ... Unlike tradition documents, web pages are almost never finished. We can say that a web site is ALWAYS under construction. One feature of a web page is its ability to display itself on any computer. Another feature ... most web pages are editable by anyone, turning the document into you own ... this is called reuse (note: you need special access, like FTP, to change an original document). Web pages are 100% constructed of plain text. If this is true, where do the picture come from? The internet lets us transport web pages around the world in the blink of an eye. The editability, displayability, and transportability of web pages makes them unique ... no other document format comes close. If you are waiting for me to teach you how to build a web page ... STOP. We all build documents ... all the time. Building a web page is not different ... and is different. I am an encyclopedia for web site development. It is just as important to know what questions to ask as it is to know the answers. You job is to know what questions ask ... and from every indication, everyone is fast getting to the "How do I ...?" point ... soon you will be able to ask each other the "How do I ...?" question. And ... when you start answering others questions about web pages ... you will know you are a webmaster. What is the difference between information and entertainment? What if we finish early? You are not free to leave. Work on the lab assingment. Talk to me or another member in class about your web site project. Begin to think about our Group Semester Project. Work on your own web site. Explore example web sites for your own understanding.
Monday, September 27	My son Denny's birthday, visit his web site
Wednesday, September 29	A one page description of your personal web site project is due at the beginning of class.
Monday, October 4	Final date to resign and get a 25% refund.
Wednesday, October 6	TBA
Thursday, October 7	Mid-semester break
Friday, October 8	Mid-semester break
Monday, October 11	Mid-semester examination period
Tuesday, October 12	Mid-semester examination period
Wednesday, October 13	Progress report -- a several paragraph description of your personal web site project, eMail'ed to Emma. This is your mid-term exam, check Evaluation for details. A short description of the site. Why you consider this site important? Who are the expected users of the site? How will they benefit? What tools will you use to do development? Why did you choose these tools? When will you FTP your progress to our web server? George will eMail your mid-term exam grade (0-10). Due date: before the end of class Wednesday, October 13.
Wednesday, October 13	Mid-semester examination period
Thursday, October 14	Mid-semester examination period
Friday, October 15	Mid-semester examination period
Wednesday, October 20	TBA John Dewey's Birthday
Monday, October 25	Final Drop Date?
Wednesday, October 27	TBA
Friday, October 29	My Wife's Birthday, visit her Web Site
Wednesday, November 3	TBA Phase 1 Registration for 2000 Spring Semester begins.
Wednesday, November 10	TBA
Monday, November 15	My Father's Birthday, visit his Web SIte
Wednesday, November 17	TBA
Saturday, November 20	Last day of Saturday classes
Wednesday, November 24	TBA
Thursday, November 25	Thanksgiving
Wednesday, December 1	Our last regular class: Semester Project due at beginning of class (4:30 PM) Self-evaluations due
Friday, December 3	Last day of regular classes
Monday, December 6	Final Exams
Tuesday, December 7	Final Exam Guess
Wednesday, December 8	Our Final Exam: What will it be?
Thursday, December 9	Final Exams
Friday, December 10	Final Exams
Tuesday, December 14	Final grades available on TOPS

Prior Dates	Description
Wednesday, August 25	see Old Syllabus
Wednesday, September 1	see Old Syllabus
Monday, September 6	Labor Day
Wednesday, September 8	see Old Syllabus
Friday, September 10	Final date to drop courses or resign and not have courses recorded.
Saturday, September 11	Rosh HaShanah
Monday, September 13	Final date to change from credit to audit.
Wednesday, September 15	see Old Syllabus
Monday, September 20	Yom Kippur Final date to resign and get 50% refund.
Wednesday, September 22	Something very special!

Texts & Resources	\| Top \| Important Dates \| Course Description \| Objectives \|
	\| Evaluation \| Grading \| Who is George North \| Class Web Pages \|

Required reading for this class will be selected World Wide Web sites as indicated each week in the syllabus. These will be found using the link at the top of this page titled "Links to Explore." From time to time we will mention and discuss some of the available texts covering this topic. You are encouraged to bring to class any books you find interesting and share these with the rest of us. Bring books and other recourses to class is one way to satisfy the class participation requirement.

