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University
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Josefa Lago Graņa Hispanic Cultural Studies (Spanish 250) Date Awarded: Fall 2000 URL: www.ups.edu/faculty/jlago/sp250. Project Description: I completed the first stage of this project during the Advanced Faculty Workshop at the Center for Educational Technology at Middlebury College, VT, between June 4-11, 2000. The workshop allowed me to design the basic framework for the site, plan the general structure of the course and start work on the History pages, upload text, pictures and links. A Course Release in Fall 2000 allowed me to complete the project. This course in being taught in Spring 2001 and so far it is proving to be a very positive experience. The purpose of this project was to design a web-based textbook to serve as the main source of reference, information, exercises, and testing for the course. Spanish 250 introduces the student to cultural studies and considers the history, visual arts, music, and prevalent cultural myths integral to the civilizations and cultures of Spain and Latin America. It explores the relevance of these cultural elements within a Hispanic context and a larger world perspective. I wanted to provide my students with a controlled version of all the possibilities the Internet has to offer in the area of Hispanic culture and civilization. Although there are some excellent textbooks available to teach this class, the advantage of an on-line textbook is that its content is not pre-set, and it can be modified to integrate new developments on current events, or recently developed links to new information. This is especially useful in a class on culture. The electronic textbook for Spanish 250: Hispanic Cultural Studies features a main page: http://www.ups.edu/faculty/jlago/sp250. It includes a menu with entries such as Syllabus, History, Art and Folklore, Maps, Resources, Exercises, Exams, and Links. The first entries consist of texts that provide information on History, Art and Architecture and Folklore that the students will need to learn, and links to pages with more detailed information on each of the topics covered. An interactive map, with several overlaying surfaces, serves to show simultaneously a synchronic and diachronic history of both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. This feature serves as a complementing tool to the information provided in other areas of the on-line textbook, and is used in class as well as for assignments. Exercises and exams are being developed using the Web-based Makers program developed by Swarthmore University. |
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