Welcome to Econ 206 Online at SCSU for the Fall 2011 semester!
This website is for both Dr. Rebeck’s and Dr. Switzer’s online courses. The exams and discussion posts will be graded the same, and the material you have to help you learn the concepts is the same: custom-created lecture notes and videos, links to interesting articles and examples of these concepts in the real world. It is recommended that you first read the corresponding chapter(s) in the textbook, then sit down and watch the videos. You are advised to learn the content in these modules the same way you would learn if you were sitting in a lecture: by paying attention and taking notes on what you are learning so that you can study those notes before doing the quizzes and exams. The only major difference between this online course and a lecture-based course is that you have the option of pausing if there is too much to write, or rewinding if you did not understand something that was said — a luxury that students in lecture-based classes probably wish they had.
When you click on the content pages on the left, you’ll notice that the dates listed on each module are in November 2009 — that’s when the skeleton for this website was established, and those dates are kept fixed so that the modules show up in chronological order on the left side of the page, making navigation easier. But that date is not an expiration date on the relevance of the content. These pages every semester by adding videos and notes as we find things that need to be improved, or as current events arise that provide good examples of the concepts we’ll be studying in this course.
Click on the links in the left column to go to individual content pages for each module. All of the modules except the first one are password-protected — the password will be on the introductory course page in D2L, and is the same for all modules.
To expand a video to full-screen, click the bottom-right button. When you are done watching the video, click the X button on the bottom-right and the screen will collapse back to regular size and you can then scroll through the rest of the page. If the font size in the content modules is too small for you to read comfortably, simply zoom in on the page (if you have a mouse with a scroll wheel, hold down the control button and move the scroll wheel up to zoom) — the paragraph width will adjust to fit into the window you have open.
After viewing all of the content within a module, you should then review the online tools provided to you by the textbook and go over your lecture notes. When you feel you are comfortable with the material, start on the Aplia practice problems, then do the Aplia homework and then take the Aplia quiz. And don’t forget to contribute to the discussion on D2L regularly so that you get a good discussion grade.
(For people not enrolled in this course: if you want access to the module pages, send me an e-mail and let me know why you would like access, and I will send you the password.)