INTRODUCTION TO PHILOSOPHY

Course Requirements

Attendance in Second Life. Apart from the initial session where we will acquaint ourselves with Second Life and with each other, we will come together as a class twelve times during the term to discuss philosophy. Every Tuesday and Thursday I will be online in Second Life for two hours — from 9-10 AM and from 9-10 PM. The content will be repeated in these two hours, so you need attend only one of them. During the six-weeks of the course, you will need to attend at least ten of these Second Life sessions, if you wish to receive full credit. (So plan ahead; you can miss up to two of these days without penalty. If your life is so busy that you have to miss more than this, then you might want to consider extra credit opportunities to help with the shortfall.) If there is a consensus to move these hours to a more convenient time, then I will be happy to do so. My aim is to offer enough opportunity that most students can dodge work schedules and other commitments. [For more on Second Life, see “What You’ll Need”]

These sessions will last one hour, and I will expect everyone to come prepared to talk.

To be prepared to talk requires the following: [see the grading rubric]

(1) you have worked through the assigned texts,

(2) you have had a chance to think this material over,

(3) you are awake and alert, and in a “real life” environment free of distractions.

(4) at least 15 minutes before our discussion begins, you need to send me an IM with a question that you have about the reading (e.g., some claim that you think is mistaken or that we need to discuss).

I have two clear goals with these sessions: First, to give you the opportunity to ask questions about the readings. Second, to give you the opportunity to discuss philosophy in real time with others in the class. I will be evaluating your participation, in terms of both quantity and quality.

We will be seated in a room, or perhaps in stadium seats up in the clouds — that is, our avatars (or AVs) will be seated — and we will communicate by typing, with the comments appearing above the AV’s head and in the chat window. I will type, but may also use voice chat (to keep up with questions and to speed information transfer in general). This is a virtual world, but the people and the discussions are as real as anywhere else and, as with any discussion, it is important to listen to the other students, try your best to understand them, ask questions when you aren’t sure, and be polite. The discussions that we have will all be recorded (you will be able to set your Second Life preferences so that these “chats” are automatically saved to your computer when you quit Second Life), and I will be re-reading these logs when assigning participation grades.

Readings. The readings are collected into twenty-five modules, and listed on the Schedule; I expect you to read through all the materials listed as “Required” in each of the modules (the “Other Resources” are for your further inquiry; you are welcome to incorporate this material in your journal writings). There will be a quiz over this material at the end of each module, and you will also be asked to post brief Discussion Forums (and comment on other student's posts) on some of these readings.

Discussion Forums. The majority of your time will be spent reading texts and writing Discussion Forum posts (eight posts total). One or two posts are due every week (see the schedule). Feel free to use brief quotes from the reading, when this is appropriate, but keep the quotes brief, and remember that it is almost always best to paraphrase. Late Policy: late posts will lose one point, and then one more point every 24 hours. (For more explicit directions on writing these posts, as well as a grading rubric, see “Discussion Forums”)

Quizzes. There will be timed objective quizzes after each module (for a total of 25), as well as seven review quizzes. With some of the modules, the quiz date is delayed until after a class discussion can take place in Second Life. You will be able to review a quiz you’ve taken the day after it is due.

Quizzes are meant to insure that you keep up with the readings, and that you are achieving an appropriate level of understanding. The quizzes will be short (ten questions each) and will primarily concern those items in the module listed under “WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW HOW TO DO.” Only the top 25 quiz grades will be counted towards your course grade.

I will also provide brief practice quizzes so that you have a better sense of whether you are ready to take the graded quiz. I suggest that you take the practice quiz, consider what you missed, re-study the relevant material, and then re-take the practice quiz, until you are able to answer all the questions correctly.

Extra Credit Journals. In nearly every module, you will the opportunity to write a journal for extra credit; see the page on Writing for more information.

Grading.The set of eight Discussion Forums (posts plus comments) is worth 60% of the course grade; the set of twenty-five module quizzes is worth 25%; and participation (in the Second Life discussions) is worth 15%.

I use the following letter grade conversion scale: A (94-100), A- (90-93), B+ (87-89), B (83-86), B- (80-82), C+ (77-79), C (73-76), C- (70-72), D+ (67-69), D (63-66), D-(60-62), F (0-59).

Students with Disabilities. Manchester College, in compliance with federal guidelines, is committed to providing students with disabilities an access to programs and activities that is equal to the access provided to students without disabilities.

If you believe that you need an accommodation due to a disability, please contact Bonnie O’Connell, the director of services for students with disabilities, to establish your eligibility and to coordinate reasonable accommodations. It is your responsibility to seek this accommodation. Students whose accommodation requests are approved will be given confidential letters to deliver to their professors that verifies the nature of the student’s disability and documents the need for auxiliary aids and services and/or academic adjustments/accommodations. Students are encouraged to meet with each professor early in the semester to discuss the academic implications of the disability as they relate to the specific course and to request appropriate accommodation. The Disabilities Office is located in the Success Center (second floor of the Manchester College Union); please telephone 260-982-5076 to schedule an appointment.

Cheating and Plagiarism. Plagiarism consists of submitting the statements, ideas, opinions, or findings of another as if they were your own. It is not plagiarism to copy from or paraphrase a source as long as this is acknowledged and the source is cited. Cheating and deliberate plagiarism will result in automatically failing the class. For more information, see the college Catalog.

Manchester College // Registrar // Department of Religion and Philosophy // Last updated: 23 May 2011