Barry Westling

Nadine, Many institutions and instructors do the same...that is, not offer extra credit at all. Barry Westling

Susan, Great! I think whenever we can get students involved, up and moving around, or actively involved in a game that reinforces learning, they're going to reflect positively on the course, the instructor, and in general, probably do better. Barry Westling

Stephanie, Many institutions and instructors frown on any kind of extra credit for reasons of fairness, skewing grades aritifically, and lack of consistency. Sometimes students will accuse an instructor of favortitism. For these and other reasons, personally I just don't do extra credit, but understand that some do, and each has to decide what works best for them. Barry Westling

Stephanie, For me, I have a back-up plan for each topic. In general, discussions, reading from textbook, or "seatwork" are good examples. I think keeping back up plans low tech, easy to implemment, and relative to the topic will be befenficial and keep students from thinking that the assignment is mere busy work. Barry Westling

Sara, This sounds very forward thinking, and I would agree that each new module will be fuller and better as a result of these efforts. Barry Westling

Adrienne, Right. Like a postest that measures to what degree prior learning HAS occured, a pretest is way to sort what prior learning do they have, or what DO they need to learn. Barry Westling

Stelian, I make my pretests using the course objectives, and put emphasis on the topics, "they absolutely have to know these" before they leave my class. Then I make my pretest around these "must know" categories. If students are mostly proficient with one or two of the topics, I will plan to spend less time on those, and redistribute time to other must know topics. So, really, it's a planning tool for me. Barry Westling

Stelian, Practical steps from someone who has been there. Your cake example is good one, because in it's simplicity, it clearly demonstrates the possible wonderful or awful consequences associated with good preparation and organization. Barry Westling

Adrienne, When students can begin to see themselves actually working in a simialr work setting, that is often an "aha" moment, one that inspires and motivates, as they visualize latent hopes for a new and perhaps better future for themselves. Barry Westling

Kit, Pretesting is a great tool just like how you plan to use it. It helps the instructor plan and and make needed adjustments to the curricular program. Barry Westling