Requirements

Readings, Class Participation, and Assignments

The textbook for this course is Teaching with the Internet: Lessons from the Classroom, by Donald J. Leu, Jr., and Deborah Diadiun Leu, 3^rd ed. (Norwood, MA: Christopher-Gordon Publishers, 2000). It has been ordered for you at the URI bookstore. In addition, you should rely on current journal research, course notes, your classmates' contributions, and Internet resources to update yourself on current issues and appropriate sites.

Your grade for the semester will be based on these things:

WebCT participation (20%)
Facilitating discussion (20%)
Seminar presentation (30%)
Term project or paper (30%)

Interpretation of grades: A grade of B on an assignment in this course will mean that you have met the basic requirements for the assignment; your performance would be acceptable on a professional level. A grade of A will mean that your performance is not only acceptable, but distinguished. A grade of C for graduate students indicates failure to perform at an acceptable level for graduate credit.

Handing in Work

Your work must be turned in when it is due. Work handed in late without an acceptable excuse will be downgraded.

For this course, you should submit your work either 1) by posting it to your own website and sending me the URL; or 2) by attaching it to WebCT e-mail. No matter how you submit it:

	You should always remember to put your name on the document
	You should give your assignment a descriptive title – "Have We Achieved Gender Equity Online?" is a better title than "Seminar Presentation," for instance. The title doesn’t have to be on a separate page; it can be at the head of your first page.

If you send it to me as an attachment, please make it easy for me to read, download, file and retrieve. This is really a plea for consideration -- the more time I spend handling your file, the less time I have to respond meaningfully to your actual work.

	It should be virus-free and compatible. I use Word on a Windows platform, so if you use Claris, WordPerfect, or some other program, please try saving it in Rich Text Format or PDF. If you forget this, I'll have to e-mail and ask you to re-send your assignment.
	Each assignment should come in a single file, not a series of attachments. The attachment should not exceed 500K – that is, it should not be so large as to take an inordinate amount of time for the instructor to download. If you send me 8 separate files, I'll have to spend time making a folder and downloading them all one by one.
	It should have an short filename beginning with some part of your own name and ending with an abbreviation of the assignment: e.g., JDoeProj, JDoeLog – 25 files with names like "535paper" are hard for an instructor to keep straight, so if you forget to give your file an instructor-friendly name, I'll have to remember to change it.
	If your file is to be uploaded to WebCT, the file name cannot have any spaces or "illegal characters." WebCT will not accept file names like Jane Doe's LSC 535 paper, and again, if you forget this, I'll have to fix it for you.

Using citations

Pick a good style manual and use it consistently. For quick refreshers on MLA and APA format, visit Purdue University's Online Writing Lab (OWL):

	Purdue University Online Writing Lab, Using Modern Language Association Format: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_mla.html
	Purdue University Online Writing Lab, Using American Psychological Association (APA) Format (Updated to 5th Edition): http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_apa.html

Remember to use footnotes, endnotes or parenthetical citations not only when you're quoting verbatim, but also whenever you're using specific facts (numbers, dates) or authoritative opinions for which you can trace a source. Two good reasons for citation:

acknowledgment of intellectual debt and
help to the curious researcher who may read your work and want to know more.

If you are not quite sure when citation is called for and why, please visit this site: "Plagiarism: What It Is and How to Recognize and Avoid It": http://www.indiana.edu/~wts/wts/plagiarism.html

Function matters more than form in this class, but do make sure to spell the names of your authors right, underline or italicize journal titles, and provide both volume numbers and dates of publication. (Hint: If you photocopy a journal article, write the volume number and date on your copy before reshelving the journal. For online style manuals, check out the reference section at the Internet Public Library, http://www.ipl.org. Style and writing manuals are under "Reference, More" at http://www.ipl.org/div/subject/browse/ref73.00.00/.)

Work submitted toward the end of the semester will be graded and returned to you by the last class if possible. Most of your work will be submitted online, in a compatible form, so the instructor will be able to edit it and make comments in Word. Work submitted in person or by snail mail can be returned to you by mail if accompanied by a self-addressed envelope with adequate postage (you can cover all contingencies by just paper-clipping the postage to the inside of the envelope); or you can note on the cover page if you prefer to have it left in your GSLIS box.

