Wednesday, October 26, 2011

October 26, 2011

Good Morning Online Instructors,

Do you have a Group Project in your course?  Are you trying to figure out new ways for your students to virtually and effectively connect and work together on the course material?  If yes, I encourage you to check out Google Docs as a student resource.  With Google Docs, individuals can collaboratively work on documents, spreadsheets, and presentations without having to physically be in the same room or working on the same computer. 

As Kristen O'Connell, Online Dean of Faculty, articulated, "the coolest thing is you can do real-time collaboration... If [students] picked a time, they [could] all work on the same document at the same time and their edits [would be] 'live'."

It also has the benefit of being able to edit documents from any computer or smart phone.

I encourage you to check it out, give it a try, and let me know what you think.

Thanks,
Heather Thomton-Stockman
Online Instructional Specialist

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

October 19, 2011

Good Morning Online Instructors,

In last week's faculty meetings Kristen discussed the need to synchronize Safe Assignments in each of your sections if you have a Safe Assignment component in a course.  Click here to access a brief tutorial demonstrating the process of:
  1. Checking whether or not your course has a Safe Assignment;
  2. Synchronizing your course if it does have a Safe Assignment.  
It is a quick and easy process but one that needs to be completed in each section, each quarter in order for your students to be able to submit their assignments without error messages or difficulty.
If you have any questions on this process please let me know.

Thanks and have a great rest of the week.

Heather Thomton-Stockman
Online Instructional Specialist

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

October 12, 2011

Good Morning Online Instructors,

As you are finishing up the grading of the first assignments for the quarter, you may be finding yourself wondering how you can help your students with proper use of APA formatting and citations.  Here is an excellent YouTube video that I encourage you to share with your students as they are working on their writing assignments throughout the quarter.  It does an excellent job of walking students - and instructors - through the proper APA process.

If you have any questions, please let me know.

Thanks,
Heather Thomton-Stockman

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

October 5, 2011

Good Morning Online Instructors!

Welcome to Fall Quarter 2011; I hope you are having a great first week.  As you are getting to know your students and helping guide your students through your course expectations and assignments, I wanted to share with you two great resources Kelly Schmidt, Online Curriculum Manager, put together that can be used in courses where Oral Presentations are a requirement.  Or, if you have a "presentation" component in one of your courses and you'd like to add in the oral recording aspect, these can be great resources to use within your assignments and instructions.  Screencast-o-Matic is an excellent option for our students when they are recording presentations and these resources walk you and your students through the process.

How to use Screencast-o-Matic to Record an Oral Presentation:
How to Record Your Presentation training doc (if you’re prompted for credentials, use your CampusConnect login)
Video Tutorial   

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to let me know. 

Thanks,
Heather Thomton-Stockman
Online Instructional Specialist