Structuring my remote Civil Procedural Law course

With the need to take courses remotely, I decided to invest more in the methodology that, in some way, I had already been developing. The example I give here refers to the subjects I teach at the Faculty of Law of the University of Brasília, an institution that started working remotely in the second semester of 2020.

In terms of tools, My course is structured in the likeness of a knowledge base - the kind we find in every modern application. I just applied to the law the approach of questions and answers (FAQ) coupled with a search tool, so the student does not need to receive any training. The appearance is quite familiar:

The video shows that it is possible to navigate through the search and that each topic has, as support material, a mind map and a short audio. Initially, I thought this recipe would work for everyone, but now I'm rethinking how to better structure the content, as the feedback I had from the students wasn't as good as I imagined.

The problem seems to be that the mind map is very good for the author of the map itself, and not for the reader. As I already had this limitation in mind, I chose to also publish a short audio (micro podcast) explaining the mind map. Today I consider making longer podcasts and indicating some texts that are already included in the bibliography (around 20 pages each text). I will update this post in the future sharing with you the results obtained.

But currently what I have is this knowledge base structure and I think the proposal was well received. On top of this "chassis", I added some optional tools: forum, chat, email, feedback, email notifications, etc. All are the simplest tools I have come across, as I really wanted to get straight to the point.

I still haven't been able to get the interaction via forum and chat on the scoreboard, but the other features were well accepted. I often receive emails with requests for clarification and questions about the matter and I send, also by email, notifications whenever I publish new content. This part I think has worked very well.

So far my top picks have worked, as what I really wanted was to avoid another WhatsApp group , in addition to not being limited to the closed environment of Moodle. WhatsApp is very informal and does not respect the boundaries between work and social life. And Moodle is a robust platform, but one that already feels the weight of age.

I don't know if I can recommend my recipe to other teachers, because I ended up building a mosaic of tools that maybe only works well for me. Another way to say this is to recognize that the learning curve is big. Well, I was looking for a definitive solution for myself, because I intend to teach for many years to come. For me it was worth the investment. 😅

For the knowledge base, I use a blog Ghost , which is an open source platform. That is, the software is free and you are responsible for hosting. The customization I did from a paid template called Digidocs (USD 59), but you can choose another one that will suit you.

The rest of the tools are applications used in their free version, in the following sequence: Disqus (forum displayed at the end of each post), Gitter (chat displayed only on the home page), Emojicom (feedback displayed after a certain reading time), Mailgun (member management and email notifications) and Hypothesis (side panel of italics and annotations). Mind maps are made in XMind and the podcast was recorded on the Anchor and distributed by the Spotify .

I hope these references serve as inspiration to help you organize your courses if you need the same flexibility as I do. But I really think that it is not the best choice for everyone and that you can host your course for free on the Canvas , because he wouldn't have to worry about anything, just his classes.

In short, I'm structuring my courses with this set of tools, as I want to have maximum flexibility in your organization. But I understand that the best solution for most would be something simpler and that comes ready . So, what is your profile? Do you prefer to look for a more customized solution or something that is already ready?