On Mon, May 18, 2009 at 2:49 AM, Kevin Fenzi kevin@scrye.com wrote:
On Sun, 17 May 2009 20:03:46 +1000 David bouncingcats@gmail.com wrote:
When I started this thread it was based only on my impression from the small sample of classroom sessions I had attended.
So I thought it might be more objective to collect a data set from the logs at http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Category:Classroom.
The summary below shows that in the total sample of 26 nominal-60-minute classes on the wiki, there was nearly always time pressure between presentation and questions, and only 6 occasions when there was more than 5 minutes for final questions.
And again I'd like to congratulate everyone involved who I think did a great job. I'm just suggesting the task might be easier if they werent trying to fit a great presentation plus great interactive questions into a 60 minute slot on IRC.
I suggest classes be scheduled at minimum 90 minute intervals, based on approx 45 min presentation, 30 min questions, and 15 min break.
Yeah, one thing to keep in mind however is that many sessions (at least the ones I have done), the teachers allow/encourage questions during the session itself. This means that there is probibly going to be less questions at the end, simply because people already asked them when they thought of them. ;)
Sure, and thats great, so I was mindful of that when I tried to assess the logs, but its quite a difficult thing to measure, so after giving that some thought I decided it was too hard to do justice to that aspect, but I still wanted to try to come up with some useful data, so I restricted my focus to the end of the class to try to assess if it was truncated or not.
I don't object to 90min as a default... I agree that most classess have had much more material to discuss. Also, if a class finishes early, there are no more questions, then the break between that class and the next could just be larger, no harm done. ;)
Thats how it looks to me too.
Thanks for the opportunity to give and clarify some input. I don't mind if my suggestions are adopted or not, as long as I've had the opportunity to explain them fully, which I have.
Skim-reading through all the logs emphasised even more to me what a great job you and all the helpers and presenters have done on this project.