QR Code embedded in HTML tools including Blackboard Learn

Do you like QR codes? I do.  I find it fascinating that my cell phone can scan a code and take me places in seconds. Now that I am supporting Blackboard Learn, I find that they are really cool embedded in a content area.  I can embed a link to my phone number that makes my phone dial my number in less time than I would take to scroll my iPhone screen to the number pad, much less dial the number. I can set a code to my Linkedin profile in case you want to know more about me. I could as easily take a student to a department or faculty profile to get more information.  The tools you need are a free online QR Code generator and a QR code reader on your smart phone.

In Blackboard, you create the content area, switch to html code and paste the embed code from the generator web site. Switch back to wysiwyg mode in the editor and test, then submit.  I found that BbL will let you resize the QR Code image as well as add notations and allow you to put multiple Codes in one content area.  To do this, you have to be a bit comfortable with HTML code but not much! Let us know if you’d like to try this as we’d be more than happy to help you!

Here is my QR code to my Linkedin Profile.

My Bio on Linked In

Resources I wish I could put in your hands now!

8 Lessons Learned from Teaching Online - from Educause

 


Margaret's Prezi Presentation

Interesting article in the Chronicle today. You'd think as a techie that I'd hate it.  I don't.  To me technology isn't about technology but as a way to make learning more efficient for more students. It's also about leveraging the skills of the teacher/professor.  Instructors share what they love with their students. If technology can make that easier, it's a win-win for both the student and the instructor.  If online courses give students access to an education that otherwise they would miss, then online it is. Check out the article. http://chronicle.com/article/A-Tech-Happy-Professor-Reboots/130741/  What do you think?

Virtual Office? Why do I need that? I teach online!

Visualize your face to face courses. If your students have questions and they take your course face to face, they can pop into your office, stop by your desk in the classroom or meet you in the cafe when you're getting a cup of coffee to get an answer. These are the 'by the way' conversations which can make learning really rich. Those types of informal interactions build community and provide information for students. They are critical to your students' success in your classes. I'll bet you didn't know that! I'll bet you thought that your stellar lectures and carefully crafted activities were all that mattered! These matter. But having a virtual office matters as much to the student as having a physical one does.

Now visualize your online course. How do you have a 'by the way' conversation? One way is through using discussion forums which can simulate the same interactions students have in a face to face course. Discussions help the student feel connected and supported in an online course. As an instructor, this helps you to manage your time and content load as well.

I usually set my courses up with three basic discussions. I title one "I need Help", the  next is a "Virtual Cafe" and the third is "For the Professor".

If you have a "I Need Help!" or "FAQ" discussion forum anyone can answer the questions. Another student may know where the quiz is or other question answer long before you had time to pop in and post an answer - that's one less email for you!

If you have a "Virtual Cafe" discussion forum, then the students have a place to have informal personal conversations and get to be friends.  This builds a connection to the course. Students who are connected are more likely to complete the course.

If you have a "For the Professor" question forum you gather questions about the material you are covering. This give you a chance to gather information which can impact your teaching. It will let you know where the student is confused, needs more information or the re-framing of information.

With these three forums, you cover a lot of ground which saves doing the same thing over and over again. But there is a big "however". It won't work if you don't set the expectations for interaction and communication in your course. Get in the habit of checking the discussions frequently and expect your students to do so as well. Set email expectations to reserve email for personal and/or emergency situations. Everything else goes on the discussions.  I think you'll find that you have more engaged students and with that comes greater success!

Happy New School Year. Let's start it with the plan to have the best online courses in the world!

A Tid Bit: Assessment/Evaluation of learning is on my mind again

I read Donald (Don) Clark's Blogs called  Big Dog and Little Dog's Bowl of Biscuits - in particular the Big Dog Little Dog's Performance Juxtaposition (Home Page of the Juxtaposition) 

Today on the feed in my mailbox was a link to an article discussing the four steps of evaluation.  His focus is instructional design. Mine is faculty and student online learning support. In my opinion these two over lap greatly, especially when talking to faculty about evaluating how well their course is doing. Don starts out with a reference to Donald Kirkpatrick's Four Level Evaluation Model

The four steps of evaluation consist of:

• Step 1: Reaction - How well did the learners like the learning process?
• Step 2: Learning - What did they learn? (the extent to which the learners gain knowledge and skills)
• Step 3: Behavior - (What changes in job performance resulted from the learning process? (capability to perform the newly learned skills while on the job)
• Step 4: Results - What are the tangible results of the learning process in terms of reduced cost, improved quality, increased production, efficiency, etc.?

He further refines the model coming up with the graphic here. I especially like this graphic because it would help faculty to see relationships between Planning and Level of Evaluation of learning. Anyway this is just a tiny tidbit (or in the case of my little Corgi, tidbite!). Take a minute and read the article - it will make more sense in its entirety. I truly meant to wet your appetite with these snips.
 


Borrowed under Don's Creative Commons Licensing.

Collaboration

Collaboration in Course Design

What does it take to be collaborative as an adult worker? This question is plaguing me.  I think that you have to be willing to step out of your 'expert' status and be willing to risk making mistakes in public.  Some of us willingly do this, others not so much.  I think this may be hardwired in our personality. I've always been interested in everything. I tend to be a generalist and a nosey rosey as my mom would put it. I want to know what my colleagues are working on. I want to know what a faculty member teaches and what they like about it.

When I design a course for/with someone, I like to watch them teach so I can see what their personality is like. There are people who are gifted orators. They should never - or rarely - be put in a situation where this is not part of their teaching tool kit.  There are others (and I think I'm one of these) who prefer to dispatch a minimum of information verbally and then do something. It's probably how I ended up being a computer trainer/instructional technologist. To teach computers, you have to do something.  Many other fields are that way. Math, Science, Writing, Reading - oh maybe many of the academics are 'do' fields. So why is it people who like to do science or math or reading feel the need to talk about it instead of doing it when they teach?

This is where collaboration comes in. That's the type of question I like to ask faculty - why, if you like to do x, do you spend most of your time talking about it instead of doing it? At a big research university where the focus is research, faculty get to do their topic while grad students lecture or supervise lab type sections. I try to get them to think out of the box of the type of teaching they experienced as a student where it was lecture, test, lecture. What other ways can your students learn about your topic of study? What made you love the field? Who are you? How does that influence what you teach? Are you more about writing about your field after long library or primary source research? Do you take primary sources and turn them into a story to tell? Do you like standing up in front of people and telling that story? I love to watch their face light up as they talk about their field. I know nothing about nanoscience but I can listen to that scientist for hours - my wheels spinning to translate what she's saying into teaching methods. That synergy of two people who love what they do, produces powerful teaching and learning opportunities.

To do this involves risk. I have to be willing to be an ignorant person in science while the learned professor of science needs to be a novice teacher or course designer even though they may have taught for years. This can be painful for some, yet they are willing to try. I admire those folks greatly. Collaboration equals risk and risk can lead to rewards - hopefully the reward is a wonderful learning experience for their students and the satisfaction of sharing what they love to do! 

What is a bio?

I had to write a bio for STI-2013. I always tend to be too open and transparent. I wrote about my past work and my education and a sentence of personal info. Is that too much? I'm new on this job and have to establish that I know what I'm doing, but do I go over the top?  This is what I wrote

Hi! I'm Theresa, with OIT Course Delivery. I am fascinated with teaching and learning with technology!

I came to UTK in Nov 2012 from my latest stint in K-12 at Claxton Elementary in Asheville, NC.  I seem to alternate between K-12 and Higher Ed. I find each environment informs my work in the other. My background includes having taught Vocational Autoparts with Job Corp. Then I spent 9 years teaching in high school Industrial Technology where I studied under Leslie Huston-Austin in Teacher Induction as part of a TX pilot program which has since become national, took part in a teacher internship at Advanced Micro Devices where I learned to integrate high tech industry into my teaching program and published a curriculum manual, and the I wrote statewide curriculum in Communication Systems. Which, led me to grad school where I received my MA at Appalachian State in Boone, NC. That was so much fun I went to Virginia Tech in Instructional technology where I ended up ABD in 98. Since then, I have supported faculty at Virginia Tech, Colorado College, Adams 14 School District in CO, and have been the director of Instructional Technology at Tusculum College.
 

Now I'm here to help you at UT. I am having a ton of fun helping faculty revise and develop courses in Blackboard Learn as well as solve problems using the tool. I am blessed to work with a great team. I live in Maryville with my long suffering husband of 35 years and my granddaughter Serenity who is the light of my life!

My UTk blog/ramblings http://tecwrk-utk.blogspot.com/

email: tswann2@utk.edu  Phone: 974-6092

Do you think it's too much, not enough or just right?  Everyone else wrote a sentence or two.

Tag clouds? Can You Build An Argument?

Have you ever played with tag clouds? I find myself fascinated with them  The example below is one of my social bookmark sites on Diigo. 

I routinely play with Wordle. I like to take an article, copy the text into Wordle and see if the author's point matches the word frequency he/she uses.  They don't much of the time.  

This makes for a fun activity for students. 

Take two articles on the same topic. 
Add two students plus one wiki and two Wordle instances. 
Combine (have the students embed the word clouds in the wiki) and 
draw conclusions. 

This makes for some fun argument development! Try it - you'll see!

  Tecwrk Diigo Tags

tswann2  My Diigo Tags

People vs Applications

I'm going in mind circles again.  It's one of those chicken and egg situations.  Do I support people - faculty, staff and students - in the use of a course/learning management system? Or do I support people who are teaching and learning using a course management system?  One is focused on the tool. The other, focused on the the process and activity.  Why is this important?

It's important because the emphasis changes and our response to users changes depending on where our focus is.

What do you think?
Are you faculty or staff?
Are you at a small school or a Big University and does that change things?
Are you k-12 or higher education.

Let's talk.

I am exploring a MOOC today in E-learning and Digital Cultures by Jeremy Knox, Sian Bayne, Hamish Macleod, Jen Ross, Christine Sinclair 

Why would I be interested in MOOCs you ask? Well because they threaten/inform the current model of education – especially higher education. I like to know what’s on the horizon even if it’s only a sun rise and not the light of day. 

My current position, where I support faculty in the use of Blackboard Learn, allows me to work with faculty in course development as well as software support. That’s the part I like best. However, I couldn't do course development in isolation well in my opinion. This is because needing help with the application is what will drive faculty to consult us. It is the hook that lets us catch their attention in hope of working closely with them to develop high quality courses. 

What constitutes a high quality online or blended course is the question of the day. I'm serving as a course reviewer of exemplary course submissions for Blackboard. Yesterday I sat through the the training video. As a consequence of that video, I've been thinking about what makes a great course. The rubric they developed is great. Interpretation, not so easy!

I'm watching the Google+ Lecture. This MOOC has 40,000 students! There is a team of five lecturers and one doctoral student from Univ. of Edinburgh who are developing and teaching this course. They are using a variety of digital tools including Hangout currently in use. There are twitter feeds for discussion/comments. There are blogs and discussions forums. Interactivity is woven nicely into the course. However as an instructor, this seems to be almost impossible to keep up with - how they are doing it is an interesting question!


I found this nice list of resources on their site at:  E-learning and Digital Cultures  It's part of the final project in the course. One nice thing about exploring the online resources compiled by others is that you find things you've never seen.  I have used many of these but not all.

• Voicethread: http://voicethread.com  
• Storify: http://storify.com/
• Xtranormal: http://www.xtranormal.com/
• Pixton: http://pixton.com/uk/
• Issuu: http://issuu.com/
• Storybird: http://storybird.com/
• Weebly: http://www.weebly.com/
• Animoto: http://animoto.com/
• Prezi: http://prezi.com
• Wikispaces: http://www.wikispaces.com
• TedEd: http://ed.ted.com
• Google Sites: https://sites.google.com

New version of BbL and Rubrics

I've been spending my  non-phone time learning the lasted implemented release of Blackboard Learn Release 9.1.9. It's not much different except that we have access to a nicer look and more functionality. 
Some of the new functions include

• Rubric enhancement now includes ability to use percentages
• Improved browser support
• Ability to manage multiple sections into one course
• Ability to view student activity reports
• Automatic re-grading when making changes to assessments
• Course themes based on teaching styles
• Partner textbook integration
• Ability to paste directly from Word documents maintaining markup
• Internships.com student portal
• Calendar tool

I'm working on an online workshop on Rubrics for the summer institute as part of the assessment activities - at least I hope it will be included.  

The videos I'm going to include are

• Creating a Rubric 
• Associating a Rubric 
• Grading a Rubric

Another thing I've been doing is assisting with Faculty First Grants. I'm leading one project with the college of nursing. It's an interdisciplinary project that is truly exciting to be part of. I'm also assisting with a couple of others on the technical side. This is so much fun!  I've probably mentioned this 10 times to everyone I meet.  

Over all things are going great both at work and home. We love living in Maryville. We took a nice long walk along the hike and bike on Sunday and saw bits of spring popping out everywhere.

