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.
Showing posts with label faculty development. Show all posts
Showing posts with label faculty development. Show all posts
Monday, April 1, 2013
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!
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!
Monday, February 4, 2013
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?
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!
Monday, January 7, 2013
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.
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.
Thursday, January 3, 2013
Tips and Mental Wanderings
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!
Friday, November 9, 2012
Week One At UTK-OIT
Welcome to Room 511 Greve Hall!
I've started with a new team at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. As of the end of the first week I am jazzed! This is a great bunch of folks. It's a much bigger group than I've ever worked in. The University is large but seems pretty efficient at first glance. The biggest challenge so far has been completing the benefit package! That took forever.
So what have I done this first week other than the benefits? I investigated and compared two plagiarizer prevention application SafeAssign and iThenticate, I've viewed Blackboard tutorials and looked at the ticket system and knowledge base. I've also observed my colleagues present BbC (Collaborate) and wikis in Bb Learn. I've also looked into social aspects of online learning and assessment.
I wanted a cool way to introduce myself to the group. I've decided to use a QR code on my door with a bio landing page. Not!
Possible project - per: Rosie is to catalog the books we each have in our offices.
The book I'm reading is Self, Peer and Group Assessment in E-Learning. (LB1028.2.S38885 2006 ) by Roberts, Tim S.
I've started with a new team at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. As of the end of the first week I am jazzed! This is a great bunch of folks. It's a much bigger group than I've ever worked in. The University is large but seems pretty efficient at first glance. The biggest challenge so far has been completing the benefit package! That took forever.
So what have I done this first week other than the benefits? I investigated and compared two plagiarizer prevention application SafeAssign and iThenticate, I've viewed Blackboard tutorials and looked at the ticket system and knowledge base. I've also observed my colleagues present BbC (Collaborate) and wikis in Bb Learn. I've also looked into social aspects of online learning and assessment.
I wanted a cool way to introduce myself to the group. I've decided to use a QR code on my door with a bio landing page. Not!
Possible project - per: Rosie is to catalog the books we each have in our offices.
The book I'm reading is Self, Peer and Group Assessment in E-Learning. (LB1028.2.S38885 2006 ) by Roberts, Tim S.
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