Dept. of Physics and Astronomy, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA
There are several ways to create a course package online. The first one
is to write an entire course from scratch. This is not recommended, because
it can take years of work to generate a competitive product. The second way
is to simply buy a complete course package from a publisher or other online
vendor. While this is quick, it is also not satisfying, because it does not
give us the freedom of creative expression, one of the main reasons we chose
the teaching profession.
We would like to advocate a best-of-both-worlds kind of approach, an approach
we have named "Multimedia Collaborative Content Creation". As a proof of
concept, we have developed the MSU lectureOnline system. This system is a
database for online resources with automatically generated navigation interface.
It can be used to create and manage online courses. We will demonstrate the
functionality of this system and discuss future developments.
Particular emphasis will be placed on interactively administered and
graded homework assignments, multiple representations of knowledge,
and ways to customize the learning experience for each individual
student.
We will also discuss our experiences with offering a virtual university
introductory physics course with large enrollment (300 students) and show
some comparative studies on the learning outcomes.
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