Semesters versus Quarters
The most difficult part of a course involves cramming all the important
material into the time available. The education system expects teachers
to hold a particular sequence of meetings, then have fully competent professions
to emerge to serve society on the other end. Such faith in the system seems
rather amazing considering how little contact time there really is to operate
a course. The process works best when the students take charge and spend
their own time to absorb the information and the skills. The lectures and
labs that teachers run are just the start in the discovery process.
In the North American university system, a course occurs in a term called
either a semester or a quarter. I have taught this course with three hours
of meetings in a thirteen week semester and I now teach it with five hours
of meetings in a ten week quarter. [A sample syllabus for each system appears
in separate tables.] Honestly, the ingredients are not the same. On paper,
there are more hours in a quarter system (50 versus 39) but the number of
weeks provide more time to develop a project and build a series of exercises.
Of course, the most focused way to teach might involve a week or two dedicated
to nothing but this course material. Much of the problem comes from keeping
the students on the topic with the inevitable distractions of life, work
and other classes. It is important to keep expectations within the range
of the possible. No matter what schedule configuration you might have to
work inside, an effective course on GIS can be built from these ingredients:
- Lectures
- Practical experience
- Case Studies
- Evaluation
Index from here: