Instructional Technology: The Green Solution

An often unrealized potential of instructional technology is the ways it can benefit the environment and reduce waste.  Here are some of my favorite ways to reduce waste through technology.

Online Readings

By providing readings online and allowing students to bring digital devices to class to use when we are working on the class readings, means that students are less likely to print it out.  However, even if they do, I provide them with instructions on how to get the most out of printing by using double-sided and depending on their viewing preferences, possibly 2 pages per side of paper (therefore a 60-page document is reduced to 15 pieces of paper).  Particularly in courses that have massive (and often, overpriced) texts that have lots inside that may never be read, I like that I can provide just the necessities. And with a growing assortment of Open Textbooks that are online for free, it makes it even easier!

Online Assignments

I stopped taking paper assignments several years ago and it has been a great experience.  Not only do I save paper but I am more organized, save time, and provide much more potent feedback to students.  Most word processor programs have a "comment" feature now so that you can provide comments around a paper rather than writing directly on it.  Between the comment feature, the highlight feature, and a file with canned comments (e.g. "Avoid using 2nd person pronouns in formal essays.  Remember that if your argument relies upon directly addressing the reader, then it might not be as strong as it can be").  I can download the papers, grade them, and send them all back.  Students get their grades sooner and have all of their grades in ANGEL or in their email.   

Virtual Tours and Field-Trips

Organizing a class field-trip has a variety of challenges.  Besides cost, determining times, getting everyone together, etc, there's also the challenge of whether there is a local place to visit that merits uprooting everyone's schedule.  However, many places such as museums and galleries are offering virtual tours for participants.  A good example of this is the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History where you can tour the facilities.  Besides the cost, the environmental impact of visiting a museum that might be thousands of miles away is all but eliminated.   

Virtual Reality/Simulations/Games

In addition to virtual tours, you might also consider finding virtual reality environments (Second Life), simulations (such as ECG Simulator) or even video games (check out Serious Games for more information on these) as great learning experiences while also reducing the amount of waste, risks, and costs.  Additionally, with many of these types of environments you can either capture the experience or have each student have personalized experiences enhancing the learning for all involved. 

What are some of the ways you are leveraging technology to reduce you and your students environmental impact? 

Keeping an Eye Out for ANGEL Issues

The semester is off to a cold and snowy start but faculty and students seem to be adapting well!  I thought I would address a few issues ANGEL has been experiencing lately.

Probably the most common one is the browser issue.  If you have not been able to type in a discussion content box, it is probably because you are using a browser that is not supported by ANGEL.

ANGEL Supported Browsers:

• Internet Explorer 8, 9, or 10 (Compatibility View must be on. Add ANGEL as a Trusted Site. For Windows 8, use IE10 in Desktop Mode; do not use in Metro Mode.)

• Safari 5 or 6

• Chrome 21, 24, 27, or 28

• Firefox 18, 21, or 22

Be sure to  check the ANGEL homepage and look under the System Check area for information on what browser and version you are using. If you find you are not using a browser that ANGEL supports please check the Browser Info area and the "Set Your Browser to Work with ANGEL" section.

Sometimes, your browser will do automatic updates and update to a version of the browser that ANGEL does not support. You can uncheck the automated updates for your browser.  Just do a Google search (for your browser name and "how to turn off automatic updates") and it should give you directions.

Another issue is that Internet links may appear to not work.  This happens sometimes with mixed content: using ANGEL, which is a secured site, with another website, which is unsecured (that's not to say the site is dangerous, but doesn't require the level of security that ANGEL requires such as an article on Boston.com).  The link may appear as broken links or blank pages. If you are using Firefox, and this occurs, click on the shield icon (left side of the URL address bar) and select "Disable Protection on This Page" from the dropdown menu. If you're using Chrome, click on the shield icon (right side of the URL bar) and click "Load Unsafe Script."

Hopefully, this will address some of the issues that you may be encountering with ANGEL. If you have any questions please feel free to contact us at angel@northshore.edu.