Monday Musings in Tecwrk Land

After I check the queue for the BbL course delivery team when I arrive at 7:30, the next thing I do is scan through my list feeds to see if anything interesting came in I can share with faculty and staff.  I'm a reader. I read everything. If I can't find it, the chances are it is SO technical I don't know correct search terms or it simply isn't to be found.  So I update my brain daily

Do you know how many words have ain in them? crain, drain, lain, tain, fain, rain- many aren't real words but my crazy misfiring brain came up with ALL of them before it sent the correct signals to my fingers for brain.

Onward to today's gem! I love images in teaching and learning. I'm very visual, probably because it's harder for my brain to misfire on an image than on text! LOL  So today when the Chronicle feed's ProfHacker had an article on instructional use of video I was in heaven. It is well written, simple to understand and has direct application to the classroom!  I can see video journals in the online EdPsyc class I'm working on!   This is should be someone you follow!

After a long weekend spent in a camping cabin in Asheville visiting friends and Jubilee! I am ready and raring to go! I'm excited about the courses I'm supporting in development.  I am very proud of Dr. Sherry Bain for her reworking of her course from face to face to totally online.  She is working so hard and learning a lot - as are Donna and I as we assist her. This is one of two Faculty First grant recipients I'm working with. This is awesome - my favorite thing to do - work one to one with faculty to develop and support online learning.

This week we will be launching our newest version of Blackboard Learn. It will exist along side of our current version as we test the locally hosted site.  This of course, is subject to change. Being the lowest of low in course delivery team - I may be wrong. I am a lot as I get up to speed with the differences between a HUGE University and small college world, K-12 and University as well as 5 years away from course management - which can be the same as a century in the pre-digital world. This is only the second time I've worked with a team where I wasn't the boss. I have never worked in one as large as UTK has.  I was very lucky to land here. Good folks, very nice faculty and a chance to continue to learn in my life's work. What more could I ask for? On yeah, a brain that doesn't misfire when it types would be nice! Happy Monday!

Wandering through Articles and my Mind (?)

OK, so I've been re-exploring Google Docs/Apps/Drive.  This time with the eye toward higher education here at UTK.  I really like the idea of them - free and easy to use and forever improving.  Education tools should be free.  If you provide good tools to students and teachers to use, them you have a loyal following for life.  Unfortunately dear Microsoft hasn't figured that out. Nor has Apple.  Of course, we all love our Apple iPad, iPhone and various tools for the ease of use that we are willing to shell out the dough to get them!

Anyway back to Google. I've been playing with Hangout to test capabilities and settings. I found this article today in Educause's website:  "How Educators and Schools Can Make the Most of Google Hangout". Good ideas, just not enough of them. Does Google for Education increase the limit beyond 10? Are there archive capabilities inside Hangout without using another tool? 

I especially like the idea of using Hangout for office hours. I like it because you can have 10 people online at a time and again, it's free and easy to use. I've tested it with friends on campus - it is easy easy!
While exploring Google tools/drive/resources (What DO you call this thing?) I found this article on their Course Builder on Edutopia:
Google's Open Course Builder: A Giant Leap into 21st-Century Online Learning  which led be on to this online course in Constructivist Pedagogy: http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/concept2class/constructivism/index.html .

I truly could surf articles related to online education, pedagogy and instructional technology for days, weeks and years!  Did I mention that's what I've been doing since the late 80's? I remember struggling with the concepts of Industrial Technology (my undergraduate major) and Instructional Technology. To me these were the same species of animal minus a table saw. As graduate schools continued and I began to work in the field, I continued to see the overlap but the line became more defined and then blurred.  This is what I try to help our professors do - draw the line then smudge it as they integrate technology into their courses or when the redesign their courses to being online. It's fascinating watching the faculty change their teaching processes and seeing the difference in method over time impact student learning.  It's a slow process but one which is infinitely interesting!

So what do Google tools offer the teaching professor or classroom teacher?  Stay tuned - I'm working on that! What do you think?

Technology changes

Since I had to work the 11:00 am-7:00 pm shift today, I spent some off time reading journals.  One was about the changes in technology and possible impacts on Higher Ed.  That came full circle as I walked in to my office and saw a colleague balancing a pile of video tapes. Not long ago, tape was the new best thing in video and audio storage media. It came right after the 8 mm and 16 mm film rage for homeowners and educators.  I've spent the last couple of years trying to share family memories with my siblings in the form of scanning stills and film to digital formats and annotating the result.  Then I realized that will be as useful to my grand kids as a Zip drive or floppy disk is to me now - NOT.  Who knows what technology impact media and the sharing of ideas, memories and images.Certainly not me!

