Evan Strevell, Teaching Professor at Xavier University, writes: “with more or less two months to go, I was wondering whether it might be worthwhile to attempt some kind of call for the sharing of best practices specifically for teaching ancient philosophy online and / or in a hybrid format. It would be especially beneficial if veterans of teaching ancient philosophy online could share how they set up individual modules, the Student Learning Objectives [SLOs] for those modules, and tools for assessment of those SLOs. Prior to last semester’s panicked switch, I had never taught online. This Fall I have an ancient survey. I am hoping to be able to teach it in person as much as possible, but I would very much like to see how others have done things in the online format. I teach a 4/4 load (100+ students with no TA help) so I have to be very prudent in setting things up.”
That’s a great question! I’ve also been wondering about this, since all my teaching this fall will be online. A good place to start is this discussion between Mary Beth Willard and Paul Blaschko on how to set up an online course divided into modules. It’s addressing the question from the context of teaching philosophy as a way of life, but pretty much all of what’s said is relevant to an ancient philosophy course.
I’d appreciate any links to discussions, FAQs, videos etc. on this topic. Also, if anyone with experience teaching ancient philosophy online would like to write a guest post on this topic, I’d be happy to post it on this blog.
