China+ODYSSEY+SYLLABUS

**Earth Odysseys Mentor Seminar** Fall Term 2008 Mondays 1-4, 2310 SEB

Instructors: Sui Wah Chan E-mail: chansuiw@umich.edu Phone: 418-2920 Office: 2202 School of Education Office hours by appointment

Jeff Stanzler (Contact Jeff for all administrative questions) E-mail: stanz@umich.edu Phone: 763-5950 Office: 2202 School of Education Office hours Wednesdays 1-2 in 2202 School of Education, or by appointment

COURSE PURPOSE

This seminar is intended to provide an opportunity for you to share your knowledge and experience as you seek to engage a diverse network of students in computer-mediated discussions of social and cultural issues. It is also intended to provide a place where you can become acquainted with aspects of the history and culture of China, and the social practices and cultural mores observed by our travelers, Matthew and Sarah Baughman, in their explorations of China.

Earth Odysseys is a work-in-progress. Each term we ask university students to guide high school and middle school students through a process of reflective thought as they consider (and perhaps reconsider) their own cultural practices and viewpoints through looking at those of others. This will be a challenge for the students (as well it should be!) and supporting the students will require patience and understanding on your part, as well as hard work. It is also a process, like most good teaching, of trial and error. Perhaps the single most advantageous trait for an Odysseys Mentor to possess, or to cultivate, is a willingness to experiment with an idea and continually adjust your mentoring based on your interpretation of what happened (or what didn’t happen). We hope that in the process of doing this work you will further explore your own educational beliefs, and broaden your intellectual perspective. It has been said that a significant portion of what is labeled as teaching is actually learning. We welcome you to what we hope will be a challenging, enjoyable learning experience.

COURSE GRADING

This should be very simple. Virtually every mentor in the history of Earth Odysseys chose this class because of their enthusiasm for helping kids to learn about more about their world, to sharpen their thinking, and to feel more confident in their writing and in articulating their point-of-view. As a consequence of this intrinsic motivation, most mentors do top quality work. Still, you should know the criteria upon which your grade will be decided:

1) Diligence and the quality of thought as shown by your participation in, and preparation for seminar.

2) The quality of your research paper and other class assignments.

3) Most Importantly...the quality and frequency of your on-line interactions with the students, and your demonstrated engagement with doing this mentoring work, and with your reflection on this work. You will have a key role in supporting the students as they seek to engage with ideas and to conduct a rich and respectful discourse. Your mentoring work constitutes the most important aspect of the course. The general rule is that you’re expected to spend 5 hours per week doing your on-line work (or other out-of-class assignments), and to be consistent in responding to the students, as well as completing reading and other course assignments. We expect that each of you will be making between five and ten substantive postings per week once the online discussions with the students begin in October.

REQUIRED TEXTS

“China: Its History and Culture" (4th ed) by W. Scott Morton and Charlton M. Lewis (McGraw Hill: New York, 2005)

Available at Shaman Drum, 315 S. State St. tel. 662-7407

READINGS, ASSIGNMENTS & CLASS TOPICS (subject to change):

September 10th Introduction to China, Background on the Earth Odysseys Project.

Readings to be discussed on September 18th: Morton and Lewis, Chapter 18, Fallows reading (on CTools)

September 17th History and Geography of China.

Readings to be discussed on September 24th: Morton and Lewis, Chapters 1-2; Reports (and responses) from our Blog site.

September 24th History of China, continued. Online Project Begins week of September 24th

Readings to be discussed on October 1st Morton and Lewis, Chapters 3-4; Reports (and responses) from our Blog site.

October 1st Religion & Philosophy; Website and the Mentoring Process.

Readings to be discussed on October 8th Morton and Lewis, Chapter 17, “China Blue” Study Guide (on Ctools)

Odyssey Reports posted this week Our First Day (Matthew)

October 8th “China Blue”

Readings to be discussed on October 22nd: Morton and Lewis, Chapter 5.

Odyssey Reports posted this week Politics (Sarah) Communist China, Or Capitalist? (Matthew)

October 15th Winter Break

Odyssey Reports posted this week The Impervious Culture (Matthew) Saving Face (Sarah)

October 22nd China enters “Modern Times”; Initial Reflections on the Mentoring Process; Discussion of research paper ideas.

Assignment due: One page initial proposal for Research Paper.

Readings to be discussed on October 29th: Morton and Lewis, Chapters 7 & 8.

Odyssey Reports posted this week: Chinese New Year (Sarah) Food (Matthew)

October 29th Ming Dynasty; Feedback on Initial Proposal for Research Paper.

Readings to be discussed on November 5th: Morton and Lewis, Chapters 9 & 10.

Odyssey Reports posted this week Censored! (Sarah) Vietnam (Sarah)

November 5th Chinese Politics; Research Paper Proposals.

Assignment due: Final Proposal for Research Paper—be prepared to briefly discuss your final proposal in class.

