We know that several of you have Macs at home. These directions are for creating narrated PowerPoints in Office 2008 for Macs.

Several instructors have written requesting instructions on setting up narrated PowerPoints in order to avoid rescheduling lectures from the snowed out week of school closings. These directions will walk you through the process of creating these. Simply send the presentation to us using Accellion, and we'll make sure it's published and made available to students.

With all the bad weather, many students are filling instructor email boxes with papers and assignments. If you'd like students to use your Blackboard site rather than emailing you, you can create Assignment Managers for any type of assignment, or SafeAssignments (which can automatically run a submitted assignment through a plagiarism detection service) in your Blackboard site, preventing your inbox being filled with several dozen student papers.

• How to set up an Assignment Manager in Blackboard
• A quicksheet for setting up a SafeAssignment (PDF)

The Educause Learning Initiative has released its new 2010 Horizon Report, detailing trends to look for in the integration of technology into teaching at colleges and universities. This year, you can read their projections on mobile technology, open content, electronic books, and augmented reality, as well as other topics.

Labels: faculty

At the beginning of the term, all Blackboard courses are marked as "unavailable" so that course masters and lecturers can finalize content before students are allowed to access it.

Once you have are ready for students to access the Blackboard site, simply do the following:

1. From your Blackboard course site, click "Control Panel."
2. From the Control Panel, look for an option in the lower left-hand corner called "Settings" and click that.
3. From inside the Setting menu, click "Course Availability."
4. Select "Yes" and click "Submit."

That's it! Your course is available.

Labels: faculty

ReadWriteWeb reports that Google Docs is now extending user storage and can be backed up with third-party tools:

• Google Docs: Now for Storage as much as Collaboration - ReadWriteEnterprise

Eric Shepherd, the CEO of Questionmark, talks about assessment fraud (and assessment types) in his latest blog article:

Assessment Security and How To Reduce Fraud

Donald Cressey, a famed criminologist, came up with a hypothesis while researching his doctoral thesis in the 1950s now called the “Fraud Triangle” it explains why people commit fraud. In order to reduce the likelihood of fraudulent activities we need to remove one of the elements of the Fraud Triangle.

The three key elements in the Fraud Triangle are Motivation, Rationalization, and Opportunity.

Labels: assessment, faculty, questionmark

When you log into Blackboard, you see the My Institution page with a column on the right hand side ("My Courses") listing your Blackboard course sites. If you have been at the School of Pharmacy for a while, this list can quickly become overwhelmingly long, with a long list of courses going back at least two years. If you'd like to whittle down this list to just the most current year or semester, you can whittle down the list to just the course sites you need to see. Here's how:

1. Next to the My Courses menu, click the small pencil icon.
2. Find the courses you no longer want to display, and uncheck all boxes by their course names and titles.
3. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click "Submit."

View a short tutorial here.

Labels: blackboard, faculty, students

Interested in trying a new technology in your courses, but aren't sure what you should know before trying it out? The Educause Learning Initative provides educators with regular bulletins on emerging technologies called "7 Things You Should Know..." Recent topics include, Google Apps, Lecture Capture, Ning, Flip Camcorders, and Second Life. To check out these recent resources and more than 50 other bulletins, visit: http://www.educause.edu/Resources/Browse/ELI7ThingsYouShouldKnow/33438

Labels: educause, resources

Join us as a group in PLC or view the Webinar from your desk. Mike Griffith, Instructional Technology Specialist and Adjunct Professor and Derek W. Toten, Director of Instructional Media and Learning Spaces Tulane University In this presentation, we will recount the institutional and pedagogical processes of deploying a Digital Narrative pilot program at Tulane University. We will discuss the methods used in training, as well as our proposed plan for scaling the project beyond the scope of the pilot. The event is free, but registration is required and virtual seating is limited. http://www.educause.edu/live098

