Syllabus

Revised 2 February 2003

Contents: Weekly Schedule of Activities  | Instructor Information  | Course Goals | Graduate Credit Options | Course Information

Weekly Schedule of Activities

The following lists the activities week-by-week. There is flexibility in this schedule to accommodate individual needs, school schedules, and individual goals. However, research has demonstrated clearly that success in an online course is directly related to a high degree of structure and scheduling. If you cannot do all the assignments for a week, you should at minimum participate three times in your topical forum.

PLEASE NOTE: You can access all of the readings, lessons, and forums for this course from the Course Menu under Educators' Resources and Educators' Forum section.

Segment / Week(s)

Activities
Getting Started / 1 Read Syllabus - Choose Forum - Install ArcVoyager - Do Race & Ethnicity Lesson - Post Learning
Getting Started / 2 Explore Lesson - Describe patterns - Respond to colleagues - Introduce self
Getting Started / 3 Choose and review an example of GIS in schools & communities - Post analysis - Use forums
GIS for Teachers / 4-6 Complete exercises - Post results & comments - Use forums
Classroom Tryout / 6-8 Plan tryout - Help others plan - Conduct tryout - Report results - Use forums

Develop a Lesson / 6-8

Design Lesson - Post Specs - Help others - Use forums
Develop a Lesson / 8-12 Build Base Map - Locate Data - Prepare Data - Write Lesson - Finish developing / modifying lesson - Test lesson - Post progress, feedback - Post final product - Use forums

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Instructor Information

Instructors

 Dr. Yichun Xie: Principal Investigator (PI) of the VISIT Project. Professor of GIS and Planning, Eastern Michigan University. Director, Institute for Geospatial Research and Education (IGRE). ESRI Authorized GIS in Education Trainer and ESRI Authorized ArcView and Avenue Trainer. (734) 487-7588, yxie@emich.edu. 

Ms. Beverly Hunter: Co-Principal Investigator of the VISIT Project. Director, Piedmont Research Institute http://www.piedmontresearch.org (phone toll-free) 877 848-2100 email: bev@piedmontresearch.org.

Dr. Randy Raymond: National Advisory Board Coordinator of the VISIT Project. Geographical Information System Specialist, Detroit Public School, AERRaymond@aol.com.

Dr. Al Lewandowski: Online Facilitation Coordinator of the VISIT Project. Teacher Consultant, Michigan Geographic Alliance. ESRI Authorized GIS in Education Trainer. alew222@yahoo.com.

Teacher Leaders

Alfred Doyle; Fred Hohn; Matt Huston; Donna Iadipaolo; Joseph Kerski; Henrietta List; David Patton; Ron Robinson; Herschel Sarnoff; Bob Saxton; Mark Schaap; Alan Sills; Jose Vites; Steve Wanner.

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Course Goals

Overall Goal

Participants will learn to identify, locate, and analyze spatial data and apply these processes into their curriculum and classroom practice. Participants use software tools for visualizing and analyzing geospatial data, and apply it in an instructional setting. Teacher investigators will develop and implement investigations or lessons whose process and outcomes are connected to existing educational standards and benchmarks.

By the end of this course, a VISIT participant will complete one of the following projects, either working as a member of a team or as an individual:

  1. Develop a lesson or student project in which students in your classroom and curriculum use geo-referenced [geospatial] data and tools for visualization and analysis.
  2. Adapt an existing lesson for use in your own classroom, field test, and report results to the VISIT Collaboratory.

Supporting Goals

Throughout the course and in support of that overall goal, you will learn and practice the following:

  1. Collaborate with teachers, scientists and technologists on issues related to the topics of this course (including getting technical or scientific assistance with one’s own project, and assisting others in their project development). This is accomplished mainly by participating in online discussion forums--- the Educators' Forum.
  2. Locate, navigate and become familiar with VISIT's  information, tools, lessons, data sources, other resources and people in VISIT collaboratory and on the WWW.
  3. Download and install lesson materials, software tools and databases used in VISIT.
  4. Learn and practice basic operations of one or more GIS software tools (ArcView, ArcVoyager, , web-based interactive mapping, others)
  5. Work through example curriculum-related inquiries using GIS-based short lessons. Begin to recognize and analyze spatial data
  6. Using the VISIT rubric, evaluate a sample lesson for use/adaptation in your classroom, students, community and curriculum.
  7. Adapt a lesson for use in your own classroom.
  8. Develop a lesson or student project for use in your own classroom.
  9. Locate and use online sources of georeferenced data for your own project.

