Category Archives: For Instructors

Online Teaching Bootcamp: January 11-13 2017

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DSC_3940New to online teaching?  In need of some additional ideas for your online class?  The Learning Technology Center is pleased to announce the second annual Online Teaching Bootcamp.

This program will be held January 11-13, 1:00-4:00 pm each day, in Hyer 210.   It will be a mix of demonstration, hands-on practice, and discussion, geared to address the most common concerns in online teaching.  All faculty and instructional staff are welcome.  Registration is recommended, but walk-ins are welcome.

There is no stipend associated with this workshop series.

Program Summary:

January 11: Hands-On D2L, Hyer 210
Registration:  https://my.uww.edu/signup/Registration/Details/14886

  • The basic layout of D2L
  • Arranging content into modules
  • HTML editor
  • Moving from Microsoft Word to D2L
  • Discussions—basics
  • Dropbox—Basics
  • Grades

January 12: Online Assignments, Hyer 210
Registration:  https://my.uww.edu/signup/Registration/Details/14887

  • Creating, facilitating, and grading discussions
  • Creating and grading papers, posters, presentations, and other common assignments
  • Quizzes
  • Online gradebooks
  • Tools external to D2L: Blogs, wikis, Google Drive

January 13: Instructor Presence and Presentations, Hyer 210
Registration:  https://my.uww.edu/signup/Registration/Details/14888

  • Instructor presence online
  • GradeMark
  • Webex
  • Studio resources
  • Presentation best practices

If you have questions about this, or any other LTC resources, feel free to contact us:  ltc@uww.edu

Desire2Learn User Guide Updated

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Logo_Brightspace_rgb_1200x630We have recently updated the vendor documentation for Desire2learn (D2L) to reference the latest versions for D2L 10.6.  The documentation can be found on the “My Home” screen when accessing the course in the Student / Instructor Resources Widget located on the right hand side of the screen.

We also have a number of resources and custom tutorials available on our wiki located at: https://spaces.uww.edu/display/instructional/Desire2Learn

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact UW-W Desire2Learn Support.

“Last Accessed” Now Available in D2L Classlist

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Previously, the only way that you were able to see the date a student last accessed the course was by drilling down unto the user progress tool within the course to find the information.  Starting today, we have enabled a new option that will display the “Last Accessed” date right in the class list!  This is the date/time that they last accessed the given course.

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If you have any questions about this, please contact UW-W Desire2Learn Support.

 

Community of Practice for Online/Blended Education

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DSC_3940All University of Wisconsin-Whitewater faculty and staff are invited to participate in a campus-wide community of practice for online and blended education.

The Community of Practice for Online and Blended Education began in the spring of 2015, thanks to a grant from OPID.  Its purpose is to serve as a campus-wide forum to develop, share, and document best practices in teaching online and blended (hybrid) courses at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.  In addition, it provides a support network for those teaching with technology.

The purpose of our meetings is to build community and meet others who are excited about teaching in the online and/or blended format.

Fall Meetings:

Thursday October 13, 2016
2:00-3:30 pm, UC259a
Signup:  https://my.uww.edu/signup/Registration/Details/14848

In this session, Stephanie Douglas and Jodi Galvan will share the materials they created for an Online Bootcamp for General Learners, as part of a LEAP project.  Galvan and Douglas piloted these resources in courses in Spring 2015 and surveyed their students for feedback.

The students responded positively, and stated that they helped them to understand if online learning is a good fit for them, reduced fear and anxiety, and gave them time management skills to help them succeed.  Given the success of the project, most of these materials were integrated into the UW-Whitewater Starter Course template.

Thursday December 1, 2016
2:00-3:30 pm, UC259a
Signup:  https://my.uww.edu/signup/Registration/Details/14849

In this session, the recipients of the Community of Practice project grant will share the results of their projects.  Two projects were funded:  the development of an accessibility template for the ECE4U program, and the creation of assessment videos.

If you have questions about this please contact the Learning Technology Center at ltc@uww.edu or 262.472.1004.

Transitioning to TurningPoint Cloud

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Turning Technologies will be offering a series of complimentary webinars to help acclimate current users to their newest software, TurningPoint Cloud. Learn how to build presentations that measures user understanding and tracks their progress. Get started using the student response system and more effectively engage your students.