On April 23rd several members of the pharmacy community will be presenting at the 2009 Maryland Blackboard Users Group (MDBUG) Users Conference. Pharmacy Sessions Include: Chat Methodology to increase Student Activity During Online Classes (Sandi Mitchell, Derick Albright, Richard Ruane, Raymond Love, School of Pharmacy, University of Maryland) Web-based Applications for Coordinating Observation Schedules (Richard Ruane, School of Pharmacy, University of Maryland) Facilitation of Student Interaction through Discussion Boards in a Mental Health Elective Course (Jason Noel, Bethany Dipaula, School of Pharmacy, University of Maryland) To register for this event or learn more about the conference program, please visit the conference website at http://www.oit.umd.edu/as/MDBUG/.

Labels: announcement, blackboard, event, faculty

On April 10th, 2009 the Baltimore College of Dental Surgery, University of Maryland Dental School presented a presentation "Virtual Dental School" constructed in Second Life and instructional uses of Second Life. You can watch the Dental School presentation and access more information on the Virtual Dental School on the UMDS Virtual Dental School Insider Blog (http://dentalweb.umaryland.edu/vi/). Elsewhere in Academia Teaching and Learning in Second Life (podcast) Created by Gerry Bayne (EDUCAUSE) on April 13, 2009 This thirty-five minute podcast features a session from the EDUCAUSE 2008 Annual Conference. The presentation, "Teaching and Learning in Second Life," is presented by Geoffrey B. Cain, Instructional Designer / Instructor and John Miller, Nursing Instructor, Consultant, both from Tacoma Community College.

Labels: educause, event, faculty, resources

The March 2009 issue of the Journal of Online Learning and Teaching (JOLT) is now online. In this issue you will find 17 articles concerned with various aspects of online learning and teaching.

Access JOLT online (http://jolt.merlot.org).

CONTENTS – March 2009 SOCR Analyses: Design Framework, Implementation and Instructional Examples of a Java Web-based Statistical Analysis Toolkit Annie Chu, Jenny Cui, and Ivo D. Dinov Perceptions of Distance Learning Among Faculty of a College of Education Shirley J. Mills, Martha Jeanne Yanes, and Cindy M. Casebeer Online Human Touch (OHT) Training & Support: A Conceptual Framework to Increase Faculty and Adjunct Faculty Engagement, Connectivity, and Retention in Online Education, Part 2 Kristen Betts The Role of Instructor Interactivity in Promoting Critical Thinking in Online and Face-to-Face Classrooms B. Jean Mandernach, Krista D. Forrest, Jamie L. Babutzke, and Lanay R. Manker Development and Examination of an Individualized Online Adjunct to In-Class Education Shawn Davis and Bryant Kilbourn Listening to Students: Investigating the Effectiveness of an Online Graduate Teaching Strategies Course Kathryn Lee The Comparison between Asynchronous Online Discussion and Traditional Classroom Discussion in an Undergraduate Education Course Kelly O'Neal The Influence of Multiple Intelligence Theory on Web-Based Learning Mark Riha and Rebecca Robles-Piña The Effectiveness and Development of Online Discussions Olla Najah Al-Shalchi Trends in the Instructional Design and Delivery in the Online Environment Doris Bolliger and Oksana Wasilik Hatching CHRPP: Developing an E-learning Tutorial for Research Ethics Laura-Lee Balkwill, Joan Stevenson, Denise Stockley , and Susan Marlin “We’re Changing Again? No Way!” A Case Study of a Course Management System Transition Barbara J. Draude, Maria J. Clayton, and Thomas M Brinthaupt From Lecturer to Course Coordinator: Redefining the Role of the University Academic for Teaching and Learning in a Distributed Learning Environment Olabisi Kuboni Toward a Philosophy of Multimedia in the Online Classroom: Aligning Multimedia Use with Institutional Goals Emily Donnelli, Amber Dailey , and B. Jean Mandernach Task Context and Computer Self Efficacy in the Era of Web 2.0 Tools Richard Burkhard and Malu Roldan My Experience with Teaching Online: Confessions and Observations of a Survivor David J. St. Clair Meeting the Challenges of Teaching Large Online Classes: Shifting to a Learner-Focus Roger W. Berry