20 Minute Mentor - Online Faculty Professional Development

The Center for Teaching, Learning, and Assessment and Academic Technology have partnered up again to bring faculty a professional development series from Magna Publications, called the 20 Minute Mentor. The goal of the  20 Minute Mentor series is to offer faculty practical professional development opportunities in twenty minute snippets that can be accessed from anywhere and at any time during the given week. Session topics cover the areas of student engagement, teaching and learning, teaching online, assessment and learning goals, and classroom management.

Information on how to access the  20 Minute Mentor sessions is available each week in the Bulletin.

New video presentations go live at 10:00am each Monday morning and are only accessible through Sunday. Presentation handouts and supplementary materials are always available.
The following sessions are on the schedule for spring 2014.  For session descriptions, objectives, and mentor bios, click on the titles below.

• January 27th - How Can I Create Meaningful Assignments for My Students?
• February 3rd - How Can Backward Design Make My Courses More Accessible?
• February 10th - How Can I Effectively Teach Unprepared Students?
• February 17th - How Should I Manage Conflict Within My Department?
• February 24th - How Can I Set Time Management Priorities in Online Teaching?
• March 3rd - How Can I Use Discussion to Facilitate Learning?
• March 10th - What Are the Three Worst Mistakes to Make in the Classroom?
• March 17th - How Can I Be an Effective Mentor?
• March 24th - How Can I Make the Activities in My Course More Inclusive?
• March 31st - How Do I Set Students Up for Success in Online Courses?
• April 7th - How Can I Make My Multiple Choice Tests More Effective?
• April 14th - How Can I Get Students to Take Responsibility for Their Own Learning?
• April 21st - How Can I Connect Students' Interests to Course Content?
• April 28th - How Do I Prepare a SoTL Article for Publication?
• May 5th - How Can I Use Technology to Create Custom Automated Feedback?
• May 12th - How Can Rubrics Make Grading Easier and Faster?

We would love to hear your feedback on the usefulness of these sessions. Please send your input to itd@northshore.edu.

Launching of Phase 2 of the College Instructional Technology Study

As we mentioned in a previous post, we had a very successful first phase in our College Instructional Technology Study.  We are now in the process of Phase 2.  In the second phase of this study, Academic Technology (AT) will explore the various student support services at the college to share knowledge and resources about students’ learning and technology in order to better understand the benefits and challenges all involved parties encounter. North Shore Community College (NSCC) has a variety of tools and resources that are used in assuring student success in the classroom and in the college as a whole and beyond. It serves the best interests of everyone if each area of the college is better informed about the range of tools, resources and technology practices. Therefore, AT will plan to meet with the various student support services to share resources and tools around technologies that enhance student learning at the college.  

“Technologies that enhance student learning at the college” means any special computer programs, devices, online services/programs/web sites, or other technologies that are used to manage and facilitate communication, interaction, and learning within the teaching and learning environment at the college, but with particular attention to students’ learning experience. This could also be using what are considered common technological programs and tools (cellphones, cameras, Microsoft Word, Facebook, etc.) in new, unique, or unorthodox ways for learning.

Across departments, divisions, programs, and projects, NSCC makes use of a wide range of instructional technology in facilitating education, guidance, and communication. While some tools are well known, others are less-known but could have the potential of large scalable uses for the faculty and staff at the college. Hence, lack of knowing or having access to the range of instructional technological tools at NSCC means that AT provides less service and efficiency en masse than it might otherwise do.  

At its core, this study is a fact-finding mission to better understand what the instructional technology is that is being used, how it is being used, and how AT can further aid the use of this instructional technology for the betterment of all.   

For a more detailed explanation, please visit the public plan at this link.  We appreciate any feedback or thoughts you might have to offer us about the project. 

WORKSHOPS Are Coming!

Mark your calendars because the annual January Instructional Technology Workshops are quickly approaching!  Just prior to the start of the Spring Semester, Instructional Technology and Design will be sponsoring a series of workshops on a variety of topics around integrating technology into the teaching and learning environment. The workshops will take place Monday, January 13th through Thursday, January 16th in DB 202 (unless otherwise noted).

