From kgrove@sfsu.edu Mon May  7 11:10:46 2001
Date: Mon, 7 May 2001 10:28:20 -0700
From: Karen Grove 
To: Scott Veirs 
Subject: Re: Great on-line courses!

Hi Scott,

glad to hear the materials were well received!  To answer your questions:

(1) the course management tools provided a way to implement homework
assignments that was not possible before, in the class of 100.  These
evolved out of frustration that students were not prepared for class.

(2) the transition occurred in one semester, during which time I was
creating the new materials and having the students use them.. the first
semester was certainly rough, but by the second semester most of the kinks
had been worked out.

About a month ago, i submitted an article to JGE journal for review about
the materials.  Let me know if you'd like a copy of that manuscript.

cheers - karen

>Hi Karen and Don,
>
>I'd like to thank you both for your excellent on-line courses.  I gave a
>group of UW faculty and grad students a tour of your sites last week and
>they were very curious, impressed, and even inspired to innovate here!
>
>One question that emerged for both of you is: "How did your use of the web
>and course management tools (like TopClass and WebBoard) evolve from
>previous forms of the course (if any existed), and overall, how long has
>the transition taken?"  I think embedded in the latter query is about how
>much time it has taken you to establish, and then maintain your courses
>in their new form.
>
>Thank you!
>
>Cheers,
>Scott


**************************
Dr. Karen Grove
Chair and Professor of Geology
Department of Geosciences
San Francisco State University
San Francisco, CA 94132-4163
phone: (415) 338-2061;  fax: (415) 338-7705
e-mail: kgrove@sfsu.edu
dept. home page: http://tornado.sfsu.edu/geosciences/geosciences.html
**************************