Labels: announcement, faculty, journal

Sloan-C's report Online Nation: Five Years of Growth in Online Learning represents the fifth annual report on the state of online learning in U.S. higher education. This year’s study, like those for the previous four years, is aimed at answering some of the fundamental questions about the nature and extent of online education. Supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and based on responses from more than 2,500 colleges and universities, the study addresses the following key questions:

• How Many Students are Learning Online?
• Where has the Growth in Online Learning Occurred?
• Why do Institutions Provide Online Offerings?
• What are the Prospects for Future Online Enrollment Growth?
• What are the Barriers to Widespread Adoption of Online Education? More...

Download the free PDF version of Online Nation. Five Years of Growth in Online Learning.

Labels: reports

Action Learning - with Michael MarquardtProfessor of Human Resource Development and International Affairs, GWU Come learn how to: Understand and demonstrate how and why action learning is effective in solving problems, building teams, developing leaders, and creating learning organizations Apply the six elements and two ground rules of action learning as well as the questioning and reflection processes of action learning Understand the skills and roles of the action learning coach Identify the various options available in introducing and tailoring action learning for an organization * There is no charge for this event. Thursday, April 2, 20096 - 8 p.m. UC Ballroom Space is limited, so register early!

Labels: event

Google Sites began as a way to create a small, simple Web site. It doesn't offer many options for customizing the look and feel of a site or adding functionality like a contact form, but it's good if all you need to do is publish information. As Google Sites has matured, it has developed many wiki-like functions that can make it useful as a small-scale note-keeping application. The keystone of this functionality is the ability to give other people viewing or editing privileges on your site. You can also mark a site private so that only people you allow in may see it. Every page you create on Google Sites has a revision history similar to the one in Google Docs, so you can go back to look at an older version of your notes. You can also attach files to your site that are versioned as well. Pages can be put into a simple hierarchy to keep similar topics organized together. Finally, there's a stream of comments attached to every page that's separate from its content. These features can make a Google Site a useful tool for facilitating collaboration among a small group of people, as a site can be updated independently and commented on by each team member. The file versioning functionality also makes it easy to store documents centrally -- instead of having to rename a file every time you want to hold onto a new version, you can let Google Sites take care of it for you. To learn more about Google Sites, take a look at their online overview. If you're shopping around for a free wiki, you might also want to take a look at pbWiki.

Labels: faculty, students

Course textbook selection is a common part of faculty preparation for an upcoming semester. In the past adopting a textbook provided faculty and students only content and resources within the physical textbook. Changing demographics of students and the availablity of resources on the Internet has prompted many textbook publishers to think beyond the traditional textbook to include web site companions to their most popular textbooks and content (aka Course Cartridges) that can be imported into Learning Management Systems (LMS) including Blackboard. Available content may range from online quizzes based on book chapters, high resolution illustrations, animations or simulations of featured content, and flash cards.

Labels: blackboard, resources, textbooks

Call for Papers Interactive Technologies Conference August 19-21, 2009 Sheraton Crystal City Hotel Arlington Virginia Abstracts for presentations from knowledgeable professionals in industry, government, military, public education and academia are solicited to provide presentations which would be part of a comprehensive conference program on the latest interactive technologies as they are being applied to training, education and job performance improvement, including ways to implement technology, descriptions of education and technical skills applications, e-Learning, enterprise management, and instructional systems design, together with Knowledge Management systems. To submit your abstract online go to: http://www.salt.org/index.htm?dc/washingtonP.asp?pn=submitabsinfo For a PDF version of the Call for Papers go to: http://www.salt.org/docs/call.pdf Society for Applied Learning Technology 50 Culpeper Street Warrenton, Va 20186 Ph: (540) 347-0055 Fax: (540) 349-3169 Web: http://www.salt.org

