[Techtalk] [Slight OT] Running a LinuxChix course

[Mary]

Hey folks,

Thought I'd post here because there are likely people here able to and
interested in running a LinuxChix course.

LinuxChix courses are simply a series of posts and some discussion on
the courses list. Previous courses have included:

 - programming in C/Perl/Python
 - basic programming skills
 - running a small business
 - security
 - home networking

Courses are normally technical but there's no reason you can't run a
non-technical course if you think it would be interesting.

I would suggest that you aim for a fairly tightly focussed course rather
than something bigger in scope (say, "introduction to C pointers" rather
than "programming in C"), for the simple reason that course maintainers
have without (I think) exception, managed no more than about 10 lessons
(normally less) before burning out, losing interest or getting too busy.
In addition, you will get very few dedicated "students" who are willing
to work through your 40 posts on finite state automata and their
theorectical properties :)

I would suggest that if you can't cover your course in 6 mailing list
posts that you make it smaller, but that's not a requirement.

Here's some random ideas:
 - GIMP techniques
 - writing regular expressions
 - vi (vim, whatever) power-use
 - emacs power-use

Now, if you're interested in running a course please:

 (a) notify volunteers at linuxchix.org and give them a chance to comment:
 give them your topic an outline of your "lesson plan"

 (b) ask courses-owner at linuxchix.org to add a courses topic for you (and
 tell you how to use it)

 (c) announce your course to announce at linuxchix.org and wait a few days
 for people to join the courses list for your course

 (d) begin posting (a lesson a week is about the right rate) and
 encourage discussion!

-Mary