Magda Vasillov and Marino
Antonio Corniel, Hostos Community College (CUNY)
Arts and Civilization I
[Prehistoric to Medieval Arts]
Arts and Civilization II [Renaissance to 21st
Century Arts]
How to Login to Arts and Civilization Online Go to: http://acc3.acc.hostos.cuny.edu Write in Course Search window: |
THE BLACKBOARD ENVIRONMENT
Blackboard courseware environment provides a template for
the all the elements of a course.
This
environment
is established with an Announcements/Homepage [figs. 1 and 2]. Here the venue is concretized. For an art history course that
encompasses Prehistoric to Medieval Arts and Renaissance to 21st
Century Arts, the visual impact of the Announcements page was important and
easily created. The banner
remained constant throughout the semester.
1.
Announcements
page for Arts and Civilization [Prehistoric to Medieval].
2. Announcements page
for Arts and Civilization [Renaissance to 21st Century].
You can
position your syllabus, your reading materials, links to web resources, grading
policies,
agenda
[fig. 3], writing assignments [fig. 4] etc.
3. Agenda for Arts
and Civilization [Renaissance to 21st Century].
This
template endures and it can be enhanced, varied, built upon. It gives your
classroom preparation a kind of permanence and potential for revision. You will
be able to enhance your course, broaden areas of study, add additional
resources. The template provides a
kind of comprehensive permanence vs. the vast piles of handouts, readings that
litter all of our offices.
4. Assignments page
for Arts and Civilization [Renaissance to 21st Century] >
Renaissance Arts > Masaccio.
Structure
and course pedagogy remain constant.
You are not teaching a new course; you are teaching your standard course
in a new virtual
classroom.
An
orderly environment for novice learners
The two
Blackboard course web sites for Arts and Civilization were carefully prepared
so that they functioned consistently throughout the entire semester. It is imperative that the courseware
environment not intrude into the dialogic learning that needs to be fostered. Students need, from the beginning to be
immersed in the content of the course Ð not in the courseware.
SPECIAL CHARACTERISTICS OF ONLINE LEARNING FOR ART HISTORY
5. Assignment links for Arts and Civilization
[Renaissance to 21st Century] Ð 21st Century Arts >
Picasso.
Direct
entrŽe to the amazing visual resources of the web allows students to access
primary, archival sources. From
the links [fig. 5] within the course web site students are prepared to go
further and explore new works of art and artists. Even more important, students are building their own
knowledge base. It is this visual
repertoire that becomes the keystone of online discussion.
DISCUSSION IN THE ONLINE CLASSROOM
Discussion
is the motive force of an online course.
The Discussion Board Forums of the Blackboard template are what give an
online course its vitality.
The discussions amplify and enhance dialogic learning. The methodology of the discipline
becomes more apparent as the course progresses. The discussions provide an inductive learning path Ð
beginning with a particular work of art to more general considerations of
style, textual allusions and context.
6. Discussion question for Arts and Civilization
[Renaissance to 21st Century] Ð 21st Century Arts >
Picasso.
7. HTML within discussion question of fig. 6.