Dekker, Andrew

Richardson, Annie

Zornig, John

University of Queensland eSpace

  
UQx, ITaLI, Institute for Teaching and Learning Innovation,  
The University of Queensland, St Lucia 4072, Australia  
Email 
uqx@uqx.uq.edu.au 
 
 
 
 English Grammar and Style 
WRITE101x 
Course Report 2014 
Annie Richardson, John Zornig, Andrew Dekker 
 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Table of Contents 
 
Introduction 3	  
Course Information 3	  
Overview 3	  
Pre-requisites 3	  
Course Team 3	  
Course Structure 4	  
Learning Objectives 5	  
Other uses of the course 5	  
Course Demographics 6	  
Total Registrations 6	  
!UQx Course Registration Comparison 6	  
Enrolment Types 7	  
Student Demographics 8	  
Gender Distribution 8	  
Age Distribution 8	  
Education Distribution 9	  
Country Distribution 10	  
Course Activity 11	  
Student Progress and Certificates ! 11	  
Active Days 12	  
Last Activity Over Days 13	  
Special aspects of the course 13	  
Discussion Posts Evaluation 14	  
Course Evaluation Findings 14	  
Plans for the Future 14	  
 
    
Introduction 3 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Introduction 
WRITE101x was offered as a UQx course on edX.org on 22nd September 2014, by the 
School of Communication and Arts at The University of Queensland, Brisbane, 
Australia. 
 
In the time-starved Internet world, where everyone’s a writer and everyone’s a reader, 
the demand for literacy is more intense than it has ever been. The ability to articulate 
ideas in smart, tight writing is crucial. Write101x was designed to enable students to 
learn how words work, in order to be able to write the concise, lucid, nuanced, and 
compelling prose that is so valued by readers. By providing learners with a thorough 
grounding in grammar, syntax, and style, the course aimed to sharpen and solidify 
students’ writing and editing competence and self-confidence. 
Course Information 
Overview 
Registration Open:  
1st April 2014 
 
Report Generated: 
16th April 2015 
 
Estimated Time:  
4 hours per week 
Launch Date: 
22nd September 2014 
 
Course Length: 
8 weeks 
 
Languages Offered:  
English  
Close Date: 
16th November 2014 
 
Course Instance: 
First run 
 
 
 
Pre-requisites 
Students should be proficient enough in English to follow an introductory-level writing 
course. 
 
Course Team 
Roslyn Petelin Amber Gwynne Megan Porter 
  
Course Information 4 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Course Structure 
 
 
Figure 1. Course Structure !. This course structure graphic highlights the course components in the 
order that they appear in the course. (This graphic is adapted from the MITx Course Reports.)  
 
 
 
 
  
Course Information 5 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Learning Objectives  
By the end of this course, learners will be able to:  
 
1. Reliably identify the roles and relationships of words in a sentence. 
2. Demonstrate mastery of grammatical concepts and syntactical strategies 
and apply this knowledge to produce coherent, economical, and compelling 
writing. 
3. Critique and edit their own and others’ writing. 
 
Other uses of the course  
Students who were enrolled in the Writing, Editing and Publishing (WEP) Program at 
The University of Queensland were encouraged to use this course as supplementary 
material. 
  
Course Demographics 6 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Course Demographics 
 
Total Registrations  
 
Figure 2. Registrations  
 
 
 
 UQx Course Registration Comparison  
 
 
Figure 3. Registration Comparison, at respective course closing dates 
 
 
Course Demographics 7 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Enrolment Types  
 
Figure 4. Enrolment Types. Three types of enrolment pathways (and associated certificates) are 
offered in edX. These are honour certificates (which are free and awarded if the student passes 
assessment), verified certificates (there is cost associated with verifying that the student is who they 
say they are) and audit (which are free but do not provide certificates).  
 
  
Student Demographics 8 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Student Demographics 
 
Certified students are students who earned a certificate.  
Gender Distribution  
 
Figure 5. Gender Distribution   
 
Age Distribution  
 
Figure 6. Age Distribution    
Student Demographics 9 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Education Distribution  
 
 
Figure 7. Education Distribution  
 
  
Student Demographics 10 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Country Distribution  
 
Figure 8. Country Distribution (per enrolment) 201 countries with registered users  
United States  
(9731 registrations) 
India  
(6063 registrations)  
Australia  
(2334 registrations) 
Brazil 
(1681 registrations) 
United Kingdom 
(1639 registrations) 
Spain 
(1461 registrations) ! 
Canada  
(1357 registrations) 
Russian Federation  
(991 registrations) !  
Mexico 
(897 registrations) 
Egypt 
(856 registrations) 
 
 
  
Course Activity 11 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Course Activity 
 
Student Progress and Certificates  
 
 
Figure 9. Student Progress and Certificates 
Viewed: Anyone who accessed the ‘Courseware’ tab (the home of the videos, problem sets, and 
assessment) within the edX platform for the course. Note that there exist course materials outside of 
the ’Courseware’ tab, such as the Syllabus or the Discussion forums.  
Explored: Anyone who accessed at least half of the chapters in the courseware (chapters are the 
highest level on the ”courseware” menu housing course content).  
Certified: Anyone who earned a certificate.  
  
Course Activity 12 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Active Days  
 
Figure 10. Activity over days. An ‘active day’ is one on which a student accessed the course and 
spent any time engaged with it.  
  
Course Activity 13 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Last Activity Over Days  
 
Figure 11. Last activity over days. This graph represents the last interaction with the course by each 
student. The black line represents the number of students whose last event was on that day (Left Y 
axis) and the red line represents the number of total students who were still interacting with the course 
on that day (Right Y axis).  
 
Special aspects of the course  
In addition to 8 weekly sessions, containing videos, exercises, quizzes and discussions, 
Write101x included interviews with leading grammarians and linguists. Students were 
also asked to write four blog posts on their learning throughout the course which was 
peer assessed. 
 
  
Course Evaluation Findings 14 
 
 
Course Report 2014 
English Grammar and Style: WRITE101x   
 
Discussion Posts Evaluation  
Figure 12. Discussion posts per enrolment type 
 
 
  
Course Evaluation Findings 
 
In the course evaluation, students were asked to consider their reason for enrolling in 
the course and asked if the course met their needs.  
 
• 97% of students indicated ”yes”.  
• 96% of students indicated they would be likely to encourage their peers to enrol 
in this course if it was offered again.  
• 84% thought the course was ’appropriately challenging’ (as opposed to ’too 
easy’ or ’too difficult’).  
 
 
Plans for the Future  
 
The course is planned to re-run in 2015.  
 
 


English Grammar and Style (WRITE101x)

http://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:367140/write101x_coursereport.pdf

English Grammar and Style (WRITE101x)

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