Updated workshop descriptions and the opportunity to RSVP can be found here.  Keep an eye out for more information in your NSCC Email. Here is the current schedule:  

Monday, January 13th
9:00 a.m. - 10:15 a.m.	Polling/Getting Feedback from Your Students, DB304
10:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.	Wow!  This App is the Best!, DB304
1:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.	New to ANGEL
Tuesday, January 14th
9:00 a.m. - 10:15 a.m.	New to ANGEL
10:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.	ANGEL Rubrics
1:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.	Getting More out of Students with ANGEL Agents
Wednesday, January 15th
9:00 a.m. - 10:15 a.m.	ANGEL Gradebook
10:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.	Virtual Classrooms - Adobe Connect
1:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.	Blogger: Google's Blogging Tool
Thursday, January 17th
9:00 a.m. - 10:15 a.m.	New to Smart Classrooms, DB304
10:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.	Creating Accessible Online Course Content, DB304
1:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.	Preparing Students for Technology and Learning Online, DB304

Preparing your ANGEL Courses for the Winter/Spring Semester

As you start to think about your winter and spring courses, we wanted to share with you the following important information that will help you prepare your course site in ANGEL.

Please review the “Preparing your ANGEL Course for a New Semester” checklist for directions on getting your course site set up for a new semester.

If you have any questions, please contact us at angel@northshore.edu.

Important End of Semester ANGEL Tasks

As you near the end of your semester there are a few IMPORTANT things you might want to consider.

First, it is always a good idea to create a backup of your ANGEL gradebook. 

• Go to the Manage tab in your ANGEL course. 
• Click Gradebook.  
• Click Print Grades (on the left side of the page). 
• Here you can change a number of things.  I usually increase the font size to 12 so it is easier to read.  
• Click Generate PDF.  This will create a PDF document that you can print or save to either your computer or flashdrive.  
• Click Done.  

That’s it!  You will now have a copy of the grades for that course.

Next, as outlined in the NSCC ANGEL Course Archive Policy, we have begun the process of archiving older ANGEL course sites and removing them from the ANGEL server.

A course will remain active on the production server for only one academic year from the end date of a given term.

If you would like to retain these course sites for a longer period of time, you have the option of generating your own archive and there are several available options for storage, including:

• Your P: Drive network folder (only accessible on campus)
• Your Google Drive, accessible through the your  NSCC email account
• A personal storage medium, i.e. USB drive, portable hard disk, computer, CD
• External cloud storage solutions, available at little to no cost (such as Dropbox or SkyDrive)

Please click on the active link listed below for directions on archiving your course.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4PhbXwAWVRCOTZmdTkweGNrZXc/edit?usp=sharing

As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to contact us at angel@northshore.edu.

Phase 1 Report of College Instructional Technology Study

In Fall 2012, the Instructional Technology and Design (ITD) team from the Academic Technology Department at North Shore Community College initiated a campus-wide project to investigate the uses and needs of faculty as it relates to instructional technology at the college.  The public document of this project can be found at this link http://goo.gl/mUZ7u.  After a year of successful discussion and work, we are proud to announce our findings on Phase 1 of this project.  We had the benefit of hearing from more than 75% of the academic departments.  This has been a very successful experience and we are greatly appreciative of all the feedback from faculty and administration.  Before moving into Phase 2 of the project, we wanted to reach out to the community to share our findings and, even more important, some of the actions and plans we will be implementing based on faculty input.  The Report on Phase 1 can be found here at this link http://goo.gl/B6gsYR.

This report captures the findings of the first phase of a two year study of instructional technology use at North Shore Community College, conducted by the ITD team.  Over the 2012-2013 academic year, the team met with and discussed instructional technology with representatives from 35 academic departments.  These meetings were largely focused on gathering information about faculty's use, challenges, and concerns around instructional technology.

