reading notes: Web Teaching Guide: A Practical Approach to Creating Web Sites (I have found this book a good review while revising the sites, it basically covers it all for those teaching at my level, would be a good book for inclusion in the gradcenter program, have also have been discouraged while reading it since what I think I have discovered is already covered in her book)
p. 16 Usage profile: how much time do you want students to spend with the site? will the site be in addition to the regular course load? or with it replace some from traditional curriculum? will site be operative during the full term? used in class
Teaching goals: what is hoped to be accomplished that can't be addressed in other ways or tools? what will site look like in two, four years?
p. 16-20 She ranks sites by administrative (providing course information) or supplementary (links to related sites or discussion space, support) or class resource (more essential to provide access to limited materials) or instructional (mechanism for instruction like in distance learning) or short term instruction (part of a semester) - compare this with Jackson!
p. 66 using the web site for peer review - have to think about this
p. 171 students not used to having systems properly configured as part of coursework
p. 198 pre-class checklist (this is for the teacher to give presentations but applies to what to cover with students): browsers preferences, additional software (plug-ins), memory, monitor resolution and color settings, audio
p. 200 copyright changes - fair use does not apply because web site is public, rather than hidden behind classroom walls with select audience, not limited to class participants

A Field Guide to Visual Tools by David Hyerle (this book brought me to think of a web site as a concept map. this backs up the idea that teaching LD students is good teaching - application of best practices)

 
ouch! just accidently hit some keys and lost what I have put here for the last 15 minutes. This makes me mad!
I was writing about the ups and downs of yesterday as a typical sensation. To cut to the chase what is grounding me is to use the feedback from other faculty to revise the sites. I hadn't been really using it and just tinkering away with little sense of completion. These give me a task list and I have to keep reminding myself to just let it go at that. An email from Peggy brought this to me. She had read the comments and was asking me about them. So this new focus of revising the sites in accordance to the feedback rather than my own circling around. Then I can really review them in terms of accessibility and am developing this summary sheet that is capturing the application of this project.

 
Some frustrations - landmark internet is down. Came to gradcenter but was interrupted by groups invading the classrooms. It's my anxiousness at play. I have decided to forego taking the afternoon off to keep working. I think the site x is done except for testing - kurtzweil and usability. Feel I need to set up front page server to work on site y so I have moved on to site z. My goal to standardize the sites is not really working out. It's too time consuming with no reward. I get it now, the LD angle for making web sites is coming into sight. One aspect of this comes from the Anderson-Inman handouts about concept mapping I got from Ellen Engstrom. In a way a web site works as a concept map - it supports as well as forwards/enhances the instruction. The organizational format is a part of the message and can be an educational objective. Another insight comes from my conversation with Pam about accessibility. She feels as if we should instruct students how to set their browser preferences rather than go for such variations for web design. It comes back to the accomodation/enabling situation - to give a fish or to teach how to fish, to teach content or process. This is the crux of the matter. Landmark's mission to develop metacognition, self-advocacy and independence. Learning disabilities provides a gray area - not blind, not deaf, an impairment that creates a discrepancy between apparent aptitude and achievement. Instruction must include teaching how to learn.

 
capstone seminar yesterday. These always leave me feeling a little stressed - a sortof reality check - a get going feeling. Not that I don't learn new things, pick up tips and enjoy my classmates but it serves to mark that time is slipping by. I am trying to pace myself, work on the capstone in the mornings and take on the rest of life at other times but this only works so far for me. But I don't know of a better way right now.
Have been looking at some materials from ellen engstrom about concept mapping for LD students and this is the real deal. Have been trying to extrapolate toward course web sites. If we can generalize about LD students is that we want to help manage the cognitive load and by providing organizational systems we can do that. Need to make the web site organization really clear and connected. That's why intuitively it has felts as if usability testing and practice is the way to go. thinking of my web site as a concept map is shaping my design at the moment.