To Sum it up, "What do I need to do this week?"

1) Start by reading The Syllabus… take your time… follow the links… This syllabus is much more important than a regular text based syllabus. All of the links are important, especially the ones to the Wesleyan and Dartmouth writing centers. Become familiar with the concept of writing about art. http://jnevins.com/museumsyllabus1

2) Post a hello and introduce yourself on the class blog. It would be really nice to post a picture of yourself…. That’s part of building community and playing “nice”. If you are terribly self conscious about that, you may post a picture of your dog, your favorite travel photo or anything… the point is that posting images will become VITAL to your success in this class. If I don’t see a post with a picture, I will assume you don’t have the skills to do it and you’ll need to straighten that out this week or your grade will suffer. http://themuseumexperience.blogspot.com/ If you haven’t joined the blog yet, you need to respond to the email blogger sent to you and create an account and get going.

3) You have emailed me about your technical readiness for the class and your preferences for which email account you would like me to use to communicate with you.

4) You have made plans for your first outing. Let me know about that either through a personal email or through a post to the group on the blog. You will spend several hours at your outing, take photos of the museum and your chosen artwork, including detail shots. Be sure to ask a guard for permission to photograph if in doubt and remember to TURN OFF YOUR FLASH!

5) Be nice and leave comments on posts others have made to the blog. Click the comment button to do it. You need to be a member of the blog to post anything, including comments.

6) Papers are due each week. Papers will be due by midnight following the week of your visit. Because the first paper falls over Labor Day Week-end, The first paper is due by Midnight, September 5^th. Email me your word .doc files to me.

7) Read my tutorial on how to resize your digital photographs properly for inclusion in your papers. If they are too big, you will have trouble incorporating them in the body of your paper and will be cumbersome to email to me. Most problems arise from using digital images that are too big. http://www.jnevins.com/sizeforweb.htm

8) I will be grading you each week of class on THE BIG PICTURE… that is a composite grade based on my perception of your participation in the blog, your enthusiasm for your visits, your use of images, timely delivery of papers to me, etc.

Please email me or call if you have any questions. I am here for you…. Please ask!

Warm regards,

Jerry