Distance+Classes

Many feminists have reservations about distance classes; they feel the lack of human contact will reduce the quality of their course, and they believe that the structured and hierarchical nature of a learning management system is antithetical to feminist philosophy. There are also objections to "talking head" courses, where the use of recorded lectures can contribute to the idea that knowledge is a "product." There are also fears that as our coursework is "shelved" in learning management systems there will be fewer courses, fewer voices, and an impoverishment of the curriculum.

One way to avoid this is to **take control of the technology yourself.** Assess the technology available to you in your learning management system, and only use applications that conform to your teaching philosophy. If you find an application restrictive, find another tool that will serve you better.

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 * If you are lucky enough to work in a university that doesn't impose a corporate system on instructors, investigate open source LMS like Moodle http://moodle.org/ and Sakai http://sakaiproject.org/ These are free, open source tools that are being built collaboratively by educators.
 * There are many free applications that can make your course more collaborative. Look elsewhere on this wiki to find examples.
 * Learn to do your own podcasting, so that you can easily change your course from year to year, and can respond to current events quickly. You can even identify a student's contributions to the course, to personalize your lectures.

Our universities are pushing us to use more and more technology. How can we do this in a way that conforms with feminist pedagogy? How do we avoid isolating our students, or turning our courses into factory output?

Screen Capture Software
This takes a little patience to learn, but the software isn't difficult. Controlling the production of your podcasts means you can easily change your course from year to year, and can respond to current events quickly. You can even identify a student's contributions to the course, to personalize your lectures. The software is installed on your computer, and you can use a webcam to record yourself. You can also make recordings of your computer screen; for example, you could record your screen as you are researching the web, as an example for an information literacy section of your course.

media type="youtube" key="KTvCHgnVVRw?rel=0" height="351" width="432" align="right" Another use of screen capture software is //machinima//, films made in virtual worlds. It is relatively simple to record your avatar in your virtual classroom. The video on the right was made by screen capture: []

Software: Jing light is free. http://www.techsmith.com/Jing/?gclid=COjchoXHwqcCFcxj2godxxHS_Q

For mac: IShowU is about $70, but a very nice program. Their support staff is extraordinary. http://store.shinywhitebox.com/ishowuhd/main.html

For pc and mac: Camstasia has a free 30-day trial. http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/

Don't forget to check to see if your institution offers discounts or free software!

Virtual Worlds
Virtual worlds offer a 3-D persistent social space where students can collaborate in real time. The video above was made in the virtual world Second Life using iShowU. See the blog [|Exploring the Virtual Classroom]for information on feminist teaching in virtual worlds.

If you are a beginner in virtual worlds teaching, start here: []

There is an ongoing debate in distance education over whether online courses should be SYNCHRONOUS or ASYNCHRONOUS.

A synchronous course allows students to participate in their own time, but prevents real-time social interaction. Proponents of synchronous courses argue that learning is a social phenomenon and should not be relegated to online discussion boards. Proponents of asynchronous courses argue that many of our students work, and find synchronous courses a burden. How does feminist pedagogy fit into this argument?