Intro to the Class-Responsibilities and Site Overview

Hi, everyone. I'm glad you found our course blog, hopefully with little trouble, and I welcome you to our main course "hub". If you're not familiar with blogs, please spend some time today learning as much as you can. Play around and see what's here and what happens when you click on things. And make sure you're able to access the materials in Google Docs. That, reading the syllabus carefully, and buying your textbook (see the syllabus) are your main priorities for today. Here's a general overview of these sites:

Responsibilities: It is absolutely crucial for participation in an online writing class that you read everything carefully, not just the articles we'll be reading, but also the class blog, the instructions for your daily activities and major writing projects, any emails which are sent, etc. It takes an independent learner to be able to survive and thrive in an online class environment, so you'll need to take responsibility for trying to find answers to your questions (by reading and re-reading instructions, finding a classmate you can ask on the blog or by phone or email, etc.) before you email me. I'll be happy to answer any questions you have, but please do everything you can to make sure the answers aren't already addressed somewhere on our course sites.

About the Blog:
Our class blog is public (which means anyone can view it), but only those who have been invited can post to it (and you'll need to be able to post to it). Please check your BRONCMAIL account for an email invitation to the blog from me.
Discussion-You'll see that here in the middle will be our main discussion place. This is where I'll put specific discussion questions or directions for activities that require you to post to the blog. You can post your own new posts by clicking on "New Post" in the top right corner of your screen, and you can post a comment to an existing post by clicking on the "X Comments" link at the bottom of the post.
Search Feature-At the top right, you'll see a search button you can use for our blog. That will come in handy as our discussions get archived and material you may want to access again is not here on this main page anymore.
Calendar-Below the search feature, you'll see our calendar. That's where I'll post what we'll do each day and what you need to do for homework.
Class Documents-Here, you'll see links to any class documents you might need (syllabus, handouts, major project assignments, etc.) as well as other useful links (UTPA library, Purdue's Writing Center site, etc.). If you find a useful link you'd like to share with the class, run it by me, and, if it looks good, I can always add it for you.

About Google Docs:
There's a link to Google Docs here on the blog, and there's a pretty good description of how we'll use it in the syllabus. You need to make sure you have access before the day is through, so please check your BRONCMAIL account for my invitation to this site. You will need to create a Google account if you don't already have one, but you will not be required to use a Gmail email address. Do some troubleshooting on your own and ask questions on the blog if you have any trouble. Maybe someone else in the class can help you.

NOTE: I will be at a conference from Wednesday through Sunday, so I will be checking in on our class during short intervals throughout those days and again later in the evenings. Please bear with me if you have questions; I promise you that I will get back to you as quickly as I can. If at all possible, use the blog to write a post and ask your questions, and if someone else in class knows an answer to your question(s), please post a comment to answer them. We'll be relying a lot on one another to make the class run smoothly, so there's no better time to start that than now!