Academic tone

In most of your assignments, you will want to aim for a business-like tone – academic but not stuffy.

It is all right to use the first person singular to explain what you did, and why. It's better to say "I used a list from BookLinks" than "The author made use of a list from BookLinks" or "A list from BookLinks was employed." (Using the passive voice as a euphemism for the first person too often leads to dangling modifiers – "Being interested in the curricular applications of the subject, a list from BookLinks was employed.")

But at the same time, you should keep your tone relatively impersonal. In the rationale for your collection development project, for instance, you don’t need to say things like, "I wanted to look at the science fiction collection because it’s an area where I feel weak" – that’s a reason, but you could find a more professional one. You can say things more like, "The fifth grade in this school does a multidisciplinary unit on scientific imagination the month before the science fair, and this generates a great demand not only for biographies of scientists but also for speculative science fiction."

User-centered approaches are most desirable. If you are not yet a practicing librarian with users to observe, you can draw on observation of other public libraries and school media centers, and – of course! – on review of the professional literature; so not yet having a library of your own doesn’t have to be a handicap. The important thing is that as professional librarians we consider the needs and interests of users before our own needs and interests.

Resources for writing and presenting online

Communicating online is different from communicating in print. For instance, people tend to read much more slowly online, and to focus their attention differently; so good websites usually limit the length of text and the amount of scrolling viewers need to do. Web designers have access to cool graphics -- it's tempting to use richly textured backgrounds and distinctive fonts -- but remember, legibility is important. Readers do better with dark fonts over pale, uncluttered backgrounds. Following are a number of resources you may want to consult as you develop your online presentations. One thing most of them don't address in detail is the importance of matching your presentation style to your audience and purpose -- so when it comes to writing a term paper, even if you plan to make it available online, take them with a grain of salt. Academic propriety still matters most, and a bulleted list may not be the best way to show your instructor the reasoning that connects your main points.

Clyde, Anne. (2002). Creating the school library web site: The options. Teacher Librarian 29 (3), 25-28.

Goldsborough, Reid. (2002). Getting the word out, on the Internet. Reading Today 20 (2; Oct/Nov), p. 12. (Goldsborough writes, "The best websites don’t merely dazzle; they try to maximize the reader’s experience.")

Minkel, Walter. (2002). Remaking your web site in seven easy steps. School Library Journal 48 (5), 46-49.

Morris, Charlie. Writing for the Web. http://wdvl.internet.com/Internet/Writing/

A net editor’s view. Morris advocates brevity, but not at the expense of information; and he has strong ideas about what kinds of information readers want and need.

Nielsen, Jakob. Writing for the Web. http://www.sun.com/980713/webwriting/

An excellent resource for designing an online presentation. Caveat: not for term papers. See also useit.com: Jakob Nielsen’s website: http://www.useit.com/

Titta, Catherine. Writing well for the Web. http://www.webreference.com/content/writing/index.html

Assumes you’re writing for a general, rather than a scholarly, audience – adopt a more scholarly style if you decide to publish your major assignments at your URL. Her handy tip sheet on "Overcoming the Most Common Mistakes" (http://www.webreference.com/content/writing/overcome.html) is helpful, but oversimplified. For instance, the distinction she gives between the most common meanings of "affect" and "effect" is useful, but each of them can be either a noun or a verb. And she catches only a few of the most common mistakes, saying nothing about "complement" vs. "compliment," "then" vs. "than," or "its" vs. "it’s." Dictionaries are good.

Warlick, David. (2002). Plan it. Design it. Build it. Put your Web site to work. Technology & Learning 23 (2; September), pp. 22-28, 30, 34, 36. http://www.techlearning.com/db_area/archives/TL/2002/09/website.html

Grassian, Esther. Thinking critically about World Wide Web resources. http://www.library.ucla.edu/libraries/college/help/critical/

A short list of criteria for users evaluating online sources, this could also be helpful to a designer editing a site.

Writing help: If you would like advice on writing, check out the URI Writing Center. Appointments are encouraged (call them at 401-874-4690), but you may also drop in and see if a tutor is available. For more information, go to URI Writing Center's website at http://www.uri.edu/artsci/eng/wrtcnt.html.