Labels: announcement, event, faculty

Poorly worded questions can adversely affect the quality of assessment results. Here are a few tips to keep in mind when you write and review questions:

1. Keep stems and statements as short as possible and use clear, concise language.
2. Use questions whenever possible (What, Who, When, Where, Why and How).
3. Maintain grammatical consistency to avoide cueing.
4. List choices in a logical order.
5. Avoid negatives, especially double negatives.
6. Avoid unnecessary modifiers, especially absolutes (e.g. always, never, etc.).
7. Avoid "All of the above" and use "None of the above" with caution.
8. Avoid vauge pronouns (e.g. it, they).
9. Avoid conflicting alternatives.
10. Avoid syllogistic reasoning choices (e.g. "both a and b are correct") unless absolutely necessary.
11. Avoid providing cues to correct answer in the stem.
12. Avoid providing clues to the answer of one question in another question.

You can find more information about best practices at the Questionmark Learning Cafe:

http://www.questionmark.com/go/learningcafe

Labels: assessment, questionmark, resources

The ten most widely read articles from last year’s online edition of EDUCAUSE Review focused on open education, Web 2.0, virtual worlds, e-books, digital libraries, analytics, and the top issues facing higher education IT. In case you missed them in 2008: Minds on Fire: Open Education, the Long Tail, and Learning 2.0 John Seely Brown and Richard P. Adler Top-Ten IT Issues, 2008 Debra H. Allison, Peter B. DeBlois, and the 2008 EDUCAUSE Current Issues Committee Web 2.0 Storytelling: Emergence of a New Genre Bryan Alexander and Alan Levine Virtual Worlds? "Outlook Good" AJ Kelton ("AJ Brooks") E-Books in Higher Education: Nearing the End of the Era of Hype? Mark R. Nelson Architectures for Collaboration: Roles and Expectations for Digital Libraries Peter Brantley A Seismic Shift in Epistemology Chris Dede Action Analytics: Measuring and Improving Performance That Matters in Higher Education Donald Norris, Linda Baer, Joan Leonard, Louis Pugliese, and Paul Lefrere Facebook 2.0 Tracy Mitrano Higher Education as Virtual Conversation Sarah Robbins-Bell ("Intellagirl Tully")

Labels: educause, journal, noteworthy

In December, AACP published a Basic Resource Guide for Pharmacy Education as a service project of the Libraries/Educational Resources Section. The list's contributors have included recommentations that should be included in all pharmacy library collections including online resources. http://www.aacp.org/Docs/MainNavigation/Resources/9673_2008BasicResources.pdf

Labels: AACP, resources

New Issue of the Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks (JALN), Volume 12, Issue 3-4 Please log in to www.sloanconsortium.org to read the full articles and comment on the new articles. If you are not logged in, you will see an abstract. The following are some highlights from the new issue: • The Development Of A Community Of Inquiry Over Time In An Online Course: Understanding The Progression And Integration of Social, Cognitive And Teaching Presence Zehra Akyol D. Randy Garrison • Academic Dishonesty in Traditional and Online Classrooms: Does the "Media Equation" Hold True? Erik W. Black Joe Greaser Kara Dawson • The Effect of Computer Mediated Conferencing and Computer Assisted Instruction on Student Learning Outcomes Darrell L. Cain Paul E. Pitre • Reflections From the Moving the Laboratory Online Workshops: Emerging Themes Devon A. Cancilla Simon P. Albon • Facilitating Critical Thinking through Online Courses Margaret Lunney Keville Frederickson Arlene Spark Georgia McDuffie • A Synthesis of Sloan-C Effective Practices, December 2008 Janet C. Moore • A Model for Developing High-Quality Online Courses: Integrating a Systems Approach with Learning Theory Maria Puzziferro Kaye Shelton • Student Experiences Using Weblogs: An Exploratory Study Priya Sharma Ying Xie • Essential Elements in Designing Online Discussions to Promote Cognitive Presence - A Practical Experience Yu-mei Wang Victor Der-Thanq Chen • Interaction in Asynchronous Web-Based Learning Environments Younghee Woo Thomas C. Reeves

