Requirements and Expectations

Curiosity

This work, and this course, requires that you throw yourself into it. It is not a checklist of rubrics. I of course respect that each of you have full lives outside our time together, but for that time, the bit you can devote to us,

I ask for Curiosity, and the responsibility to follow through on it.

You need to develop an interest in this work and pursue it beyond the confines of each little assignment. Closely related, you will need to try new things and be part of teams. Your initiative and care are paramount. These are values that I hope can guide us. Interpreted practically, these values imply things you will need to be able to do, verbs. Read, watch, discuss, listen, write, research independently, make notes for yourself, share ideas and build them up.

These activities serve the bigger picture in two ways:

1. They bring us together in a common culture. We will have an easier time speaking with each other and as members of the larger discourse when we have some shared experiences to connect us.
2. They are simple ways to do diligence in approaching something big, hard, and open-ended. Our little writings and readings won’t complete your game project for you, but when you do them you can feel like you’re making progress and becoming the sort of person who does these kinds of things.

Because the purpose of these activities is not to memorize information or prove to me that you read, you can take them on with your own goals in mind. Interpret them to serve your needs, or change them to fit.

• Read for the ideas you’re hungry for, and take notes like a comedian recording her dreams, not to transcribe topic sentences for the quiz.
• Keep up to be part of the team, because it is your responsibility to all of us.
• Begin your own research as soon as you can. Touch it at least twice a week, and keep track of where you’ve been.

Class Participation

You have taken Honors classes before. Informed participation and shared curiosity are taken for granted as the foundation of the course.

Our anchor is the shared classroom space and time. Being there, and being ready to be there, and being a part of what we do there is the basis of our shared journey. You need to be trustworthy as a member of the room: from doing readings to how you listen in conversation.

Each week, there will be some form of learning experience and reflection/analysis, out of class. Typically, there will be some assigned reading and a small piece of writing. In-class and Slack-based discussions will be drawn from these materials, as well as from those relevant to your areas of independent study. On the way to our major designs, we will have at least two other, smaller team-designs.

One aspect that students find difficult is finding a way to care enough about what happens in our class periods that they use these memories in the future. Like a lot of good times, it is easy to have fun in the moment and then have a hard time trying to remember where we left off. Again, doing better is simpler than it sounds:

• Taking notes in class – not facts that you need to reproduce, but keeping track of ideas and impulses, making good on the idea that our work outside class begins inside it.
• Developing a long memory – in presentations and future discussions, making use of earlier discussions and presentations, linking the ideas of one shared time and place to another.
• Directing discussion – What is the point of sitting together talking about these subjects and issues? I did not have the most patience with this as a younger person. Having been through it a bunch, we will all be happier with our discussions when we try to use them as a way to get somewhere, not merely pass the time.

Assignments

Assignments are detailed in their own section. As a first approximation, know that the course is organized around a major, team-based design project. There are other assignments that support and extend the major project, from reading to writing to playing games. The material directly assigned to all students is accompanied by an expectation that each student and teams carry out similar work as independent research and development.