How To Participate In Digipo (September 2017 version)

I will be preparing for my classes to start contributing to Digipo next week. I look forward to the storm of consternation that will crease my learners' faces as I trot out more crazy notions.

Every time I say I can’t make it easier to participate in Digipo, I find a way to make it easier.

The current process involves no skills greater than knowing how to work a word processor, and (more importantly) allows students to participate anonymously if they wish, without having to sign up for Google accounts or have edits tracked under pseudonyms. We accomplish this through a Microsoft Word template and by submitting the files into public domain.

You can of course use a more complex process, sign your name to the article, and use Google Docs as your central tool. Depending on your needs and skill level you may want to do that. It’s just not required anymore.

Here’s the steps.

1. Read (at least some) of the book.
2. Pick a question to investigate from our list of 300+ questions, or make up your own.
3. Have your students download this Microsoft Word template that guides them through an investigation of a question. Apply the skills from the book.
4. Do whatever sort of grading, assessment, or feedback you want.
5. Take student reports where the students have agreed to submit them into public domain, and zip up the word documents. Mail them to michael.caulfield@wsu.edu. Make sure you introduce who you are, what the class is about, and a bit about your experience as I do not open zip files from random people. Also give me a blurb about how your class would like to be identified on the site (they have the option  of remaining anonymous too). For verification purposes, send it from your university account. I may email back to verify.
6. I’ll put them on the Digipo site in a subdirectory with a bit about your class and give you a password that allows them to edit online going forward.
7. At a later point we’ll assemble a small panel of professors who will go through the student work and choose ones to “promote” to the main directory based on quality. The key question reviewers will ask is whether the document provides better information than at least one of the top ten Google results for the question.

That’s it!