Labels: journal

It’s a new year and already time for the next biennial MDBUG Users conference! If you've never heard of the Maryland Blackboard Users Group (MBBUG - http://www.umbc.edu/mdbug/), it's a Maryland based users group for all things Blackboard and beyond. Faculty, students interested in and involved in teaching, as well as technology staff are all welcome to participate in the users group. This year’s program “Learning 2.0: Beyond the LMS” will be held on Thursday April 23rd on the University of Maryland College Park Campus. Come and join your colleagues from around Maryland and share your stories by submitting a proposal to present a presentation, poster, or panel at the conference. Jeffery Teciak, University Librarian at McMaster University will be the keynote speaker this year and will be speaking on Learning 2.0. We are accepting proposals for individual or panel presentations or posters in the following areas: * effective practices in teaching and learning (faculty focus) * effective support models (instructional technology support/ technical staff focus) * effective practices/implementations in K-12 * Leadership issues Proposals are due by February 20, 2009 and can be submitted electronically by going to http://www.oit.umd.edu/as/MDBUG/mdbugproposalform.html Remember, even if you aren't able to present please try to attend! The event will be free through generous sponsorship by the Maryland Education Consortium and Blackboard (however pre-registration will be required).

Labels: blackboard, event

After months of debate within the EDUCAUSE community, the top five Teaching and Learning Challenges for 2009 have been announced. The top five include:

1. Creating learning environments that promote active learning, critical thinking, collaborative learning, and knowledge creation.
2. Developing 21st century literacy among students and faculty (information, digital, and visual).
3. Reaching and engaging today's learner.
4. Encouraging faculty adoption and innovation in teaching and learning with IT.
5. Advancing innovation in teaching and learning (with technology) in an era of budget cuts.

In the coming weeks EDUCAUSE will be asking the education community to contribute ideas on possible solutions to each of the top five challenges. To keep an eye on this interesting and valuable project, visit the EDUCAUSSE Teaching and Learning Challenges '09 site at http://tlchallenges09.ning.com/

Labels: noteworthy

As the fall semester quickly winds to a close, I wanted to send out a few reminders as you wrap up work for the fall semester and begin making preparations for the rapidly approaching spring semester. Course Evaluations Students have until Friday December 19th at 5:00pm to complete course evaluations. Students are sent periodic reminders that their evaluations are closing to ensure they don’t forget to submit mandatory course evaluations. We will begin sending evaluation reports to course masters via email on Monday December 22nd . Course masters can expect to receive evaluation reports no later than Thursday January 8th. Campus Test Scoring Service (Holiday Closing) The test scoring service will be operating on their normal hours 7:30am – 4:00pm (sheets must be dropped off by 3:00pm for same day processing) through December 23rd. Faculty or teaching assistants experiencing issues with the campus test scoring service should contact me at stucker@rx.umaryland.edu with questions or concerns. Special Closures: December 19th The campus test scoring service will be closed on Friday December 19th from 11-2pm for a holiday function. Test scoring will be taking place during the day, but no test sheets will be accepted between 11am and 2pm on the 19th. December 24th The service will close at noon. December 25th – January 4th Closed. The test scoring center will reopen on Monday January 5th. Preparing for Spring 2009 Blackboard If you haven’t already noticed, Blackboard sites for Spring 2009 have been created. We are working with a few course masters who have special set-up needs and these sites may take a few days longer to complete. Your Course Schedule (CELCAT) If you haven’t already done so, please be sure to check your course schedule to ensure that faculty, lecturers, and technology are appropriately assigned to your courses. If you have changes to make before the winter holiday, please send them to syllabus@rx.umaryland.edu. Correct course schedules are vital to ensure that your course has appropriate technology assigned (i.e. Mediasite and Video Conferencing) well in advance of your actual class sessions. Faculty Course faculty are automatically enrolled as a part of your course set up. Non-course masters are granted “Course Builder” access to post materials and make announcements in Blackboard. However, they do not have default access to the gradebook. If you have faculty that require special access to manage assignments or exams, please let us know by sending an email to help@rx.umaryland.edu. We’re happy to accommodate special requests for your course sites. Student Groups in Blackboard If you would like us to set up student groups in your course, please send an email to the helpline at help@rx.umaryland.edu if you have not already requested this service. We can set up these groups for you using Student Affairs assigned groups or your own custom groups. We will be taking requests through the start of classes. Guest/Invited Instructors We have a special form set up to allow course masters to identify invited instructors. The form is accessible via the Pharmacy Portal under the “Courses” tab or directly, by visiting: https://rxsecure.umaryland.edu/apps/affiliates/apply/instructor/. This will provide you with Recording Release Forms (for Mediasite and Adobe Presenter) and an opportunity to request Blackboard access, and inclusion in your semester end course evaluation. As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to ask by sending a note to help@rx.umaryland.edu or calling 6-4488 for the fastest possible response time.

