Inspiring Thoughts
“A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.”
— Martin Luther King, Jr.
Author Archives: swalcher
“Rise of the MOOCs” Presentation
I recently created this Prezi to introduce some of the history and concepts behind MOOCs to several different faculty groups at Northwestern. It has been fairly well received, so I thought I should share it more widely. [gigya src=”http://prezi.com/bin/preziloader.swf” allowfullscreen=”true” … Continue reading
The Big Questions: Incentivizing Students
The third “big question” Coursera has posed has to do with retention (though I think they’d be loath to use that term): How can we incentivize students to diligently pursue their online courses of study? I haven’t done a lot … Continue reading
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The Big Questions: Video Lectures
The next question in the series of “big issues” that Coursera has posed is: What makes a video lecture effective? Everybody and her brother has advice about how to make lecturing more effective (particularly in STEM fields, which makes sense … Continue reading
The Big Questions: Assessment
Continuing my thoughts the other day about what makes a good course good, but not great, I looked again at Coursera’s website — where they list several questions they’re trying to tackle to take their courses to the next level. … Continue reading
Good Courses and Great Courses
I’ve been thinking today about the differences between good online courses and great ones, based in part on my experiences thus far as a student in “Critical Thinking in Global Challenges” (CTGC) — a Coursera course I’m taking as part … Continue reading
Unicorns Exist!
One of the things that people often first object to when considering Protagoras’ notion that, “Humans are the measure of all things,” is that it seems to suggest that all knowledge is relative, that anyone can say anything they want … Continue reading
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Tagged English 468, history of rhetoric, Protagoras, sophists
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Taking Measure of Protagoras
As John Dillon notes in his introduction to The Greek Sophists, most of the ideas of the sophists come to us either in fragments, or through commentary written by their enemies. Indeed, Plato is one of our chief sources for … Continue reading
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The Sophistic(ated) Traveler
so·phis·ti·cat·ed Adjective /səˈfistiˌkātid Having, revealing, or proceeding from a great deal of worldly experience and knowledge of fashion and culture So, one of the things that always strikes me as important to understand about the Sophists was that not only are … Continue reading