The following workshop is being proposed for inclusion in the 2013 Society for Cinema and Media Studies Conference, which will be held March 6-10, 2013 in Chicago. http://www.cmstudies.org/?page=upcoming_conference

Workshop: Teaching and Learning at a Distance: Taking the Film, TV, and New Media Classroom Online

This workshop seeks to examine the current swell in online teaching and the unique challenges encountered by film, television, and new media professors.  As the academic landscape shifts to more flexible and student-centric modes of learning, online learning becomes much more attractive to both students and higher learning institutions. Therefore, university instructors are finding it necessary—or at least lucrative—to take their classes online.  This shift from face-to-face to online teaching and learning brings with it a number of preconceived biases about the superiority of a synchronous learning environment, in-class bonding, and effective means of higher level learning.  As more college and university courses go online, teachers must troubleshoot how to overcome such biases and how to bring the same quality learning to the virtual classroom.

Film and media professors are presented with a curious blend of advantages and disadvantages as courses go online.  While the new modality makes separate screening times unnecessary, allows an easy-access platform for displaying content, and allows students to share media they find relevant to the subject at hand, it also presents the instructor and institution with a sticky wicket of copyright issues and new challenges with regard to student engagement and accountability.  Just how are today’s professors taking advantage of the online classroom and how might they overcome some of the inherent struggles of online learning?

Topics might include but are not limited to:

·         Copyright issues·         Strategies for developing a strong classroom dynamic·         Creative resources for television and film content in online teaching·         Integrating students’ mediated passions into effective learning·         Using new media to interrogate old media·         Twitter as an effective learning tool·         High and low-tech online resources·         Effective software for communicating media analysis·         Methods for creating class discussion around a piece of media (or genre or series, etc.)·         Low-tech production based assignments that can be easily communicated and posted online

Please send abstracts of 250 words along with a short bio to Kelly Kessler at [log in to unmask] by August 10. Notifications to be sent by August 15th. 		 	   		  

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