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The topics included are “Transitioning to TurningPoint Cloud” and “PowerPoint Polling for New Users”.

Tuesday, September 20th, 11:00 am

Wednesday, September 21st, 1:00 pm

Thursday, September 22nd, 1:00 pm

If you have any questions about these events, or anything else related to TurningPoint please contact the Learning Technology Center at ltc@uww.edu or 262.472.1004.

Academic Innovation Coordinator Position

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The University of Wisconsin-Whitewater is seeking an energetic, organized, and innovative faculty or instructional academic staff member to act as the
coordinator for academic innovation at UW-W during the 2016-2017 academic year.

Interested faculty and instructional academic staff should apply by Sept. 19, 2016. For more information, view:  http://www.uww.edu/acadaff/provost/academic-affairs-news

Starter Course, Fall 2016

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DSC_3956The Learning Technology Center is pleased to share an updated D2L Starter Course for faculty and staff.

The Starter Course is a template, pre-loaded with important campus policies, teaching resources, and module outlines.  It can be copied into your course and edited to meet your teaching needs.  While it was designed for the needs of online instructors, it is useful for any modality.

The Fall 2016 Starter Course includes updated policy links, sample discussions, rubrics, quizzes and dropboxes, a layout to make use of content folders, and resources for student support.  These student support resources come from the LEAP project of Jodi Galvan and Stephanie Douglas.

Galvan and Douglas piloted these resources in courses and surveyed their students for feedback.  The students responded positively, and stated that they helped them to understand if online learning is a good fit for them, reduced fear and anxiety, and gave them time management skills to help them succeed.

Here are some quotes from their students:

Help them determine if online learning is a fit for them

“This was my first time as an online learner. I think it was a good experience for me to see the difference in workload, interactions with classmates and the professor, and being independent.” —College of Arts and Communication, Journalism, sophomore

“I learned about the traits that many successful online learners have. I thought it was interesting that there are common learning habits between people who do well with online learning because I didn’t think about how it could be difficult for different types of learners.”–College of Business and Economics, Accounting, junior

Reducing fear and anxiety

Has resources for all students learning with technology (e.g., D2L) by:

“The modules helped alleviate the small fears I had that I would possibly struggle in a new learning environment.” —College of Education and Professional Studies, Special Education, graduate student

“The modules took care of the few worries I had, and they made me feel more prepared for a course like this. Up until I went through them, my anxiety level was growing because I had no clue what I was doing.” — College of Business and Economics, Information Technology, sophomore

Giving them time management skills to help them succeed

“One of the big things that I learned from the online tutorials was time management. It’s so hard being a college student and working, so you have to make sure that you’re balancing those things out. What really helped me was putting reminders in my phone.” —College of Letters and Science, Biology, senior

“One of the modules that I found most enlightening was the one called “Time Management Tools”. This offered three different ways of making my life easier that I have never heard of before.” —College of Education and Professional Studies, English/Spanish, senior

To access the Starter Course, follow the directions on this site:  How to Register for the D2L Starter Course

Active Learning Workshop Series

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Active Learning:  Engagement, High-Level Thinking & Enhanced Learning

ClassroomIn 1987 Chickering and Gamson wrote that “learning is not a spectator sport,” and in 2016 their words still fit.  Active learning involves students in the learning process, leading to better retention and student outcomes.  The LTC and LEARN Center are please to co-sponsor a 3-part workshop series focused on active learning.  This series will explore a variety of approaches to active learning, applicable to both face-to-face and online learning environments.

Attendance at all 3 sessions is encouraged, but not mandatory.

Session 1:  Active Learning, an Introduction
September 15th, 11 am – noon, UC 262
Facilitators:  Elizabeth Simpson & Barbara Beaver
Signup at: https://my.uww.edu/signup/Registration/Details/14784

This session will examine the definitions and possibility of active learning, and explore why it is a continuing trend in higher education.  We’ll address examples from here on the UW-W campus, as well as others from UW System and across the nation.  Participants will gain suggestions for the integration of active learning in their own courses, examples assignments, and techniques.