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Graduate Credit Options
To make it easier for you to obtain graduate credits along the way as you continue your investigations, we offer a series of credit options, as explained below. 

Credit Option One

Credit Option One – 2 Credits (GIS Skill & Science Inquiry Lessons)

Teachers may receive two graduate credits from EMU after they have completed a selection of 8 lessons (a combination of GIS basic skill lessons, or/and GIS-based science inquiry lessons) and participated in the VISIT Collaboratory to exchange ideas and obtain technical support. A teacher new to VISIT can expect to complete this sequence within approximately six weeks of participation in the VISIT online program, and many returning teachers may already qualify for these credits.

Note: You may take Credit Option 1 plus one more option from Credit Option 2, or 3, or 4. This policy of “credit options” applies to teachers new in the February 2003 Semester as well as the teachers in the Fall 2002 and previous semesters. Therefore the teachers registered in previous semesters are encouraged to come back completing one of the project options.

Credit Option Two

Credit Option Two – 1 Credit (Classroom Tryout)

Teachers may receive an additional one graduate credit from EMU after they have tried out an existing lesson (a GIS basic skill or science inquiry lesson) in their own classroom. This option requires that a teacher submit one VISIT Curriculum Rubric done by herself or himself, three VISIT Curriculum Rubric completed by the students, and a summary report of the class try-out (such as, the grade level, class subject, number of students, student responses and assessments, etc.). A teacher can expect to complete this sequence within approximately three weeks after completing Credit Option 1.
Credit Option Three

Credit Option Three – 1 Credit (Evaluate A Teachers' Investigation)

Teachers may receive an additional one graduate credit from EMU after they have evaluated an investigation developed by teachers. The teachers' investigations are accessed through the line, "Teachers' Investigations" from the left panel within "EDUCATORS' RESOURCES". This option requires that a teacher submit one VISIT Curriculum Rubric done by herself or himself, and an evaluation report. The evaluation report will assess what is there and what isn't from the perspectives of curriculum and GIS, how to characterize the materials for possible users, and how to improve this investigation if you are revising or adapting it in your classroom. A teacher can expect to complete this sequence within approximately three weeks after completing Credit Option 1.
Credit Option Four

Credit Option Four– 1 Credit (Build A Basemap)

Teachers may receive an additional one graduate credit from EMU after they complete a GIS basemap for the future use in GIS lesson/project development and submit the basemap and data sets to the Collaboratory. A teacher can expect to complete this sequence within approximately three to four weeks after completing Credit Option 1.
Credit Option Five

Credit Option Five– 2 Credits (Build A Lesson)

Teachers may receive an additional two graduate credits from EMU after they (individually or as part of a team) develop a lesson or project for their own curriculum or community. A teacher can expect to complete the steps involved in developing this lesson in approximately six weeks after completing Credit Option 1.

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Course Information

Course Title

 VISIT Collaboratory

Course Number

VISIT 001
Course Discipline

Science Education
Course Description

This online Collaboratory introduces teachers to educational scientific and social science inquiry applications of geospatial information technologies and sources of geo-referenced data in topics such as population, demographics, environmental science, watershed analysis, community-based problem solving.
Location

VISIT Collaboratory on this dissemination site. You need register first to participate in the Educators' Forum. Please provide with a valid email address when registration for the forum. Then you can Login with user name and email address(serves as password) to join the class discussion Forum you interested. If you have any question, please find reference in "How to use the Forum" manual or contact lzhang2@emich.edu.
Meeting Day(s)

Self paced. Available Every day. Please plan to participate (post messages) at least three times per week. Each course week begins on Sunday and ends the following Saturday.
Meeting Time(s) Minimum of three hours per week of self-study and class discussion.

Prerequisite(s)

 Ability to connect via computer to the VISIT online collaboratory.

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