Labels: announcement, faculty

The campus test scoring center located in the lower level of HS/HSL is now offering e-mail return of test scoring results to faculty. The test scoring service has been testing email distribution of test results over the past few months and have received positive feedback from faculty participating in the trial. As a part of this new service, the test scoring service has published a new unified submission coversheet for all faculty using their services. New Coversheet (pdf)

Labels: faculty

Blackboard has announced the 2009 Blackboard Exemplary Course Program and is now accepting submissions for review and applications for ECP Reviewers. Since launching in 2000, the program promotes the effective use of eLearning technology through the dissemination of best practices for creating engaging online courses. Learn more about the 2009 Exemplary Course Program visit http://www.blackboard.com/ecp where you'll learn more about the program, information on Blackboard's Exemplary Course Rubrics, and learn how you can participate in this year's program.

Labels: faculty, students

While Blackboard and similar on-campus technologies are great for managing courses and organizations, they aren't the easiest way to coordinate communications for students, freelance contractors, scholars, and professionals from other insitutions and campuses. "Groupware" - Web-based software that helps organize and store group communications and provide groups with other tools for storing and sharing information - continues to be a popular way to coordinate communications between groups large and small. This article introduces you to the ups and downs of four options for managing your online group. Google Groups One of the best established groupware tools on the Internet is Google Groups. Functioning much like a classic mailing list, Google Groups distributes your emails and messages to the whole group. In addition, Google archives your messages, and allows you to search through the Group's archives for information. Google also provides collaborative pages (with version control) for group members to use to share information with each other and the larger public, and upload pictures, documents, and other files for sharing with group members. Google hosts advertising links on your group space, but they are neatly tucked into the lower-right corner of the Group's main page. Yahoo Groups Another of the Internet's oldest Web-based groupware tools, Yahoo groups has many of the same tools you would find with Google Groups: messages are distributed to all group members, and also stored in a searchable online archive; the ability to set your group's privacy settings; and group members can share pictures and files. In addition, Yahoo Groups can also be set up to include special information tables, including tables for a phone book, contact information, library lists, and other applications, as well as polls and a calendar for your group. However, Yahoo will advertise on your group's page much more aggressively. Facebook Groups If all of your potential members are on Facebook (or are willing to join), Facebook groups are an option. Facebook groups provide a message board and message wall to groups, some messages from which will show up on the news feeds of group members. Group administrators can also send messages to all group members, which are then delivered to group members email addresses, as well as set privacy settings for who can view or join the group. Members can share pictures and videos, but not other types of files. However, unless your members regularly monitor Facebook, it makes it hard for any member to send out a message to all other members right away. CiteULike Groups CiteULike is a new social network and academic bookmarking site. It provides groups with the ability to share and tag Web-based academic materials (such as articles online or in online databases) and information on books, as well as to have discussions and share blogs. While the system is still new, new features are constantly emerging, so this may be a groupware option to watch.