Upcoming Sessions:

Session 2:  Incorporating Active Learning Strategies into your Teaching: Evidence-Based Practices, Case Studies, and Stories from the Field.
October 19th, 12:30-2 pm

Session 3:  The Unique Challenges of Active Learning in an Online/Blended Environment.
November 17th, 11 am – noon

If you have any questions about these workshops, please contact ltc@uww.edu.

Fall 2016 Updates from the Learning Technology Center

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From left to right: Elizabeth Simpson (Instructional Design Specialist), Jessica Eddy (Technology Training & Advancement Advocate), Nicole Weber (Director of Learning Technology), Elaina Barr (Media & Training Specialist), Aaron Axelsen (Operations Manager).

The UW-Whitewater Learning Technology Center (LTC) is here and ready to help you! Our team of experts have a wide range of skills to tackle all of your instructional course related needs.

Join us Monday, August 29th from 2PM to 5PM at the annual ICIT Technology Open House to chat about teaching and technology. The event is located in room 275 (Grand Ballroom) in the University Center.  We hope to see you there!

Desire2Learn 10.6 Upgrade

Logo_Brightspace_rgb_1200x630On June 9th, 2016, the Desire2Learn 10.6 upgrade was complete.  Overall, there were not any major changes to the way D2L operates.

The Turnitin integration has been updated.  The new integration moves the configuration to a new tab within the Dropbox edit screen.  There are some additional options that are now available directly inside of D2L as well.  Peermark is currently not available via the integration, and must be used directly from turnitin.com.tii

Respondus Lockdown Browser configuration has also been moved to a new link on the quizzes windows.  The new integration allows for the use of Respondus Monitor, the Respondus iPad App and now has options to support Jaws and other screen reader technologies for enhanced accessibility.rldbFor a full list of changes, see: What’s new in Desire2Learn 10.6.

Instructor Support Survey

Thank you to all the instructors who completed the LTC Instructor Support Survey this past April. Congratulations to Andrew Dahl (Marketing) and Rachelle Yankelevitz (Psychology) whose names were selected from the drawing to win mini iPads!

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Over 100 instructors completed the survey and we could not be more pleased with the information that was provided. We intend to use the information to make data-driven decisions about our support, programming, resources, and emerging technology exploration projects over the next year.

We received so much great data that we are still sifting through it, but we will be sure to share what we learned on the LTC Instructional Resources Blog when the final report is complete. As a sneak peak, instructors identified being most interested in learning more about active learning strategies for technology-enhanced, blended, and online courses. This helped us to focus our themed workshop collaboration with LEARN this fall on Active Learning Strategies!

Weekly Email Updates

figure3_4Did you know that you can get a weekly email updates about what’s going on in the LTC? Every Monday morning, you’ll get an email that contains a summary of the latest items from our blog. To signup for these updates, just fill out the form below!


Active Learning Workshop Series

The LTC and LEARN Center are pleased to co-sponsor a 3-part workshop series focused on active learning.  This series will explore a variety of approaches to active learning, applicable to both face-to-face, hybrid, and online learning environments.

Classroom

Session 1: Active Learning, an Introduction: September 15th, 11 am – noon, UC 262

Session 2: Incorporating Active Learning Strategies into your Teaching: Evidence-Based Practices, Case Studies, and Stories from the Field: October 19th, 12:30-2 pm

Session 3: The Unique Challenges of Active Learning in an Online/Blended Environment: November 17th, 11 am – noon

For more information, visit: https://wp.me/p2U0PY-foU

Fall 2016 Starter Course

The Learning Technology Center is pleased to share an updated D2L Starter Course for faculty and staff.

Capture

The Starter Course is a template, pre-loaded with important campus policies, teaching resources, student support resources, and module outlines.  It can be copied into your course and edited to meet your teaching needs.  While it was designed for the needs of online instructors, it is useful for any modality.

These student support resources come from the LEAP project of Jodi Galvan and Stephanie Douglas, who implemented these resources in their courses. Their students responded positively, and stated that they helped them to understand if online learning is a good fit for them, reduced fear and anxiety, and gave them time management skills to help them succeed.

For more information, visit: https://wp.me/p2U0PY-fp0

Instructor Spotlight!

