Description:
In this assignment you will craft learning objects that could be used by others to better understand a particular hard to grasp, or confusing topic you have encountered in the class. You will find something you find difficult in the course, and once you feel you have a handle on it, create something to help others better understand the topic in question. This assignment is geared towards helping others in general, and you need not treat it as something that must be addressed to college students or professors. Instead you can make your audience anyone that may also find the topic difficult to grasp, or hard to understand (for example – parents, grandparents, children). It is important to keep in mind that the content of your learning object must be sufficient to fully explain the issue in question.
Your project can be fully text based, but it would be better to develop it using visual or auditory elements (e.g., a video (such as a TikTok style video), or hand drawn images/schematics (such as a cartoon strip, or comic book), slides, flowcharts etc.)
Make sure that your learning object details not only how to better understand the topic, but also what you originally found difficult/didn’t understand. This is important as it will allow others to follow your thinking as they make use of the learning object.
The size of the assignment should be dictated by the topic you are creating a learning object for. In other words, what you need to be sure of is that your learning object accomplishes the task of helping others to learn the topic in question. I would thus recommend showing it to others before submitting it. A good rule of thumb for the size of the project is that:
a written project should not be less than 1 full page
an illustrated (dynamic or otherwise) project should not be less than 1 full detailed page
a video project should not be less than a 60 second video
This learning object also need not be dedicated to an entire paper we have covered in this course (though it certainly can) it can instead be dedicated to a particular argument, concept, or difficult passage.
In the coming weeks I will post examples of past student learning objects for you to look over.
Note: I view the above assignment to be one in which you, the student, should feel free to take the Mrs. Frizzle approach – “Take chances, make mistakes, get messy!” This includes both the construction of your LO, its design, and the topic of choice and argumentation.
Some resources to help you with creating the Learning Object:
Your phone camera
iMovie
Canva
GIMP
YouTube
Grading:
The Philosophy Learning Objects (including the reflection piece) is worth 8% of your total grade. The grade will be a reflection of how well the learning object identifies a philosophical issue.
Does the learning object adequately capture the philosophical issue in question? Does the learning object clearly identify what the philosophical issue is? Is it clear what the author found hard to understand, and is this difficulty addressed? Do we gain a better understanding of the topic from this learning object? These are the kinds of questions I will be asking when I grade the assignment.
File Format:
Please submit word documents in pdf format, and videos or posters in easily accessible formats.
