Friday, August 31, 2012

IT September, 2012 Schedule of Learning Opportunities


Join in on one of our learning opportunities this month...in person or online on our own schedule!

All sessions are open to full-time or adjunct instructors and any staff who are interested in participating!
  

i3: Innovative Internet Instruction [online] Workshop

The i3 Workshop is designed for instructors interested in learning more about teaching online, whether you are new to online teaching or experienced and wanting to learn some of the latest best practices. Participants learn the strategies used to teach online, including instructional design strategies and online teaching approaches, how to utilize the Moodle course management system, and much more.  Full time faculty members receive one promotional credit for successfully completing the online course. To register for the fall session of the i3 Workshop: http://svcc.edu/employees/it/training/registration.html or contact us at extension 229. 

Tablets, iPads and More User's Group

Do you have a tablet PC, iPad or other lightweight mobile computer?  If it’s a new technology for you, you probably have questions that someone with experience can answer, such as what does ___mean? How do I ____?  If it’s familiar technology, you may have recommendations for how to make the most of its capabilities…favorite apps? common problems with solutions? the coolest thing? accessories?  Let’s organize ourselves into a user’s group so we can share our knowledge/questions!
Sept 14, 2-3PM, Library Conference Room

ILCCO Book Discussion

ILCCO sponsors a book discussion each semester in which faculty and staff involved in online education read a book and discuss it via web-conferencing for 4 sessions throughout the semester (begins late September). If you like to read or would enjoy engaging in lively discussions with faculty throughout the state, let us know and we'll be in touch when we know what book has been selected for the Fall term. ittraining@svcc.edu or ext. 229

Blogs

These learning opportunities are designed to meet the needs of busy faculty who may not have time to attend workshops, but appreciate ideas and resources, shared in small chunks and in easy-to-read, online formats. Comments and questions are always welcome!

1. Teaching Evening Classes

One would think that teaching is teaching, but there are a number of special issues involved in teaching evening or any extended-time classes. Check out the tips on a blog shared by Black Hawk College's Teaching/Learning Center:  http://15ideasteachingevening.blogspot.com/  Tip: Scroll down to Day One and read that first as an introduction to the blog's contents, and then read up in order to Day Twelve, as several of the posts refer to earlier posts and it will all make more sense. Let us know if you like this format and we'll do more of these over the next year!

2. Moodle Monday and Linky Thursday

Almost every Monday, we post a tip, idea or resource related to using Moodle for online, hybrid or web-enhanced teaching. And almost every Thursday during the school year, we post annotated web resources for instructors teaching with technology. Both are available on our blog at http://isitcafe.blogspot.com/  A short email will be sent to all faculty announcing each post. Comments, questions or additional ideas welcome!
 

3. Teaching Tips for SVCC

Most of us struggle to keep up in our discipline and have little time to keep up with the literature on college teaching, technology integration, online or hybrid teaching, etc. This blog will pos,t on a weekly basis, nuggets of great information from these areas to support your teaching and your students' learning. Many of the tips come from faculty or faculty support personnel at colleges all over the country, written in response to an invitation to share tips and strategies for teaching today's students! http://teachingtips4svcc.blogspot.com   A short email will be sent to all faculty announcing each post. Comments, questions or additional ideas welcome! 
  
Coming in October---Student Focus: What can we do about THAT? eFolios; Copyright...and more!

Monday, August 27, 2012

Moodle Monday - Test Banks and i3 Workshop


I3 Workshop

The i3 Workshop will be offered beginning September 10, 2012. The course is designed for instructors interested in learning more about teaching online, whether you are new to online teaching or an experienced instructor wanting to learn some of the latest best practices. Participants learn the strategies used to teach online, including instructional design strategies and online teaching approaches, how to utilize the Moodle course management system, and much more. Full time faculty members receive one promotional credit for successfully completing the online course. To register for the fall session of the i3 Workshop fill out the form at http://svcc.edu/employees/it/training/registration.html or contact us at extension 229.


