The Six Rules for MTH 124:
- Budget your time. MTH 124 is a 5-credit course with no meetings, so you will need to plan on spending about 15-20 hours per week doing mindful work. That’s 3-4 hours per weekday if you choose not to work on weekends. If you are taking other courses or have job of family responsibilities, you’ll need to think about where to put these hours in your daily and weekly schedules. In my experience, the #1 reason students don’t succeed in online courses is overcommitment and not managing time well.
- Take initiative. Ask questions on CampusWire (or email, if they’re private) when you don’t understand something after working with it. And make the first move to help a fellow student with their questions if you can help.
- Get comfortable with technology. Being a fully-online course, we will use technology every day. Get comfortable with using technology early, so you can use it well.
- Stay engaged. As mentioned above, you are expected to check your GVSU email twice daily, read new posts on CampusWire twice daily, contribute to the discussion board daily, and make at least two significant contributions to CampusWire per week. Make daily engagement with the course a habit, and don’t take days off (unless it’s a weekend and you have all your work done).
- Maintain awareness. It’s each student’s responsibility to know the calendar, be aware of announcements, and keep up-to-date records of grades, course announcements, and upcoming events. “Not getting” an announcement and “not seeing” a calendar event are not options!
- Be professional. Maintain a positive, professional attitude, especially in email and discussion board interactions. Remember that it’s often hard to “read” the tone of another person through online communication, so make sure to go the extra mile to project professionalism.