SYLLABI: Teaching Online Journalism and Communication

Online Journalism Review aggregated syllabi in 2004, however this list needs to be updated. In an attempt to aggregate this information, I have begun a list of syllabi dedicated to online journalism, online communication and social media. I found that results from Google do not showcase all of the best available syllabi online.

This section highlights faculty syllabi that focus on skills, theory, online communication, and journalism. The selected sites featured interactive, timely, and great resources for students, educators, journalists, and people with a desire to learn. I have also highlighted some useful features that I believe may be useful for educators.

Mindy McAdams – University of Florida
Mindy McAdams shares her syllabi focused on the teaching of multimedia, animation, and reporting for online users. Her sites are designed simply and feature possible assignment ideas and online resources for educators and students.

Dave Stanton – University of Florida
Dave Stanton has a broad background, which enables him to teach web consulting, design and XHTML/CSS. I really like that Dave gives his students video tutorials to help them process information outside of class.

Serena Carpenter – Arizona State University
My class is the foundation class for all things concerning online media. It is divided into three sections: 1) social media, 2) visual communication, and 3) Web site creation. The focus throughout the semester is on online communication. I provide ideas for class assignments as well. I also provide tutorials on my blog.

Leslie-Jean Thornton – Arizona State University
This is an online reporting course for students in a Masters program. The resources page also provides some useful tutorials.

Carol Schwalbe and Nancie Dodge – Arizona State University
The Advanced Online Media class builds upon skills taught in previous basic online media classes.

Cindy Royal – Texas State University
Cindy Royal’s site contains useful ideas to include into lectures.

Don Wittekind – University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
I am impressed by Don Wittekind’s ability to teach Flash, based on my experience from a past seminar. Don provides a list of classes that he teaches in the left-hand navigation section. He provides some lectures and handouts as well.

Ryan Thornburg – University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
Ryan Thornburg shares his online reporting syllabi. His assigned readings page is interactive.

Alfredo A. Marin-Carle – Ball State University
The New Media Journalism concentrates on web design. The reference section offers a list of useful sites for people teaching such courses.

Tracy Rutledge – University of Tennessee at Martin
Intro to Multimedia focuses on creating multimedia websites. She provides some tutorials as well.

Donica Mensing – University of Nevada-Reno
Donica Mensing shares her syllabus for her online reporting course, which covers multimedia reporting, social media and HTML/CSS. She provides helpful videos as well.

Laura Ruel – University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
Laure Ruel teaches design and multimedia storytelling. She has a great downloads section that features storyboarding and usability execises.

Chris Harvey – University of Maryland
I like that this instructor’s Online Journalism class schedule is interactive and detailed.

Sean Mussenden – University of Maryland
His Online Journalism course has screencast tutorials teaching others how to use WordPress.

Gaurav Mishra -  Georgetown University
The Social Media in Business, Development and Government course concentrates on social media literacy.

Henry Jenkins – Director of the MIT Comparative Media Studies Program
The New Media Literacies course site shares resources related to online participation and communication.

Alice J. Robinson – Arizona State University
The Digital Cultures and Social Media course is a doctoral seminar. There is a list of thought-provoking pieces on her schedule and on her Delicious page.

Corinne Weisgerber – St. Edward’s University
The Social Media for Public Relations class offers useful material for anyone teaching social media including how to reach online users.

David Carlson – University of Florida
He teaches an Applied Interactive Newspaper course and an online communication class. I like that student projects are shared.

Tim McGuire – Arizona State University
The Business and Future of Journalism class encourages students to reflect on the journalism industry by having them write about business models. Tim also provides links to suggested readings.

Siva Vaidhyanathan – University of Virgina
This Introduction to Digital Media instructor encourages students to take a critical look at new media and its impact on culture. The reading list is a useful resource.

Jeffrey Michael Heer – Stanford University
Research Topics in Human-Computer Interaction is a graduate-level course focused on HCI. He also includes links to student articles.

Vin Crosbie – Syracuse University
The course examines how new media differs from traditional media. Crosbie provides a list of books that may be useful for other instructors.

To add your course to the list, email me or provide your syllabus in the comments section including background information related to the course. I hope that these examples are useful for educators designing their classes for future semesters and for those looking for resources to learn more about the online media environment.

