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#OneNewThing from TLT
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CREATE AN ORGANIZED AND EASY TO NAVIGATE SYLLABUS IN ONENOTE

Mendi Benigni

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Microsoft’s OneNote is available as part of our Office 365 and is available to all Faculty, Staff and Students. This newsletter will show you how you can use it to create and organize your syllabus into something that is more easily digestible by students.

Below is an example of a converted syllabus.

You’ll see from the example that OneNote forms an easy to use navigation on the left side which helps the student to find the exact section of the syllabus they need.

You can easily add graphics and images to your syllabus as well.

If you use the OneNote integration in OAKS to create a Class Notebook, you can import an existing syllabus right in and modify it for that semester. This will also give your students automatic access to the syllabus.

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IMPORTANT NOTE:

This method is not without its downsides.
  • You can only print one section at a time, not the entire syllabus.  This could be difficult when including it in T&P or on a departmental website.
  • You should share it via the Class Notebook link in OAKS, otherwise, the Share link is only good for 30 days.
  • Students have to log in with their CofC credentials to see your class notebook and therefore, your Syllabus.

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online teaching tips
Distance Ed

Online Teaching Tip: Keeping students on track by changing your OAKS Course Home

Mendi Benigni

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Your OAKS Course Home doesn’t have to look the way it does now.  You can change it to add a widget that can help your students stay on track.

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Adding the Content Navigator to the OAKS Course Home

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screenshot of the Content NavigatorThe Content Navigator is a tool that indicates, to the student, how much content they have viewed and have left to view.  The percentage and blue color next to the Module name indicates the amount of content that has been viewed within that Content module.  Students can then click directly on the module name or the percent to see which area are left to view and can access the content directly from the course home.

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How To:

  1. From your homepage, choose Management > Edit Course > Homepages.
  2. Choose the dropdown next to CofC Default Course Homepage choose Copy.
  3. Click on the new copy to open it.
  4. Change the name to make it easier to identify.
  5. Scroll until you get to the Widgets area.
  6. Click on Add Widgets in the area in which you wish to add the Content Navigator.
  7. Click the checkbox next to Content Navigator then click Add.
  8. Mouse over the Content Navigator, and using the 8 dots to the left, click and drag to move it to the proper place on the homepage.
  9. You can also delete any widgets that you do not want by clicking on the X in the upper right corner of the widget.  NOTE: please do not delete the Calendar or the VoiceThread widget as they re used by other tools.
  10. Click Save and Close.
  11. Now activate the new Homepage by clicking the dropdown under Active Homepage and selecting your new homepage
  12. Now click Apply.
  13. Click on Course Home to see your new page.

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This tool is a great way to keep your students up to date on their progress and to prevent them from missing something.   Because this works with only the Content area you will want to be sure to link discussions, quizzes, and assignments into your Content as well.

 

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Activity feed Icon with a + a pencil and Post
Collaboration, discussion

Tech Tip Tuesday: Communicate in a New Way in OAKS

Mendi Benigni

In our OAKS (D2L/Brightspace) classes there are often two types of communication: detailed and thoughtful discussions and class questions and answers.  While the Discussion tool is great for the first type of communication, it’s less effective for the Q&A type.

Now, however, OAKS has a new tool called the Activity Feed.  This is a tool that you can add to your Course Home and allows you and your students to communicate quickly and easily.

The Activity Feed functions more like a chat feed. Check it out.

screenshot of the activity feed

You, as the instructor, can set it up so that students can only comment on your posts or can create their own.  This interaction is what sets it apart from News which is a more static means of communication.  However, like the News tool, it can take advantage of Notifications, so the students can make sure they won’t miss a message AND it’s the first thing they see on the Course Home when they enter the class.

Activity Feed:

  • On the Course Home
  • More interactive
  • Allows Notifications
  • Great for quick communication

 

HOW TO:

Add it to your course home

  1. In OAKS, go to your course
  2. Select Management > Edit Course > Homepages
  3. Next to CofC Default Course Homepage choose the dropdown arrow and choose Copy.
  4. Now click on the copy to open it.
  5. Rename your homepage to something you can easily identify (ex. My course home with activity feed).
  6. Now scroll down to the Widgets area and click Add Widget in the area where you want to see the Activity Feed.
  7. Select the Activity Feed box and then click Add.
  8. Move the feed to the proper location by dragging it.
  9. Click Save and Close.
  10. Now at the top, under Active Homepage, choose your new homepage from the dropdown menu and then choose Apply.
  11. Click on Course Home in the top left and you should see your new homepage with the Activity Feed.

Configure your Activity Feed

  1. On the Course Home click on the dropdown arrow next to Activity Feed and choose Manage commenting and posting.
  2. Determine who can post and who can comment.  I would recommend checking Enable comments on posts and Allow all learners to create posts.
  3. Click Save.

Use your Activity Feed

  1. Just type your message in the box and click the blue + to post it.
  2. I would also recommend that you not use the Assignment feature of this tool at this time as it can be confusing for the student.
Magnifying glass over a finger print
Assessment, Collaboration, Mobile

Digital scavenger hunts for building class community

Mendi Benigni

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Scavenger hunts are a great way to get your students working together for a common goal.  This is a wonderful way for them to bond as a class or to gel as a group project team.   These types of hunts can be used for assessment as well but I want to focus mainly on team and community building.

