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[neutralname]

For one of my online courses, I assigned students the task of explaining a scholarly article that I had already explained in my online lectures and in Powerpoint.  Some did the task well, but others did not.  The assignment of reading a scholarly article is daunting for some students -- the level of sophistication of the argument seems too great, and their brains overheat and melt.  Their attempts at explanation are a word salad.

It occurred to me that I might could try annotating the pdf of the scholarly article with comments and explanations about the functions of particular paragraphs, explain technical terms, and highlight when the author is discussing the views of other people rather than stating his own views. 

Has anyone tried this, or tried a similar sort of explanation with older technology (like photocopies of the annotated article)?  Any experience as to how well it works?

[changinggears]

Yes, I always do this when introducing my students to annotating.  I generally introduce annotating by modeling it.  I'll put the article on the ELMO and talk my way through annotating it.  Then, later I'll have students annotate an article and put samples up on the ELMO and have the class discuss the methods used to annotate (marginal notations vs. sticky notes vs. just highlighting vs. double-entry notetaking, etc.) and compare their own annotations.  I think modelling annotating is a good first step because it simultaneously shows them the kind of thinking and questioning that they should be doing as they read and the correct method for annotating.  Even if you encourage or require annotations, students tend to rely on just highlighting what seems to be important info rather than actively engaging with and questioning the ideas.  They not only need to be taught different methods for annotating, but also the thought processes behind it.

This past semester I experimented with having students work together to annotate texts using Diigo.  I created a Diigo group account for the class and bookmarked texts.  The students then had to annoate the text.  Diigo allows you to highlight sections and add notes with a sticky note as well as carry on a threaded discussion; all annotations are saved to the bookmarked version of the webpage, so students can see other's annotations and add their own.  Not only did students enjoy collaborating on their annotations but I could see how students were annotating and provide feedback to them.

[neutralname]

changinggears

Thanks.  That's very useful.

Do you think the talking through the annotation is important, and would be useful to reproduce for an online course?  I could do that using Camtasia.  Or would it be enough to just make the annotated documents available to the students and require them to emulate the annotation that I do?

[changinggears]

changinggears

Thanks.  That's very useful.

Do you think the talking through the annotation is important, and would be useful to reproduce for an online course?  I could do that using Camtasia.  Or would it be enough to just make the annotated documents available to the students and require them to emulate the annotation that I do?

I, personally, feel that it's important to model the thought process for the reasons stated upthread.  I think that simply asking students to emulate my annotations doesn't really help them to internalize the process and the reasons why we annotate.  They may not necessarily understand why or how annotating helps them understand a text if all they see is the end result and my students , at least, never quite succeed at simply emulating.  I would use the analogy of a car motor: asking students to emulate something you've already completed would be like someone giving you a car motor that was already put together and asking you to put together you own car motor using their example.  Some people could pull it off, but not many.  Most people would have a better chance of putting together their own motor if they could watch someone else put together a motor first.  If your students have experience annotating and understand the how and the why, then using your own annotations to explain a text might be sufficient.  But if you're trying to teach and encourage students to annotate the texts themselves, I think modeling is essential.