DE Oracle @ UMUC

An Interactive Student Activity

Gary Jones

Graduate School of Management and Technology

Category: » Online-pedagogy » Teaching-tools

Note: Dr. Jones has used this activity to foster interaction among students in his WebTycho TMAN 611 course (Principles of Technology Management) with great success.  Dr. Jones recommends that this activity be conducted prior to the last two weeks of the semester. 

Students were required to write a 20-25 page term paper and to make an online presentation on  the paper's main points.  A one page summary (2-3 screens) of the presentation was required to be posted to the Project Presentation Conference prior to the paper's due date.  The summary was to contain the key points, major conclusions, and recommendations--the kinds of items the students would present to senior management in their organizations as the most important aspects of their work (that is, about three minutes worth of "talk"). 

Students, in the role of senior management, read each person's summary, responded to at least two summaries with probing questions or comments.  Comments were to be based on ideas/concepts learned in the course plus their own knowledge.  The faculty member commented on all summaries. 

Each author was required to answer any questions/comments posed to him/her. The responses could be in the conference, thus viewed by the whole class, or to the questioner individually. 

The result of this activity was considerable interactivity and lively discussion among students, some of whom responded to more than two summaries. Online discussion went back and forth many times on various issues.