MAT 0024 Elementary Algebra - Blended
Professor Mariana Coanda

Online Orientations

Professor Mariana Coanda has developed and has been teaching this developmental mathematics course as a blended course, which prepares students for college-level mathematics and mathematics based courses. To pass the course, students must pass a mandatory Florida State Examination.

Class meets only once a week for 2 hours (instead of 3), and for remainder of the class time students are required to participate in online activities (in MathXL and Blackboard). The first class meeting (Orientation) is mandatory. It gives students a chance to become acquainted with each other and to learn about the course's requirements, how to maneuver in the Blackboard virtual environment, how to register and access the MathXL component of the course. ). Besides the in-class orientation, an online orientation tutorial is provided as well (“Start Here” button). In order to remain in the course, and gain access to the Learning Modules folder, students must successfully complete the online orientation (before the deadline for add/drop period). This includes sending an e-mail, posting a discussion, and passing an orientation quiz.

Below is a screenshot of the course homepage.

Although Professor Mariana Coanda gives guidelines to her students every week (in class, after lecture) about the online activities, for their convenience sheI organizes the entire material of the course in learning modules.  Each learning module provides additional guidelines and links to required activities. A special module was also created for the Final Exam.

Below is a screenshot of the Learning Modules folder.

All learning modules are organized similarly: an overview and objectives (guidelines) with links to all activities needed to be completed in each module. Below is an example:

This course requires the students to complete the HW in MathXL- Pearson's online homework, tutorial, and assessment system. The key to success for math students is practice, and MathXL provides that opportunity through algorithmically generated problems with excellent videos, animations, and textbook references. Also the students receive the support they need, when they need, from the same problems and guided solutions (“Help Me Solve This” or “View an Example”), or might send me an e-mail (“Ask My Instructor”) with their question(s) and automatically a link to the problem will be added as well.

The online communication is also important in this course. Besides e-mails, chats, and general informative discussions, students could earn extra points by participating in some required discussions. Most of the required discussion topics are related to study skills, but sometimes Professor Coanda likes to add funny pictures like in this example below:

Professor Coanda can be reached at mcoanda1@broward.edu.

Instructional Technology
Broward College, Central Campus, Building 17, Room 226
3501 S. W. Davie Road, Davie, FL 33314