Investment in video at newspapers not significant

There was a push for video in 2006, however that emphasis may be changing at U.S. newspapers.

Video is published only a few times a week at most U.S. newspapers, according to a recent survey published in the Newspaper Research Journal by John Russial.

The online staff is usually responsible for editing video. Online staff averaged 11 people at large-circulation sized , 5 at mid-sized, and 2 at small papers. However, it is photographers (75%) and reporters (45%) who are responsible for gathering video, and very few news leaders report using a team to produce video stories for the web, which may result in lesser quality work. Russial argues that this may mean that people with broad technical skills rather specific skills are valued at newspapers.

Visual Toolkit of Freebies – Step by step instructions

I spent the day working on my visual toolkit. I am in awe of how much easier it is today to share and embed beautiful elements on your Web site. I believe that anyone can use and follow this handout. Have fun!

*Thanks to @chrishogg for the tip on Scribd

FCP video editing problems

My slideshare lecture on video editing provides tips on video editing and how to use Final Cut Pro. It is also provides information on troubleshooting problems with Final Cut. One of the most difficult parts of teaching software is troubleshooting technical glitches or figuring out how the new user or student ended up where they did. My presentation presents four common problems news users face when editing in Final Cut Pro.

1. “I don’t see my video.”
   • This likely means that the computer does not recognize that the video camera is connected to the computer.
2. “I see red lines through mu clips.”
   • This means that FCP cannot find your video because it is likely stored at another location, which means you did not save properly.
3. “I can only see part of my video and the rest says needs rendering.”
   • It means that your clips need rendering before you can view them.
4. “My video is not playing.”
   • A trick that may help you is to copy and paste your video project into a new timeline, which may solve the problem.

Check out my slideshare presentation to see how to solve these problems. Tomorrow, I will talk about exporting video from Final Cut Pro to a player. A media player allows the user to play your edited video.

How to shoot b-roll video

The key to good video is shooting sequences. A sequence is a wide, medium and close-up shot of the same object or person. When shooting video, you want to mimic how humans see the world. A person will cognitively process visuals in steps. For example, if a person walks into a room looking for a chair to sit on during a public speaking event. That person will walk into a room and see the whole room (wide-shot), then they will see a few people (medium-shot), and then they will spot an empty chair (close-up).

I also limit the shooting of zooms and pans by my students. A pan is recording video as the camera horizontally moves across the room. First, movement can look pixelated online, diminishing the quality. Second, the shot lasts a long time if shot properly. Third, our eyes do not zoom. We can not look at someone and zoom to them. Thus, it is better to shoot shots when shooting video for the web.

How to shoot a video interview

I teach video in four steps in my online media class, which equals to 8 hours of class time. I am a former broadcast instructor who has spent many years teaching video to people of all backgrounds. I find that this approach works best for me. I hope that it helps you teach or learn video basics.

1. Online video trends

2. How to shoot an interview – they must practice shooting following the interview. I provide an in-class assignment on my lecture slides.

3. How to shoot broll or cover video – they must shoot a sequence and a action shot following lecture.

4. How to edit and prepare video for the web – they edit the video they shot over the past few days.

I have shared my lecture on online video trends on my blog. Today, I will share my lecture on how to shoot an interview. The following days I will share with you my b-roll shooting and editing lectures.

Online video storytelling and trends

I will share with you my lecture on online video trends. The focus of this lecture concentrates on educating my students on how online video is different than broadcast video including current trends.

Broadcast news organizations perform an important function by providing the top news stories of the day. People expect this information when they tune into the news. However, many of those stories may not be visual. In the past, I used to tell my students to use a detached, wide-shots when narrating important information because audience members could not cognitively handle important factual information under interesting video. Imagine talking about the number of renters abandoning pets in this economic crisis while watching a kitten playing with a string. People will most likely only see the kitten, and not hear the narration.

In the online environment, online communicators can communicate critical facts in other ways such as text or graphics.

The beauty of the online environment is that only video pieces that are visually worthy should be placed online. This is why you should see more raw video online. However, a common mistake I see is that people will write the text first without considering the visuals or audio. Writers should weave narration in between audio and video. To accomplish this, video writers should listen to their audio and watch their video before writing.

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