The overall positive findings of the project revealed that a significant majority of the faculty are using a wide array of instructional technology with their courses including regular use of our learning management system, ANGEL, and the suite of Google tools.  It was also clear that faculty  utilized and appreciated the support regularly provided by ITD.  Faculty also showed significant interest in pursuing additional instructional technologies such as publisher and other third party eContent, library-supported digital resources, social media, Web 2.0 tools, ePortfolio, and web conferencing platforms.

The challenges encountered by faculty fell into three main areas: clarity around the roles of  Information Systems (IS) and Academic Technology (AT), technical issues within the classrooms, and faculty/student interactive technology challenges.  Given these concerns, this report identifies the different actions that AT will pursue in the next year. These actions include the following:

• Pursue a two-tiered approach to address and improve student preparedness for online learning.
• Investigate and choose a survey that accurately assesses online preparedness
• Develop an Online Learning orientation course to address the most common gaps in preparedness.
• Develop a Mobile Guide for faculty and students to increase awareness of what is available and useful, and to assist in troubleshooting mobile usage within the college.
• Establish the Learning Environment Modeling Lab (DB234) where faculty can try out new methodologies and technologies before deploying them in the classroom. This is an initiative of the Classroom Architecture Group comprised of key Academic Technology staff from ITD and Instructional Media Services (IMS). This initiative will work in conjunction with the newly established Education Technology Innovations Group.
• Develop an Open Educational Resources Guide in partnership with the Library and the Education Technology Innovation Group.
• Promote and integrate the recently acquired college-subscription to Atomic Learning which provides instructional videos on technology with over 50,000 tutorials of 1-5 minute walk-through videos.

To check out the various materials we have been using for this project, visit this Google Folder at this link http://goo.gl/5jBP15.

The Gold Standard Implementation of Peer Instruction Using Clickers

Recently, I watched a webinar from Turning Technologies that addressed a standard of implementation for using clickers for peer instruction.  Julie Schell, the Director of OnRamps and Strategic Initiatives, was the presenter.  In her presentation, "Using Clickers with Peer Instruction," she offered the 7 basic steps of this standard:

1.  Provide a mini lecture
2.  The instructor asks a question to the class
3.  The students are given time to think about the question
4.  The students vote for the first time
(The answer is not shown if there is a right answer; the answer may be shown if there is not a correct answer)
5.  Students discuss their response to the question with a neighbor or in groups
6.  A second vote is taking in class
(The answer  is shown)
7.  There is an explanation of why the answer is correct.

Peer instruction and class interaction often fall apart when one or more of these steps are left out of the process. Check out the entire webinar here. 

If you'd like more information about survey and polling solutions to help enable peer instruction and student discussion in your classroom, please contact me, Dave Houle, at dhoule@northshore.edu.

More ANGEL Tips

The semester is well under way and I thought I would present some tips on using ANGEL.

TIP  #1:    Personalizing Announcements

When students log into their ANGEL course, it is always nice for  you to have a message welcoming them, directing them or updating them on the course.   You can personalizing your announcement and thus make the student feel as though you are addressing him/her individually. You can include the student's first name in the message.

You can use a simple script to add a student's first name to any announcement.  To do so, just add the following: $First_Name$ into the announcement text box (such as "Greetings $First_Name$).  Be sure to add it exactly as it is shown (or copy and past it).  This will enter the student’s first name on the announcement page.  It will also work in course mail.

TIP  #2:    Printing the ANGEL Gradebook

An ANGEL tip for those of you who are using the ANGEL Gradebook. It is always a good idea to "save" a copy of your Gradebook a few times throughout the semester.  It is very easy to do. 

1. Go to the Manage tab in your course.
2. Go to Gradebook.  
3. Click on the "Print Grades" in the left column.
4. On this page, select the parameters you would like to print.  You can even change the font if you would like to view it in a larger size.
5.  Click on "Generate PDF"
6.  You can either print or save the PDF file to your computer or flash drive.

If you have any ANGEL tips you would like to share, please feel free to comment!