Labels: faculty, students

Thanks to Dr. Ed Moreton for pointing out his nifty online tool. Do you ever need to poll multiple group attendees, especially across campuses or institutions, on a best time, agenda, or date for a meeting? Doodle allows you to collaboratively schedule and plan events for a group of people across multiple campuses and locations by using a poll to see who can (or will) participate at what times. Thanks for the pointer, Dr. Moreton!

Labels: didyouknow, faculty, students

Blackboard has a nifty feature where instructors grading an assignment or an assessment can enter specific feedback for each student. This is a great way to send comments to students that you'd normally write on a printed assignment. It isn't obvious, though, how students can see that feedback. That's because they need to click the link for the assignment or assessment again to see your feedback. Because students need this link to see their feedback, you'll need to keep it available to students. Instead of limited student submissions by date, you'll simply need to allow students to make only one attempt at a test -- assignments always only allow a single attempt.

Labels: faculty

When you create a new item in Blackboard's gradebook, it gives you two options that affect how students will be able to see the grade: Make item available to users This controls whether students can actually see this grade. Invisible grades are useful if you're going to be putting in grades early but don't want students to see them until a certain point, or if if you'd like to keep notes of some kind about the student -- some instructors use this to track what group a student is in, for example. Include item in Gradebook score calculations This controls whether a grade affects the final grade that Blackboard calculates for each student. You definitely want to turn this off for grades that are just for notes, or if you gave an assessment that wasn't for credit. Keep in mind that both these settings work independently, so you can have an grade visible to students that doesn't count towards the final grade, an invisible item that does count towards the student's grade, and so on.

Labels: faculty

As in previous semesters, students will be completing their course evaluations online. The exact dates of the course evaluation period for this fall haven't been determined yet, but there are two things coursemasters should do sometime in November to prepare:

• Take a look at the standard evaluation questions and decide if you would like any extras associated with your course. Please e-mail these requests to Lisa Lebovitz.
• Look at your course's list of lecturers in the portal, and confirm that it's complete. Please e-mail changes to the CNS help line.

Please do both these things by December 1, so there's plenty of time for us to make adjustments to your evaluations before the semester ends. Once evaluations begin, though, you don't need to take any action. Our evaluation application automatically e-mails students to notify them that an evaluation opens, and then periodically reminds them to complete them if they haven't yet. There will be also be a link to the evaluation in your Blackboard site, under the Assignments section.

Labels: faculty

The campus is hosting a free symposium titled "Innovation in Education through Technology" on November 18th from 8:30am - 1:15pm in the School of Social Work's Kaplan Hall. The keynote presentation is titled "21st Century Learning: New Communities, New Content, New Conversations" given by Barry Adams, Ed.D. and educational consultant for Apple Inc. Additional sessions will be held on topics ranging from copyright for instructors, classroom technology, developing online interactive course content and more. Our very own Drs. Sheth and Wilks will also be presenting on their work to create online case-based learning tools in Microbiology and Antibiotics II. For more information and details for registering: http://www.umaryland.edu/etc/ConferenceInformation

While many faculty are interested in networks such as Facebook as social phenomena for students (and as ways to keep track of friends from their personal lives), many are less interested in using Facebook as a place to network with current and former professional colleagues. For that, many faculty have already started using a network called LinkedIn, which launched in 2006. While LinkedIn was originally just a place to share resumes and CVs and find work-history connections, the network has recently expanded its services. One of the most interesting features it has added are groups. Groups can be set up to foster networking among alumni, current and former colleagues, research interests, professional associations, or particular industries. Groups can host discussions and share information in their own forums, and you can choose to be notified of group activity via email (so that you don't need to stay perpetually logged in to LinkedIn in order to keep up with the discussions). To find out more about Groups, log into your LinkedIn account (or sign up for a new account) and then click Groups from the left-hand toolbar.

