Create your folder structure in Manage Files
Now that you've decided how you are going to organize your course, you need to create folders in the Manage Files area of Carmen to hold the contents of your course.
You may be asking, "Why bother?" Let me tell you why! I see many courses where the files are uploaded at the top level, and there are basically no folders for organization at all. The course works for the students, so who cares if the file organization is a mess?
You probably have, at one time or another in your life, walked into a storage closet where everything had a place and everything was in its place. Those places were labeled and organized in a logical manner. A complete stranger to the closet could have gone in and found an object in a few moments based on just knowing the name of the object.
On the other hand, you've probably also seen a storage space where everything was tossed in haphazardly and the thought of labels seemed like a joke. Some file storage areas in online courses look like this. No one, including the instructor who uploaded the files in the first place can find anything or even identify whether it is a needed file or not. Everything is thrown into one big box (the top level folder) and no file has a logical name that tells you what it is or even what it pertains to.
Imagine if, two or three terms down the road, you need to change one of the documents in your course. There's an embarrassing misspelling, and the students are making fun of you. So, you start looking for the document in your Manage Files area, and you've labeled everything with titles like "4.2SR-tly.667." There are ways, of course, to figure out which document you need, but imagine the time you can save for yourself later if you just give your folders and files logical names now. And just imagine if you have to ask a support person to enter your course and help you with a problem. I frequently hear tech support people making unappreciative comments about the "train wreck" that some instructors have in their Manage Files area.
You don't want your course to look like this. It will cost you time and aggravation that you will not want to give to it. Begin by avoiding this organization disaster from the start.
Take a look at this short video that shows you what a disorganized course file area looks like and what an organized file area looks like. The video shows you how to create and organize your folders in Carmen in order to meet the requirements of this assignment. After you view the video, go to the next page for some final instructions.
