Week 7 - It's All Too Much: Class Resources and Intellectual Property

I loved the title of Week 7 and I agree with Lisa about "It's All Too Much". I had a hard time digesting all the information about intellectual property, especially understanding all the details about the laws. I guess for my online classes, I will use open sourced online materials and the traditional copyrighted textbooks that students purchase.

I enjoyed the article about the accessibility issues. First, I am a strong believer that everyone should have equal opportunity and equal access to the materials available in the internet including disabled people. Second, this issue affects my personal family. My mother who has been a ferocious reader since her childhood has been diagnosed with macular degeneration. Now, she will be able to access free printed portuguese materials with large print through the  Project Gutenberg and Internet Archive.

I will definitely be making use of the free open educational resources. For my practice, I would use the college open textbooks from College Consortium especially for mathematics and chemistry. I found a great algebra review from Geogebra which uses interactive online activities using a "procedure-based" dynamic approach. Students are in control of their learning by creating their own problems  in the areas that they need extra practice and review. When necessary, the activity shows the next steps with hints and explanations to the students. All solutions  are presented in steps with answers. A printable version is available, The downside of this resource is that you need Java to have access to the activity and ten correct answers to master the skill. The link is  http://archive.geogebra.org/en/wiki/index.php/Self-Assess_Algebra_Review

I am in favor of implementing the open textbooks not only at the community college level, but throughout the K-12 public schools. It would save money that can be allocated into other educational programs such hiring more aides and would provide free high-quality online textbooks to all the students. If the students have the access and training to the proper technology and tools, the later action can help reduce the achievement gap amongst the poor and minority students.

Instead of creating my own Mind Map, I decided to post a link of a Mind Map from mindmeister  for 50+ free learning websites for Elementary School Students, Mind Map, How I would have liked to do it. This Mind Map represents what I would like to have done, but mind mapping does not fit my thinking style.