Welcome
Below is a short introduction to help you get acquainted with the work flow of this course. The second part is an introductory video in which I introduce my ideas on story, cognition and learning. It is a presentation I have been doing for over a year now and is actually the premise for the Digital Narrative & Cognition Course that is offered each summer.
Let’s review some things to help you become familiar with what we are about to be doing
- This course is organized into lesson cycles consisting of one to three weeks. This should be enough time for you to successfully complete each assignment that shows up each cycle. The first cycle is dedicated to providing the opportunity to look over the course. It is six days because of the financial aid requirement.
- This brings up another point: While most of the content for each of the learning cycles are set, this does not mean we won’t be introducing new things as we go long. I expect you to log onto Canvas regularly… two to three times each week. Do not lose sight of the fact that you should be spending approximately six to nine hours a week outside the class. The duration of each log-in depends on the nature of the task. For example, after a log-in, you might only need to check the course announcements and emails and would be spending a total of 5 minutes online. Or, after a log-in, you might work extensively on various course assignments and spend 50 minutes at that time. Student log-ins are recorded by Canvas and will be verified. The bulk of the time will be spent learning what is needed to do the mini projects. Much of this will be in the form of following the tutorials that I have found or ones that you find on your own. There will be a deliverable assigned that will be announced at the beginning of each learning cycle.
- Many folks have begun to think they can complete the tasks for this course using phones and/or tablets. For checking up on the announcements etc, this is ok. But note that using of an external site for course content MAY cause you some navigation issues.Also note that sometimes the video formats for links in the lessons is Flash. Because Safari intentionally omits support for most everything Adobe you MAY not be able to view the videos using Safari Web browser. If you want to use your iPhone or iPad, the you will need to download Chrome to view the flash videos.
- Since this is an graduate-level production course, there are no exams etc. There may be, however, ungraded self-check quizzes. Completion points for these check-ups are awarded based on your confirming participation or by my review your reflections. All graded activities are based on specific deliverable based activities, reflections, and your final project.
- Feel free to Post any questions you have, comments you would like to make, or anything else directly related or not to the content of the course on the Pajamas Cafe forum located under the Discussions tab. Hopefully, your fellow classmates will respond to you in a timely manner.
- There is no required text for this course. We do suggest recommended texts for the Adobe products as they can serve as tutorials. You also can find plenty of opportunities to get tutorials online . We do require that you spend a little on Photoshop, and perhaps a video editor. Adobe has a student package that is very reasonable. For the videos Wondershare Filmora is very cheap.
- Last, take a look at this video that helps set the table about on story and learning:
