An Assignment Born out of Insomnia

I could not sleep so I have created the following two discussion assignments for the most boring chapter in my econ 102 class. The credit should be given to Dirk Mateer at Penn State. I am nervous about the Beyonce assignment. Please advise me if I should do it or not?
Here is the link to his other musical ideas.
Assignment 1 The Slope of Demand Curve

Here is a song. Please read or listen to the lyrics and answer the following question.

Having bills to pay makes a number of people turn to crime in the song. When someone is so desperate for money that they they sell their body or steal, what type of demand do they have?

What will their demand curve look like? Will it be more vertical or will it be more horizontal?

Assignment 2 The Elasticity of Demand
Here is a video that has to do with the Elasticity of Demand. Listen or read the lyrics to the following song and answer the following questions:
Is Beyonce's demand for her boyfriend elastic or inelastic?
What did the boyfriend believe was the elasticity of her demand?
Did her elasticity of demand change? (hint: I was such a fool!)
Look at the title of the song what does it have to do with Elasticity?
Caution be polite and remember your posts can be read by others. Do NOT share too much information about your personal life!

New Attempt

I have playing around with this idea of using Google Hangout on Air feature where the hangout is automatically is posted on YouTube. My last attempt documented in this post was not very successful. Today I tested it out using Google Chrome and it worked well. Below is the results:

Accelerated Learning

I have been studying and thinking about how to improve our online program and to meet the expectations of the ACCJC during their next visit to our school. During my research I found a presentation and posted it on this blog.  As I watched the video I noticed that someone from the College of Canyons was a presenter. I decided to go to their website and found myself more intrigued by the concept of Accelerated Learning.

The following is a screenshot from their website:

College of the Canyons offers a variety of courses in accelerated, or short-term, learning formats. Our GO! classes are 5-week, online courses. PACE classes are typically 8-week hybrid classes that meet both Saturdays (on campus) and online. PAL courses are offered in pairs: two 8-week Math or two 8-week English classes offered back-to-back in one semester with the same instructor and same classmates. Please click on the links above to learn more about each program

Quickly, I realized that their PACE program is a variation on a little experiment  that economics department is conducting now. The economics department offers two eight weeks classes back to back in one semester. The idea was to help students to complete both Econ 101 and Econ 102 in one semester. During the first eight weeks of the semester Econ 101 is presented and during the second eight week of the semester Econ 102 is presented. Unlike regular 16 weeks classes which meet three hours a week, these classes meet for 6 hours a week. These classes are 100% on the ground or face to face.  (NOTE: This idea was inspired by my discussions with Dr. Wetsman)
The College of Canyon has taken this concept of Accelerated Learning and has added an online component. At our school we call these classes Hybrid classes. They are basically leveraging the online technology to shorten the classes. Students in this program will take 8 weeks courses, same as our students can in Economics at our school, without having to sit in 6 hours of lecture per week. The other three hours per week is completed online. The students complete homework and complete classwork which can assess SLOs, freeing up the remaining time for lectures and/or discussions.  This allows students to complete more units in the same amount of time.
Also instead of only one Department doing this they have scheduled a series of classes which lead to a degree. This is an important point! Why? Currently, students who have signed up for the first 8 weeks Econ 101 class may or may not sign up for Econ 102 during the second eight weeks. There are many reasons for students not signing up for Econ 102. It could be that they do not meet the Prerequisite (Math 70) for Econ 102 or it could be they have realized that Economics does not suit them and wish to study another subject. However, if only one department (econ) is offering these classes, they will have a void in their scheduled during the second eight weeks.
In my opinion, this program will benefit our students.

Using Google + In Class

Here is an idea that I may test out in class. I plan to place my laptop in front of the class and log into Google +.
Next I plan to start a Hangout (See picture below)

 

I will name the Hangout by the date and topic of the class.

I will enable Hangout On Air function which will stream the class live onto my Youtube channel. 

Step 3 I will copy the embed code from Google + into Blackboard

 Allowing students to watch on Blackboard. 

I tested out this idea in my classroom with nobody there. The following video was the result. The sound was not good. The cause of poor sound could be due to 1) my microphone on the computer, 2) Poor wifi network at school 3) poor performance by Google plus.

This post was updated on August 10 with the video of my experiment.

4 Steps 2 Happiness

I subscribe to illustrations by Carl Richards on his website Behavior Gap. I found this latest illustration on point. In my Economics classes I try to explain the concept of unlimited wants vs limited resources. Most of my students do not accept this concept and confuse wants with needs. I am thinking of assigning the following questions as homework after the first lecture.

• What if financial happiness is not about getting more but about wanting less?
• What if things start out as wants and become needs not because the thing itself has changed but because our feelings about it have changed?
• What if you can never really get enough of something that you don’t need?

I will modify the questions removing the word financial.  I encourage everyone to follow this link to view Mr. Richard's illustration.

Google Plus Hangout

This weekend was all about grading and avoiding the process of reading to grade. I read one or two papers and then would go on facebook. I would read a few more and look at my email. During one of these procrastination sessions, I started playing with Google +
I realized that they have improved their Hangout Feature which I have written about before.

Now they allow you to broadcast your Hangout on Youtube. 

I imagine using this feature in my face to face classes. where a student at home or at work can watch the lecture on Youtube.

Students can access the video from within Google Plus or directly from Youtube

The students can access it directly from Youtube. They do not need a G+ account. All they need is the link to the video.
 

Here is a link to the Google Plus Hangout support page

Lowering The Probablity of Things Going Wrong

Yesterday at PFC our Basic Skills Coordinator Sergio G. reported on the success that Basic Skill program is having with the retention rate of the first cohort of students in this program. The Basic Skills program is a very well planned and well run program under the leadership of Robert H. and Sergio G.  During this presentation one aspect  caught my attention and I began wondering if this aspect could be applied across the campus to increase success and retention rate for all of our students.  What caught my attention? The classes these students were registered for are 8 week courses.
During my time at Rio Hondo I have noticed that we have the greatest students who are here to learn. They come motivated with good attentions and most fail only when life gets in their way. I have had students, who have lost their jobs in the middle of the semester,  some who were evicted from their homes, some whose car were repossessed preventing them from getting to class, and yes some who had run in with the law. 
Intuitively, I see a correlation between our students difficult life events.and their success rate in my classes.
Currently most of the courses offered are 16 weeks long. That is 16 long weeks for things to go wrong.  I wonder if we offer 8 or 10 weeks classes will that increase the success rate of our students?
The probability of things going wrong is lower in a 8 weeks or 10 weeks classes thereby higher chance of success for our students.

Was it Discipline or Curiosity?

This article from Ed Source Community College Students Struggle to Pass College Level Math Courses got me thinking back to when I used to hate Math. It was only after returning from the U.S. Army that I had enough discipline to persist with the problem sets assigned. Beside the discipline I was lucky to have math teachers who presented the material in a way that appealed to my sense of curiosity. The curiosity created by these talented faculty may have been more instrumental in my love of math.

The Platonic Notion of Education

We have been looking for the perfect single way to deliver education. Instead we should be looking for the perfect ways to educate our students.  Different students learn in different ways. I am not talking about learning styles but modes of delivery. When I advocate for various methods of delivering the contents of our discipline to students, I am talking of in person, online and hybrid. The "platonic" notion  of how education is flawed. (in the video skip to the 13 minute). Just because "YOUR" educational experience was one way and "you" succeeded at that game does not mean everyone should be subjected to the same mode of delivery. The search for the "universals" masks the understanding of variability.

Faculty as Students

The virtual college has created a course to train the faculty on the new features of Blackboard. Now every faculty member should be enrolled in this course. By completing this course faculty members can receive flex credit. If this program is a success, then I will push to create other courses that faculty can take advantage of for flex credit.

If this succeeds, I see two beneficial outcomes. 1) Flex activity will truly become educational. 2) faculty will gain the perspective of students in an online class.

An Idea for my Website

Here is an idea for my website. It will be lots of work because I would have to build one page for each chapter.

Click on picture to see larger image

Where is our face on facebook?

Many of our students are on facebook. Actually many of our colleagues are on facebook (you know who are). I was playing around with facebook the other night and someone invited me to be a member of the Saddleback college facebook group. I accepted and next facebook recommended that I join IVC's (Irvine Valley Colleges) facebook group. I was curious so I did as I was directed and the next day I got a message in facebook.
The message stated that "the drop deadline without a W is September...."
I am wondering when will we get an official Rio Hondo Facebook account?

Paying Tuition

Here is a great idea from Santa Ana Community College. The professors at Santa Ana are chipping in to pay the tuition for low income students with grade point average of B and taking a full load at Santa Ana.
Read about it at Inside Higher Ed.

Are We Going The Way of T.V.? Part 2

On Wednesday I posted a video to this blog and asked "Are we going the way of T.V.?" I did not explain what I meant by this question.
In this interview Jeff Zucker's comment of:

"... our biggest challenge is....how are we going to make this transition from analog world where we programed to the viewer and told the viewer when the movie comes on to this digital world where everything is available whenever the viewer wants it..."

...made me think about the following.
For the most part the college set the schedule and tell the students Econ 101 is offered at the following set of times in the following rooms (very similar to how a movie theater offers movies to its patrons). Think of our regular face to face classes as the 'analog world' that Jeff is talking about and the online classes as the 'digital world' where the learning material is available whenever the student wants it.
This trend is coming to education and the community colleges are the first to be hit by it. Look at this article from Inside Higher Ed. Look for the following sections:

Community colleges reported an 18 percent increase in distance education enrollments in a 2007 survey released this weekend at the annual meeting of the American Association of Community Colleges...
Last year’s survey (2006) found community colleges reporting an increase in distance education enrollments of 15 percent.
...This year’s survey suggests that distance education has probably not peaked at community colleges.

Youtube Rio

I saw the following in the Chronicles of Higher Education. It got me thinking about getting the Virtual College to sign up for YouTube Rio. I am not joking. Take a look at the USC site on YouTube! El Paisano can have their videos, and each Division and Department can have their own video pages. Watch the video and you will not be disappointed!

Inserting Music Into My Course

I got an i-pod for my 40th birthday. I have become addicted to this little machine. First I uploaded my CDs (collecting dust in the garage) into i-tunes and onto my little i-pod. Also I discovered the shuffle function on the little machine, similar to the random function on your CD player.

Next, I discovered i-tunes store. No I did not buy anything, but found i-tune U.

I started with some lectures from MIT on Physic by Walter Lewin. He has a cult following both on the MIT campus and now on i-tunes (read previous post). Now I am downloading various lectures on various topics from Stanford, Berkely, MIT, and Duke.

So when you see me listening to my i-pod and pretending to be cool, it is not true. I am actually listening to some lecture. I am really a nerd pretending to be cool!

Today by mistake I left my i-tune on shuffle and after Paul Krugman's (an economist) speach, I was surprised by Rage Against The Machine!

Rage Against The Machine, is a heavy metal band from the late 90's. After the shock of the heavy metal my brain said "hey why don't you play music in class?"

I was thinking of the following senarios:

Everytime a student answers a discussion question correctly, I play music.

If so many students score high on an exam, I can play their music.

This next one is my favorite.

If I see someone napping, I can play Rage Against The Machine!

Did You Know?

I got the following email from Ms. Brock. I posted the video here. I think that I have already posted a different version of this video on the blog back on September 10. Anyway this is a great video and deserve a reposting.

My Weekend Reading

This weekend I realized that I hate long weekends. No school Monday and I am going crazy. I started reading various economics blogs which linked out. One story was about Gisele Bundchen wanting to remain the world's richest model and is insisting that she be paid in almost any currency but the U.S. dollar. This story made me think about how I wish I could be paid in Euro$.
Another story that caught my eyes was from Forbes about prediction market software. As the story points out most businesses and organizations 'under-utilize the value of one of their most coveted assets: the institutional knowledge of their employees, business partners and customers.' It made me think about our customers, the students. Is there a survey of our students? If yes where can it be found?
The Prediction markets work by soliciting input across a diverse group of "traders" inside and/or outside the organization. This sounds like shared governance.
The following are the steps for implementing such a system:

The first step in implementing a prediction marketplace is identifying the risk factors you want to monitor and the questions you want to ask about those risk factors.

The second step is deciding who will participate in your prediction market. Typically, you want as large and diverse a group as possible. Even departments traditionally not involved in decision-making processes may have a perspective that is useful to capture. If confidentiality of information is an issue, find a platform that lets you limit access to some questions and grant wider access to others.

Giving you time to address risk factors before they become serious issues is a key operational and competitive advantage. Prediction markets help cut through the clutter inherent in any large organization by revealing what people really think to ultimately create a more transparent environment where problems are known earlier and therefore addressed more effectively. Though managers may be uneasy about losing control over information they could once spin, most leaders agree: It is always better to know about a problem early on and put a plan in place while it's still containable. The alternative, as we have all learned, is crisis communications.

The article seems like a sale job. It is a commercial posing as an article but I looked at the Inkling Markets website and found some interesting ideas (I just may be really bored and think they are interesting).
For example I liked the following idea:

Idea Box / Idea Database / Idea Wall: A special email address, database, or physical space is set up to collect ideas by anyone in the company. Typically the ideas collected are reviewed on a periodic basis or are forwarded to an expert or manager in the area the idea pertains to. Metrics may be collected that measure the number of ideas created or the internal department or group with the most ideas and employees are measured on how often they've contributed.

But the idea I liked best was the following from their Build community page:

...what if you could make your users part of the content equation with a minimal amount of effort on your part? What if they could pose questions about the topic area they are already interested in and have others predict what's going to happen? Suddenly there is an entirely new channel of content available to your users that is completely self generating.

This new channel can be purely entertainment or can be designed for your customers or business partners to make them feel they are helping to drive product development.

I imagined a section on the Rio Hondo website where students, faculty, and classified staff can make suggestions. Then others can hit a buttons with Great idea or Terrible idea.
However I am back to reality now and can not wait till Tuesday when I go back to school to fight against terrible ideas and enjoy the good ones too.

The Typical Freshman

This is a link to Higher Education Research Institute. They survey students and have just released their survey on American Freshman for 2006.
One of the findings that deserve attention was that cost of college diverts students from their first choice. This should translate to higher enrollment numbers at community colleges.
Are we letting these students know of the possibility of completing their GE requirements at a fraction of the cost?

Economics of contemporary issues

This would be an interesting class to teach. I have linked this posting to a possible textbook for such a class.
1. Economic Growth: An Introduction to Scarcity and Choice.
2. An Introduction to Economic Systems and the Workings of the Price System.
3. Competitive Markets and Government Policy: Agriculture.
4. Efficiency in Resource Allocation: How Much Do We Have? How Much Do We Want?
5. Market Power: Does It Help or Hurt the Economy?
6. Air Pollution: Balancing Benefits and Costs.
7. Health Care: How Much? For Whom?
8. Crime and Drugs: A Modern Dilemma.
9. College Education: Is It Worth the Cost?
10. Educational Reform: The Role of Incentives and Choice.
11. Poverty: New Approaches to An Old Problem.
12. Tracking and Explaining the Macroeconomy.
13. Unemployment: The Legacy of Recession, Technological Change, and Free Choice.
14. Inflation: A Monetary Phenomenon.
15. Sustained Budget Deficits: Is This Any Way to Run a Government?
16. Social Security: Leading Issues and Approaches to Reform.
17. International Trade: Beneficial, but Controversial.
18. Financing Trade and the Trade Deficit.