Why it's Awesome to be the IT Gal works great for the the other IT.

I LOVED this graphic at first. Of course, I LOVE infographics period.  But I'd make some changes - first of all the Title would change to: "Why it's Awesome to be the IT Gal"!  In my world IT stands not for Information Technology but Instructional Technology.  I (wo)man  the Blackboard help phones and tickets.  I love online courses and and think that with the innovation and creativity faculty are capable of, and bunches of front load time and support - online courses can match or even beat the face to face course.  What Bean Counters in financial  areas may not realize (my assumption based on money issues) is that the development of a stellar courses is extremely time consuming for both the subject matter expert (faculty member) and the staff who support them. They also don't realize  is that not all faculty shine on stage. Some do best in a tutorial support model. Some do best in seminars - small groups with intimate connections and others shine on stage in large groups. I love small group and one to one. Technology can be involved or not. I love working the phones, Skype or Communicator or visiting an office. I like working in a departmental group on a project.  My colleague in Blackboard support loves to be on stage and prefers that most. We both can do both - it's just a matter of comfort and enjoyment of the methods.  Technology mediation doesn't change that!

Where this poster resonates is that I use technical issues as a conduit to the attention of the faculty member. When they have a technical problem related to instruction, I go into overdrive problem solving mode.  I don't just give them the solution they asked for but through probing questions, I find out what instructional need they have and then seek to find a solution.  I also use the opportunity to build trust which will let me help them take instructional risks.  That's how IT (Instructional technologist) and IT (Information Technologist differ. We both are great problem solvers. The instructional folks don't go as deep into the technology side and the information folks don't want to touch the instructional needs.  We work well together as a team in an educational environment.  Add instructional designers, video folks and graphic artists and a faculty member and you have a team who can transform a class.

My title "Why it's Awesome to be the IT Gal works great for the the other IT".

Give us a call on the help desk! 865-974-9900

Infographic: Why it Sucks Being the IT Guy

Today I found a cool site - from Center for 21st Century Universities and Georgia Tech. Tech Bursts are short instructional videos done by students and explain a singe topic in a entertaining way. 

Have you wondered how you can do more than lecture in a large class class? Check out Associate Professor Amy Pritchett and her large engineering course at GA Tech. She uses problem based learning and just in time lectures - how cool is that? 

I guess I need to set up a spreadsheet of these sites! Unless you'd like to look into my diigo site that is.

Tips and Mental Wanderings

Nice tip from professor Luis Cano on what to do if Blackboard Learn won't download.  He was trying to download the Grade Center before the annual purge and it just wouldn't work. He was doing all the steps correctly - and me being new at this - had little to offer.  His research turned up a problem with Firefox which was preventing the download. This link led to the fix
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/cant-download-or-save-files#w_remove-download-manager-plugins 

One project assigned to me by Rosie was to catalog the print materials people have in their offices.  Being a lazy sort who didn't want to write down all that information, I began looking for an app.  I wanted one which would snag all the relevant information from the ISBN and catalog it. That's a hard app to find - there were apps but it too awhile to find one which would do what I wanted it to do. I finally found BookManager  ($1.99 purchase).  It even allows for a tab delimited or comma delimited download for import to excel. I hope it will also upload to my bibliographic software. 

When I asked that question, I left this blog to find the answer.  The answer was a new even cooler tool that's free! I found the EasyBib app for iPhone.  Video of App

It will email me the bibliography in APA, Chicago or MLA format - how cool it that! In 3 minutes I scanned the ISBN codes of two shelves of books!   

I've decided that I've put so much energy into my never to be finished dissertation bibliography that I might as well put it together as a publication of sorts. Now where did I put that file?  I have multiple old computers with dissertation materials. I guess it's time to pull it all together. Stay tuned!

Today, I met with Patrice Cole, a professor teaching Sustainability: Reducing our Impact on Planet Earth   We had such fun talking about her course and how to use Blackboard Learn to enhance it.  We covered the technology introduction to Blackboard, which had been our goal, but then we talked about how to design the course for today's student. 

How do you build in a sense of community online? What active learning projects and assessments do you use to maintain attention? How can you leverage the hand held technology they all carry? What makes a good PowerPoint slide in a traditional lecture room with a 100+ students? It does get me excited to introduce online teaching and best practices to a faculty member who is excited to be teaching and loves their discipline as much as I love mine!