Course Description	\| Top \| Important Dates \| Texts & Resources \| Objectives \|
	\| Evaluation \| Grading \| Who is George North \| Class Web Pages \|

Prerequisites:

Knowledgeable in the use of computers

An eMail address

Good work ethic

This course is intended to help educators acquire a working knowledge of electronic Information Networks. Begun in 1989 by Tim Berners-Lee, the World Wide Web (WWW or W3) didn't appear in popular culture until after 1995. Today, web site addresses seem to be everywhere. Do you really know what -- http://www.ed.uno.edu/index.html -- is?

We will discuss how teachers can use WWW sites in curricula development. Especially, we will attempt to show how developing WWW sites themselves will make teachers more productive. There is a substantial initial investment in building your own web sites, but once started, it will be easier for you and "for others" to reuse your work. It may be "for others" is most significant. Not only do educators directly benefit from their own work, they benefit from all the other educator built web sites. One example of a great web site to link to you own site is: http://ed.uno.edu/. This is the hyper linked part of WWW.

We will learn that the WWW is just one example of a hyper linked environment ... that the web is the best known prototype of an information network. It is my expectation that you will come to understand that no one benefits from information networks more than educators.

Most of this class will be conducted as a business, we will be web publishers. We will be planners, copy writers, editors, graphic artists, and technologists. We will learn what is a web server, how to build one, what is needed to start a web site from scratch. We will also discuss what are the future WWW trends.

Information Networks:

provide educators with access to abundant resources;

provide students with new ways to participate in knowledge creation;

provide simultaneous access to information and publishing;

bring us closer to the goal of Universal Education;

empower students, decreasing the roll of teachers as purveyors of knowledge;

make teachers and students partners in learning;

join together teachers, students, parents, and community members;

build Communities of Learners in a single location (the classroom);

join learning scenarios with abundant resources;

The goal is learning -- taking place in a social context where knowledge is created from information with action guided by pedagogy.

We will build information networks!

Objectives	\| Top \| Important Dates \| Texts & Resources \| Course Description \|
	\| Evaluation \| Grading \| Who is George North \| Class Web Pages \|

Helping educators develop the skills needed to build WWW sites for themselves (home pages), for their classrooms, and for their schools are the foundation for the objectives of this class.

Students will be given the opportunity:

To develop the vocabulary needed to understand the terminology found in web site development.
To improve competency in identifying appropriate uses of WWW in their classroom.
To improve conceptual understanding of all the skills and technologies needed to operate a WWW server.
To improve the computer skills needed to aid in classroom management.
To build the skills needed to teach other educators about WWW site development.
To demonstrate competency in a broad range of the above skills.

Evaluation	\| Top \| Important Dates \| Texts & Resources \| Course Description \|
	\| Objectives \| Grading \| Who is George North \| Class Web Pages \|

Please note that it is possible to earn more than 100 points. Read carefully each of the six evaluation areas below. Hint ... follow the links to details of each area.

30 points - Individual WWW site project -- Build a personal WWW site

10 points - Mid-semester exam -- Who will be first to ask me about it?

30 points - Group semester project: rebuild College of Education WWW site.

------------ Final exam -- "In class presentation"

20 points - Participation -- attendance and contributions to in class activities.

20 points - Emma -- Weekly written assignments posted to our list server.

Final grade will be based in large on student's self-evaluation. Remember, evaluations are due at the beginning of our last class -- see important dates above for exact date.

Grading	\| Top \| Important Dates \| Texts & Resources \| Course Description \|
	\| Objectives \| Evaluation \| Who is George North \| Class Web Pages \|

A = 90 - 100 points

B = 80 - 89

C = 70 - 79

etc.

Who is George North	\| Top \| Important Dates \| Texts & Resources \| Course Description \|
	\| Objectives \| Evaluation \| Grading \| Class Web Pages \|

Today, I am Ph.D. candidate in the College of Education, Curriculum & Instruction. In my past life, for 30 years, I was a systems analyst, programmer, Information Systems manager, and computer consultant. I earned a B.S. in

Liberal Arts from the University of the State of New York, and a M.S. in Computer Science from the University of New Orleans. My goal is to teach at the college level ... to help educators integrate Information networks into their daily lives as teachers and learners.

George North
Office: ED 308A
Phone: 280-6523
Home: 834-1891
eMail: gnorth@mac.com
Web Site: http://georgenorth.net/~george/georgeHome.php
Office Hours:
Monday: 3:30 - 4:30
Monday: 7:15 - 8:15 PM
Also by appointment