Labels: faculty

Tired of seeing a course you taught last spring in Blackboard? They'll eventually get archived, but if you're impatient, you can remove a course from your My Institution page by clicking the pencil icon in the upper-right corner of the My Courses section. Uncheck all the checkboxes next to a course to remove it from view. If you ever change your mind, you can bring back a course by checking the Display Course checkbox.

Labels: didyouknow, faculty

In what may be a first, Springer U.S., a major publisher of science and business texts, has begun sponsoring a social networking site that focuses on academic users. Called CiteULike, the site combines features of social networks, social bookmarks, and blogging platforms. The most notable utility of the site is the ability to track information on academic articles. You can place a CiteULike bookmark on your browser. Once you find an online article you want to keep track of, you can click the CiteULike bookmark and a new window will pop up giving you a chance to fill in the bibliographic information, an abstract, and your own notes. CiteULike can even automatically fill in this information from some of the major science and technology databases. In addition, once you save an article, you can upload a PDF copy of the article (so you can access it again anywhere), and see what notes others have added for the article. You can also export the materials you have saved into formats that can be read by bibliographic programs such as Zotero or EndNote. In addition to saving and tracking online articles, CiteULike allows users to create profiles, host blogs on their research process, and maintain networks of colleagues (called "Connections"). It will even look at the articles you are saving and identify "neighbors": users you may or may not know, but who are bookmarking the same articles that you are. Instructors and research team leaders can also form groups that are either private (open only to a specific group of students or researchers) or public (open to any researcher or student with an interest).

Labels: faculty

When someone types your name into Google or another search engine, what will they find? If you are like most people, you have tried searching for yourself on the Web at least once. In the past, unless you were listed on a work or school site, or unless you ran a personal site or blog, most people wouldn't find much. But Facebook, MySpace, and other social networking sites have made themselves increasingly searchable. As many students begin to prepare to enter careers and search for jobs, they have become increasingly concerned about how to protect your online identity while still enjoying the benefits of an increasingly social Web. This is the beginning of a series of posts on managing and protecting your online identity. While the "best" way to protect your online identity may be to stay off the Web, that cuts you off from opportunities connect with new and old friends, build professional and personal networks, and share ideas with people with common interests. These first few posts will look at the privacy features of one of the most popular social networks, Facebook. View the tutorial.

Labels: students

You can use Google Docs to hold an informal survey. Log in and choose Form from the New menu to get started. Surveys are anonymous, but people can answer them as many times as they want. Because of this, this feature is best for simple kinds of polls, like deciding on a certain day for an event. It's not really meant for student organization elections, for example. Another free polling application that might be worth taking a look at is Micropoll.

Labels: didyouknow, students

You're probably familiar with using flash cards to learn a series of new concepts -- like the top 100 most-prescribed drugs. But you might not know about free Web-based flash card applications that go above and beyond what you can do with regular flash cards. The most basic advantage of online flash cards is that they're completely free, and they're also accessible anywhere you have Internet access. You can also share sets of flash cards you've created with your classmates, so everyone doesn't need their own set of cards. You can also create a personalized set of flash cards, too, with your own annotations. Some online flash card applications also have special modes to help you learn more quickly, too. Because the application can track which cards you have trouble with, it can help you focus on just the information you're still a little shaky on. There are two flash card applications that are worth taking a look at: Quizlet and cueFlash. Both require free registration to take advantage of all their features, but cueFlash will let you browse card sets without logging in -- and one of their most popular sets is labeled Top 200 Drugs.

Labels: students