COMP8035 Week 01 Tutorial

I gave feedback based on the blog posts I had seen before class. The ones I saw were fine although some students needed to make some minor adjustments.

We decided on IEEE format for references.  Users of MS Word should figure out how to make the most of the built-in in referencing tools.

The tutorial classes will be optional for students (not for me), but it is a good chance to get feedback on progress and get help with individual issues.

COMP8035 Week 01 Lab

I spoke about the assessment for the module.

I spoke a bit about using quality sources for research and gave out a list of journals available at CIT that I thought might be useful.

I asked students to

• select two topics
• find five articles about each one
• write a blog post listing them
• write a short comment on each topic
• write a short note on each paper

and e-mail me the URL for the blog


We watched Black Mirror: Nosedive and spoke a bit about ratings culture. That would be an interesting topic to research.

The deadline for these tasks is 1800 on Friday 

COMP8035 Autumn Repeat

To pass the repeat sitting of this module students must submit a 3500 word research paper on one of the following topics:

• Price Discrimination
• Big Data & Privacy
• Prediction Markets
• Ratings Culture
• Higher Education 2.0

The essays will be marked using the same rubric that was provided to students for the first sitting.

The paper is to be submitted vis TurnItIn.com before 2300 on 17 August 2016. The Class ID and password are the same as during the semester.  Students who already registered for the class on turnitin need not re-register.

COMP8023 Class 12.1 & 12.2

I met with each of the four students who came to class and gave each some feedback on his/her essay.

I will have fuller feedback for everyone in due course. I will e-mail students individually as their papers are ready for collection.

COMP8035 Classes 11.1 & 11.2

I gave back some of the papers I have received (late) with some comments. The comments weren't as thorough as on some others, but we are getting stuck for time.

I suggested to students that they might swap essays in advance of the next draft to try to catch typos and errors.

I met with each student to to get an update.

COMP8035 Class 09.1 & 09.2

I returned all the drafts I received on time with comments. We discussed some of the common issues.

I hope to have the drafts that were submitted late corrected soon.

COMP8035 Essay tips

Some things to watch for

• Quality sources.
• link points to make to evidence in literature
• Put a lot of thought into the structure

Style & Language issues

• there is no "we", no "you", no "us" 
• don't use ; unless you know what you are doing
• subject verb agreement are is very important
• don't use commas where full stops are required
• All sentences start with a uppercase letter. Yes. All of them.
• figure out the rule for the apostrophe. 
• i.e. and etc. are best avoided
• Put a space, after punctuation ,not before.
• Every good sentence has a verb
• there's no need to talk about "this report" or "this essay". just say what you have to say.
• you can use "above" or "below" to refer to other parts of the text
•  "With the ...", is a very weak way to start a sentence. Say what you what to say. be direct.
• incredible = cannot be believed

COMP8035 Classes 08.1 & 08.2

Michael gave a presentation on TV2.0

Afterwards I explained about referencing and the importance of connecting the bibliography with the main text.  We discussed the importance of using quality sources.

We discussed each student's essay topic and talk about some different approaches.

I gave out a rubric for the essay.  I had some corrected but those students were not in class.

When I have them all don I'll send an e-mail. My hope (but not expectation) is to have feedback on all of them before the weekend.

I didn't talk about the structure of the essays. But the overall organising structure is really important too.

Interesting article

http://www.economist.com/news/business/21695388-worries-about-fraud-and-fragmentation-may-prompt-shake-out-crowded-online-ad

COM8035 Class 06.3

Nobody turned up.

There will be no more Friday classes for this module.

COMP8035 Schedule

For you to be on schedule you should have a draft of you essay completed by the end of the month. Please send it on to me, when you have it done.

COMP8035 Classes 06.1 & 06.2

We had presentations from Jasmin and Kieran.  Albert was scheduled for today, but he will do his another day.

COMP8035 Class 05.3

I met with each student and discussed his/her essay and/or presentation.

COMP8035 Classes 05.1 & 05.2

Brian, Karl, and Dillion gave presentations.

COMP8035 Class 04.3

I met with each of the students and discussed the essay (&/ presentation)

COMP8035 Class 04.1 & 04.2

David gave a presentation.

With only one presentation we finished a bit earlier, but most students stayed and did a bit of work, as did I.

COMP8035 Class 03.3

I met with  each student and discussed progress with the paper.

COMP 8035 Class 02.3

Students worked away by themselves. I met with students who are presenting next week and helped them refine the focus of their topics.

COMP8035 S/he

Yesterday we discussed the problems of using gender neutral language in academic writing.

Here's an intersting podcast n the issue from Lexicon Valley

COMP8035 Classes 02.1 & 20.2

I gave students handouts on style, structure, academic tone and talked them through the most important points.

I gave a handout on the Chicago Style of referencing, and talked about it very briefly.