For interaction, successful group work, and/or great discussion to occur in your class there needs to be trust.  Students need to trust the instructor but more importantly, they need to trust their classmates.  This trust is what allows the students to speak their minds, voice their opinions, or contradict an instructor or a classmate.  Without this all you get is superficiality.

While building trust within a classroom is another topic in and of itself, the first step to establishing this type of environment is to get the students familiar with one another and to have them experience working as a team.  A scavenger hunt is a fun way to do this.

Check out Goose Chase scavenger hunt creator.  First, a special shout out to Melissa Negreiros from Philip Simmons Elementary who introduced me to this application.  It’s a free (mostly) digital scavenger hunt application and here are the details:

  • Free
    • Regular account allows for 3 groups in a hunt and one hunt at a time.
    • Educator account allows for 5 groups in a hunt and one hunt at a time.
    • Educator paid is <$50/yr.
  • Online
  • Built-in list of possible activities from which to choose
  • Can create your own activities customized to your students, organization, or content
  • Can set a duration for the hunt
  • Can easily invite students with a class code, no accounts required
  • Can password protect it

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Uses:

  • Group community building
  • Class community building
  • Icebreakers
  • Content assessment
  • Field trip engagement
  • Brain break
  • Learn about campus resources

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Small Teaching Tip 13 Building Stronger Learning Communities
Best Practices, Small Teaching Tip, Teaching Advice

Small Teaching Tip #13: Building Stronger Learning Communities

Jessica Smith

In higher education, teaching is often perceived simply as the transmission of knowledge and that can contribute to our focus on content delivery at the expense of other elements of effective teaching.  Educational philosopher John Dewey argued that effective teachers do more than deliver content to their students.  They also value learning by doing rather than simply listening, giving students the freedom to explore and create their own meaning, and encouraging the application of knowledge to their lived experiences.

In order for these values to flourish in the college classroom, students and professors must build a safe, supportive learning community.  After all, the goal of teaching is not simply to build knowledge and competencies, but also to grow a network in which learners feel comfortable sharing perspectives, challenging one another’s world views, and stretching their thinking.  So the following are a few simple ideas to build greater community in your own classes.

  • Add clear statements to your syllabus that explain expectations regarding community and communication (and discuss them during the first week of class). Consider including topics such as:
    • The roles of students and instructor (e.g.  the instructor may initiate discussion, but students are responsible for facilitating).
    • How you want students to communicate with you and with each other (e.g. behavioral expectations, technology tools, etc.)
    • If you’ll be incorporating online interaction, include a section on netiquette.
    • What students can expect from you in terms of communication (e.g. response time to emails, making appointments, etc.)
    • Your expectations for quality participation (e.g. what “counts” as contributions to class discussion).
    • How students can get support and help when they need it (e.g. your office hours, Center for Student Learning, Helpdesk, etc.)

 

  • At the very beginning of the semester, send students a “welcome” video introducing yourself and the course.  Voicethread is a fantastic application to use for this purpose because it combines online discussion with multimedia content delivery.  For example, you could combine Powerpoint slides that contain information about you and the course with a webcam video of you discussing this information.  Then, students can leave audio, video, or text comments to introduce themselves and ask questions.  Creating such a presentation serves multiple purposes:  First, because you can cover typical syllabus information in the video, it frees up the first day of class for icebreakers and discussions.  Second, if you share personal information and use a webcam to record yourself talking, it allows students to get to know your personality better.  Finally, if you use an application like Voicethread, it allows students to engage one another in conversation and start building community.

 

  • Use the minutes before class starts to get to know your students better.  Many of us arrive to our classrooms without time to spare.  We then concentrate on taking attendance, turning on the computer and projector, and reviewing our lecture notes. Meanwhile, our students sit silently, gazing at their phones.  We may not consider the minutes before class begins as consequential, but they offer a fertile opportunity to get to know our students better and build a more positive classroom environment.   A number of studies suggest that learner satisfaction is related to the social presence and immediacy of the instructor.  So make it a goal to arrive to your classroom early and use those extra few minutes to chat with your students and set the stage for the rest of the class period.

 

  • Incorporate more opportunities for student collaboration.  Yes, students often grumble about group projects, but there are so many other ways to include collaborative learning in your classes.  Consider including more low-stakes opportunities rather than only culminating projects worth a significant portion of the students’ grades.  Peer teaching is one great option and a significant amount of empirical research indicates that working with peers has a positive influence on students’ psychological wellbeing, including autonomy, environmental mastery, and personal growth.  The research of Eric Mazur, who popularized peer instruction in the hard sciences, demonstrates learning gains frequently double and sometimes triple when peer instruction is integrated into class time.  To get you started, check out this post about peer teaching strategies and this one about facilitating drama-free group projects.

 

  • Create an online space where students can “hang out.”  This allows students to build community in a less formal way than structured assignments and in-class discussions.  This digital space could be used for students to ask one another questions, form study groups, and provide support.  There are numerous ways this can be accomplished, including using the OAKS discussion board, social media such as Twitter, Google Hangouts chat, Slack, Lino.it, or RealTime Board

These are just a few ideas to start building community in your classes.  What ideas do you have?  Please share in the comments!

This post is part of a series which presents low risk, high reward teaching ideas, inspired by James Lang’s book Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning.