You’ll want to submit your final research essay as a post to our OpenLab site by the end of the day of the last day of class on May 20. You’re welcome to turn it in early, too. If something comes up to prevent you from turning it on time, please drop me an email letting me know what’s going on and when you think that you can submit your work.
Below, I’m including a video demonstrating how to post your research essay to our OpenLab site. Further below, I have a set of screenshots that highlight the main points that I talk about in the video.
Screencast Showing How to Publish Your Research Essay to Our OpenLab Site
Steps for Publishing Your Research Essay to Our OpenLab Site
Lecture 10 on New Wave Science Fiction, Harlan Ellison, and Philip K. Dick is embedded above. Write your own notes into your notebook for the lecture and your readings of Ellison’s “Repent, Harlequin, Said the Ticktockman!” and Dick’s “The Electric Ant.” Then, add a comment to this post of at least 250-words summarizing the lecture and your readings before Wednesday, April 29.
Keep track of the lectures and readings. You can check the Dashboard > Comments on our site to see if you’ve missed any 250-word summaries. If you have, get them done and send me an email letting me know which ones you’ve caught up on.
As I’ve said before, this is a challenging time that we find ourselves in right now. To be a successful student with distance learning requires tremendous self-discipline. I know that you all can do it, but depending on your circumstances, it can take more or less conscious effort on your part.
If you haven’t reached out to me yet about your research essay, please send me an email to jellis at citytech.cuny.edu with your plan. I’ll reply with some feedback and advice.
I will have my weekly office hours via Google Hangouts on Wednesday, April 22 between 5-6pm. I’ll post an announcement beforehand with the link. Email me if you need to talk at a different day/time.
If you’ve seen the film Galaxy Quest, you know the catchphrase: “Never give up! Never surrender!”
I hope that everyone is doing well and hanging in there! If you’d like to talk about your research essay project or anything else to do with the class, I’ll have office hours via Google Hangouts today between 5-6pm. You can access it via this link (link removed after office hours end).
For this week’s class, we’re turning our attention to Science Fiction Film through the 1950s and Forbidden Planet. Before Wednesday, April 22, watch the lecture and Forbidden Planet, and post a comment here of at least 250-words summarizing both.
Remember to email me at jellis at citytech.cuny.edu with your research essay project ideas and I’ll get back to you with some helpful feedback.
Also, I will have office hours on Wednesday between 5-6pm on Google Hangouts. I’ll post a link to our OpenLab site beforehand.
The OpenLab created a new project site called “Comforting Content for COVID-19 Coping.” It’s essentially cute videos and photos of animals. I’ve added some things of my cats Mose and Miao Miao. Others have added links and other content with more posts to be published soon. If you’d like to check it out, you can find it here. And, if you’d like to contribute, there are directions about how to on this page.
I think it’s safe to say that everything about what we’re now going through and dealing with is difficult, hard, and stressful.
City Tech has a Counseling Center staffed with helpful and caring folks who want to help students face these challenging times. While they currently can’t meet face-to-face, they have other ways of talking with students online or over the phone. Up-to-date information about contacting them is available on the City Tech Counseling website here.
Also, NYC Well offers counseling for all New Yorkers via text, talk, and chat through their website. They also maintain a curated list of wellness apps that offer support for a variety of things.
I’ll hold office hours today (Tuesday, April 7–this being a CUNY Conversion Day for Wednesday classes) between 5pm and 6pm. You can find me on Google Hangouts here (link removed after office hours ends), or you can email me your questions at jellis at citytech.cuny.edu.
Greetings, all! I hope that you and your families are doing well in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis.
This week, I posted two lecture videos. The first is the second part of the “Golden Age of SF” and it covers Robert A. Heinlein’s “All You Zombies–” and Tom Godwin’s “The Cold Equations. After you read both of those stories and listen to the lecture, remember to write at least 250 words summarizing the important points from the lecture and the two stories. Copy-and-paste your summary into a comment made to this post.
The second video discusses the research essay project and how to research your topic in the databases and ebooks available through the library. Two things that I forgot to mention in the video: First, perform a quick check in some of the databases for the work that you plan to write about. If there’s not much there, you should consider switching to a different example. Second, your research does not all have to be about the example that you are writing about. For example, you could choose to write about Janelle Monae’s Metropolis EP. There might not be much in the databases specifically about this album, but there will be articles about science fiction and music, which you can reference in your discussion about Monae’s work.
This week’s summary shouldn’t refer to the research lecture–it’s purpose is to help you with your essay project.
This week’s summary should focus on the Golden Age of SF Part 2 lecture and the readings.
I’ll have office hours Tuesday from 5-6pm. I’ll post a link beforehand to the Google Hangout. Also, I’m available by email at jellis at citytech.cuny.edu.
I hope that you and your families are doing well. This is a trying time for us all, and I wish you both strength and serenity to make it through to the other side of these trials we must face.
By now, I hope that you have heard the announcements by Chancellor Matos Rodriguez about changes to our academic calendar. If you haven’t, you can read his announcement here. Essentially, he devotes some of this week to what he calls the “Recalibration Period for Educational Equity,” which is meant to streamline some of the online teaching and access to computers for students, and the new, shortened Spring Recess, which will be Wednesday, April 8 through Friday, April 10.
Due to this new schedule, we won’t have lecture this week or next. However, I will be working on my video lectures for you to resume the week of Tuesday, April 7 (a CUNY Conversion Day), and I will be available to talk over email (jellis at citytech.cuny.edu) any time and my next video office hours will be on Tuesday, April 7.
Please use this hiatus to take care of yourselves and your families. If you have time available, get caught up in our class and your other classes, too. I’m happy to receive your work late–just drop me an email to let me know that you’ve posted it to OpenLab (for your weekly summaries) or email your midterm notebook to me directly.
The currently due Lecture 7/Golden Age of SF readings summary is now due before we return for Lecture 8/Continuing the Golden Age of SF on Tuesday, April 7 (this is a CUNY Conversion Day).
Also, I’ll post this message in a video above soon. Watch it for some additional advice about how to be a successful student with distance learning.
The new schedule for our class is on the syllabus page and included below.
10
W
Apr 1
Recalibration Period for Educational Equity, see this message from Chancellor Matos Rodriguez for additional details.
Research Essay due before class as a post on our OpenLab site. Class Notes, End of Semester due as a scanned PDF emailed to Prof. Ellis. Final Exam due as a Word docx file emailed to Prof. Ellis.