Test Banks

Publisher provided test banks are one of many tools available to instructors. However, publishers utilize many different formats to publish these test banks. The procedure for uploading your test bank to Moodle will vary depending upon the format of your test bank.

Today we will share four tutorials for the most common test bank formats and has provided links to each, below. Click on the pertinent link to open a .pdf document with step by step instructions.








Thursday, August 23, 2012

Linky Thursday August 23, 2012


      
           



1.  popplet.com
      
     Today's first shared link features an interesting web tool with several potential classroom applications.
      Users add photos, text boxes, and so forth to the work area. This work area has the potential to     
      become the basis for a presentation with zooming effects similar to prezi.com, but also allows for
      flow charting, audio, and more. See examples at the site.

      www.popplet.com

2.  storybird.com

     This little web tool could be fun for personal use if you have young children, or could serve as the 
     basis for a classroom project for early childhood education students. The free application provides
     graphic images in the style of a child's picture book. You add the text. The books are printable and
     may be viewed on a variety of devices.


3.     Student Success

Learner analytics is a hot topic in higher education right now. This article examines two case studies in a university setting.
       


4.    Geometric Shapes

These geometric shapes are in a printable .pdf document and include cutting and fold lines for constructing a 3-D geometric shape. Follow this link to download a copy.


Thursday, August 16, 2012

Linky Thursday August 16, 2012




                                      Linky Thursday

               August 16, 2012

            Today we have some new links for a new school year. Check them out!

            Word Clouds

            Word clouds are mostly for fun, but a creative instructor might use one to briefly emphasize  new vocabulary words or key concepts in a lesson. They can also be useful as illustrations or images to add visual interest. Wordle brought us the first web tool for creating word clouds, but tagxedo.com allows the creator to make a shaped word cloud. Click on the links below to locate these tools.
         
            www.wordle.net

            www.tagxedo.com


            Student Presentation Tool


            Do you want to stress the importance of primary documents as a source of information in a history course? Perhaps you'd like students to collect examples of art for an art history or humanities class. Here's a neat little application that allows students to place documents and images into an interactive grid called a "museum box" for presentation.

            www.museumbox.e2bn.org


 

Monday, August 13, 2012

Moodle Monday - Five Tips to Start your Semester

Welcome Back for the Fall Semester!

As you are prepping your courses for Fall here are a five tips to make sure the online portion of your courses are off to a great start!

  1. Send an introductory email to your students. Sending an introductory email to your students tells them you are geared up and ready to go, inspiring them to do the same.   Make sure to include contact information, important dates from your syllabus, and other information that will help your students learn and succeed.  This is a great idea even for face to face courses.
  2. Prep your Moodle course. Check your course to make sure it’s ready for Fall semester.   Make sure all your due dates and start dates are correct, links still work, and that your sections or resources are shown or hidden as you need.   
  3. Introductory Ice Breaker / Forum - a best practice for online classes is to include an ice-breaker activity which allows students to get to know each other.  An easy way to do this is an introductory forum.    Read more about online ice-breakers here.
  4. New Timeout Default Procedure - you received an email from Dr. Molly Baker, our new Director of Instructional Technology, concerning the new default timeout for Moodle and best practices for quizzes.  Please  make sure to read through this change to Moodle.
To recap:
      • Moodle Timeout is 3 hours
      • Quiz default time limit is set to 2 hours (this can be changed), with this on students will see a timer as they take a quiz
      • create quizzes with no more than 5 to 7 questions per page
      • this change only affects future quizzes you create, it does not alter existing quizzes.  Please edit existing quizzes to meet these best practice guidelines.


  1. Make your course available-  if you have hidden your course, be sure to go to the settings link in the administration block and make your course available in the “Availability” section

If you haven’t requested your Fall Moodle Course, please do so soon!
Request using the form here:   http://svcc.edu/employees/it/Moodle-Request