DIGITAL DEVICES
I’ll be using my laptop and/or iPad to access my course notes and readings. You’re welcome to do so, too. We’ll also regularly use our devices in class to collaborate on shared documents and slide shows. In short, you’re very welcome to use devices in class so long as they facilitate your engagement and collaboration and do not enable your distraction 😉.
DEADLINES
Our deadlines aren’t arbitrary. They’re established to help keep you on track with your work, to ensure that our collaborative work progresses smoothly, and to give me sufficient time to review your work. Assignment deadlines are clearly noted on the syllabus. In all cases, you’re made aware of these deadlines weeks in advance, and in some cases you even choose your own assignment deadlines, which allows you to do your work when it suits your schedule. I am also more than happy to work with you, in advance of assignment deadlines, to develop your projects.
I take your work seriously, I read it closely, and I’m known for providing substantial, thorough, constructive feedback. It takes me about an hour to review each student project. I set aside big blocks of time for assignment review immediately after each deadline, and pretty much every day of the week I’m committed to reviewing some batch of student work! Missing deadlines means you miss your “window of opportunity” for review and feedback, which is a big part of your learning experience. Late work = no comments. For the last few tumultuous years, I’ve not penalized late work, but I’ve been told that such a policy won’t work at Penn 🙂 So, I’ll accept work up to one week past the deadline, but they will not receive feedback and will be subjected to a grade-step-per day penalty.
A student who has not submitted all assigned work by the end of the semester does not receive an “Incomplete” by default. “Incompletes” are assigned only in extreme circumstances, and require that you consult with me well before the end of the semester and sign a contract obligating you to complete all outstanding work by a date that we agree upon. Again, late work will not receive feedback.
SUBMITTING WORK VIA GOOGLE DRIVE
You’ll occasionally be asked to submit your work via Google Drive. Because I prefer to insert margin comments and propose revisions directly in/on your text, I need to work with an editable document (e.g., not a pdf). You can share your material with me by clicking on the “Share” button in the upper-right corner of Google Drive/Docs, inserting my email address, then clicking on the little pencil icon and choosing “can edit.”
I’ll probably propose some line edits and add some margin comments to your Doc. I don’t expect you to respond to my recommendations and queries, but I do hope you’ll at least consider them! If you’d like to discuss my comments and your plans for revision, please speak with me during office hours! I unfortunately can’t continually monitor for new margin comments across all students’ documents 😉