Do you want to help us promote a technology for your fellow colleagues?  If so, let us know!  We are currently putting the final touches on some short videos featuring D2L, Quality Matters, and ePortfolio that we will be releasing soon.  In the meantime, check out these videos from Carol Scovotti on using WebEx and Matt Vick on Rubrics!

Educause ELI Initiative

ELI_103X103ICIT has purchased a membership to the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI)! Creating a profile and selecting UW-Whitewater as your organization allows access to the “community of higher education institutions and organizations committed to the advancement of learning through the innovative application of technology.” (http://www.educause.edu/eli).

This means access to:

Updates from the System: LERG

Fall 2016 is the beginning of the Learning Environment Requirements Gathering (LERG) process, in preparation for the learning management system RFP.

shutterstock_345584081As many are aware, the current UW System contract for the D2L Brightspace learning management system (LMS) will end on June 30, 2018. Information from the requirements gathering process and the UW System Learning Environment Needs Analysis (LENA) project will be used to create and issue a Request for Proposal (RFP) in late 2016 with the objective of identifying and selecting the appropriate digital learning environment for the UW System institutions by Spring 2017.  The Learn@UW Executive Committee will manage and oversee the requirements gathering process.

The UW System intends to gather requirements from various stakeholders this fall.  We will update you are we receive additional information.

CaptureFilms on Demand D2L Integration

If you are not aware, UW-Whitewater has a license for the vast array of film content available in the Films on Demand library.  You can now access these Films directly from Desire2Learn!

More information at: https://spaces.uww.edu/x/A4Bk

Exploration: New Technologies

shutterstock_382942804We have been exploring a number of cool technologies and have some new things for you to try out!

  • Learning Analytics Tool Chest Pilot. We are participating in the UW System Learning Analytics Tool Chest Exploration Project for the Spring 2017 semester. Learning analytic software allows students, instructors, advisors, and administrators insight into specific avenues that can influence student success in a course. More information to come soon!
  • KleerBoard.  We recently added a new technology into our media recording studio.  The KleerBoard is a clear acylic board that you can use like a white board.  Being clear, we can shoot through it with the camera and create some unique videos.  More at: https://wp.me/p2U0PY-fnC
  • TurningPoint Cloud.  We have deployed TurningPoint Cloud to campus.  This comes with a number of new features and better D2L integration.  More at: https://wp.me/p2U0PY-fnL

Need Desire2Learn Help?

We are here to help you with all your Desire2Learn (D2L) course needs! The best way to request support is by using our online support form which is located at http://d2l.uww.edu/contact

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We do our best to respond to all support request within 1 business day of receiving them.  We do monitor the box on evenings and weekends for critical issues on a best effort basis.

Don’t forget to request for fall semester courses!  Course creation must be completed every semester, and it is a manual process on our end.  Courses created by 3pm on business days are typically available the next day.  Request for your courses at http://my.uww.edu/d2lrequest

Don’t forget to Visit Us

Are you still with us?  If so – great, you made it to the end!  Be sure to stop by the LTC throughout the semester to visit.  As a reminder, we are located in McGraw Hall, Suite 120 and are around between 8:00 AM and 4:30 PM weekdays.  We can also be reached at ltc@uww.edu or 262.472.1004.  We’ll always be willing to help, and have plenty of treats on hand for your sweet tooth.  Have a great semester!

ICIT Technology Open House – Monday, August 29th

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Faculty and staff are invited to join us at the annual ICIT Technology Open House!  This year the event will be held on Monday, August 29th from 2pm to 5pm in the University Center Grand Ball Room (UC275).

Add Reminder to Calendar (iCal)

Why should you come to the tech open house?

  1. New for Fall 2016.  We have a number of new and exciting things going on in the Learning Technology Center.  Stop by to learn about them and see how you can apply them in your courses.
  2. Meet the Experts.  The majority of our interaction with users is via email or phone, we never get to see your face.  Stop by and introduce yourself!
  3. Meet the Vendors.  We will have some of our vendors on hand who will be able to talk to you directly, answer questions and take feedback.  So start thinking of your questions now, and bring them with!
  4. Free Stuff!  There will be light refreshments, swag and drawings!  We have some pretty awesome prizes lined up!

We hope to see you all at the event!  Help us spread the word and tell your colleagues as well!