So, I hated the mandatory Online Education intro and the etextbooks have missed the point. Also there are these mandatory discussions, where one person writes a forced and disinterested paragraph responding to the reading, and someone else writes a forced and disinterested comment on the bottom. The internet wisdom of never reading the comments has rarely been so true.
But the quizzes. They are the best.
Students can take them any time over the week, which is so amazing. I know I’ve done less-well on exams when I was tired, headachey, or distracted by other deadlines. I’ve also tried to time my course reading before a quiz, in order to hit the sweet spot between being quizzed on what I crammed 10 minutes ago, and being quizzed on something I vaguely remember reading at the beginning of the semester. Being able to take my quiz when I am feeling comfortable and confident is so great.
Plus, you can take the quizzes multiple times, and the highest one counts. So, if you hand in a quiz and realize you messed something up or if you’re not happy with your score (available instantly, did I mention that?), just try again.
And course grades are always available, which is I’m finding motivating and really reassuring. It’s nice to see my average whenever I want, and know that I haven’t forgotten anything. (I got a lot of Bs in college because I aced 4 assignments and completely forgot about the 5th.) It’s not always fun to do homework at night, so looking at a good course average is motivating.
(I just did the math to see if I can pass by getting As on every quizzes and ignoring discussions. I can’t. But if I maintain an A in quizzes, I only really have to do 2/3s of the discussions… Why did I work that out? The discussions are so much worse now.)