Readings to be discussed on November 12th: Morton and Lewis, Chapter 11.

Odyssey Reports posted this week Personal Space (Sarah) Subway (Sarah)

November 12th Cultural Mores; China and the West

Readings to be discussed on November 19th: Morton and Lewis, Chapter 12.

Odyssey Reports posted this week Health Care (Sarah) Can I Get A Latte With That Stretcher? (Sarah)

November 19th Health Care in Contemporary China; Upheavals of the 20th Century in China

Readings to be discussed on November 26th: Morton and Lewis, Chapters 13-14.

Odyssey Reports posted this week Adventures in Language: The Good Stuff (Sarah) Adventures in Language: The Hard Stuff (Sarah)

November 26th The Chinese Language; The Reform Era

Readings to be discussed on December 3rd: Morton and Lewis, Chapters 15-16.

Odyssey Reports posted this week (to be discussed Dec. 3): Trip to Suzhou and Beijing (Matthew) Beijing (Sarah)

December 3rd More on Chinese Language; Research Paper

Assignment due: Research Paper

Odyssey Reports posted this week (to be discussed Dec. 10): Shopping and Bargaining (Matthew) Sitting at the Bund (Matthew)

December 10th China Today; Final Reflections

Assignment due: Final Reflection Paper

OUR CLASS “BLOG” Our blog site is located at:

http://ody.waycoolprojects.com/

ID Login: your complete umich e-mail address (e.g. stanz@umich.edu) Password:

Follow the "Stuff" link and post responses to two of the four student responses that are there each week. Underneath your actual response, write a little bit about why you wrote what you did: What did you want the student to think more about? Where did you want to offer praise and/or encouragement? Did you see any opportunities to help them make connections with their own lives?

ODYSSEY REPORTS

We expect that all of you will read all of the reports, and expect that you will participate in any and all online discussions. We will, however, have a schedule by which you will each be asked to briefly present, in class, about selected reports and the discussions that took place around those reports. More details about this in October.

WEEKLY MENTORING JOURNAL

Once the online interactions begin in early October, we would like you to keep a weekly online journal in which you chronicle some of the details of your experience as a mentor. We may ask you to address a specific topic from time to time but, as a general rule and in the absence of a specific task from us, we’d like for you to choose one of the responses you posted each week, and tell us the story behind it, what you were hoping to accomplish with the response. You might discuss your understanding of the student posting to which you were responding, what you felt was needed by way of a response, and why you thought so. You could talk about what a particular student response evoked for you personally, or a choice you faced as you thought about responding, or a challenge you faced in thinking about or crafting your response. Your journals will be kept in your blog, which will be a part of the Earth Odysseys web site. Again, we will have more specifics about this in October.

RESEARCH PAPER

We would like you to use your culminating project to explore a topic that interests you, a topic suggested by one of the reports and focused on China. We will discuss this in more detail, but we will be looking for a 5-8 page paper that explores and responds to a research question that you craft for yourself. We would like for you to use the first several weeks of class to look through the reports and to think about a topic that interests you. On October 22nd, we ask that you hand in a one-page initial statement of your area(s) of interest. We will respond to this statement by our next class meeting on October 29th. Then, on November 5th, we’ll ask that you turn in a more developed, final version of your proposal that responds to any feedback we’ve given you, and that frames the central research question that you are interested in exploring. The paper is due on December 3rd.

FINAL REFLECTION

At our final class on December 10th, we would like to reflect with you about your experience as a mentor…what you learned, what you think that the student’s learned, how the experience could be improved, etc. We ask that you prepare a written reflect on aspects of your mentoring experience in a 3-5 page (double spaced) reflection that responds to these prompts:

A) Select a student posting that you feel was of particular merit and explain what it was about the posting that you found especially noteworthy. Think of yourself as offering guidance to a teacher who is asking you, "What skills might my students develop or enhance by virtue of participating in Odysseys?" Please include the text of the actual posting.

B) Talk about an insight you gained from your Odyssey experience about yourself as a teacher and/or a learner. Use this as an opportunity to tell us a story about your mentoring experience and how you made sense of it. If the experience is connected to a particular interaction, please include the text of that interaction.

C) Offer one piece of concrete advice for a future mentor….a strategy you’ve employed, or something you’ve figured out that you think they would find helpful, or something you wish you knew in September…and write about it. We’re augmenting our mentor handbook based on your suggestions.

WEB RESOURCES

There will be multiple occasions where you will need to have access to information about China. Here are some good sources—we will distribute others in class:

Asia for Educators http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/

Ask Asia http://www.askasia.org/

Education about Asia http://www.aasianst.org/eaa-toc.htm

Internet Public Library http://www.ipl.org/ (Started at our School of Information, this is a splendid collection of links to resources...search for China, and off you go!!)

China Mirror http://www.chinamirror.org/ Login: chinamirror PW: chinaed