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By Brendan, on March 5th, 2010, 10:01 am
North Seattle College is hosting a Open Textbook workshop on April 20, 2010, from 10-3, with lunch included. Come and join the effort in making textbooks more affordable. Become an advocate and trainer for Open Textbooks.
This event is sponsored by the Community College Open Textbook Project and The Washington State Board of Community And Technical Colleges (SBCTC) and free for all who want to attend. SBCTC is also offering to pay for mileage of those who are traveling more than 50 Miles to attend the event.
Advocates and Trainers will learn how to:
- Foster interest in open textbooks
- Assist faculty with discovering, selecting, and adopting open textbooks
- Assist students in choosing a format (online, downloaded, printed, bound)
- Work with all the stakeholders on campus including bookstore, print
shop, library, and administration
- Provide feedback to the authors and educational community
- Plan, market, and deliver an adoption workshop
- Find textbook usage and costs on your campus
In addition to travel reimbursement, Advocates and Trainers will receive a $1,500 stipend to assist in their development, as well as to present a faculty workshop about Adopting Open Textbooks at their local college campus.
To register for the Seattle workshop and for information on becoming an Advocate and Trainer, and locations for other workshops please visit http://opentextbookadvocatetrainers.ning.com/.
By Brendan, on March 2nd, 2010, 2:35 pm
Get some practice using the collaborative online web conferencing tool, Elluminate. There is a practice session, hosted by Shoreline Community College, happening on Wednesday, March 3, from 2-3 pm. Connect from your computer by clicking this Elluminate session link:
https://sas.elluminate.com/site/external/launch/meeting.jnlp?password=M.CB2CB2664979AE8F3065444E874D4E
No need for a password, just enter your name after you click the link.
By Scott, on February 11th, 2010, 5:27 pm
eLearning has a new resource available on Smart Penguin for students, faculty, and staff. Although Smart Penguin provides the solutions to, or the prevention of, most technical issues that Clark College Blackboard users may experience, things may still go awry. To help students and faculty get back to their online coursework more quickly, the tech support team in the eLearning Department now provides a system called Tech Ticket, which can be used to submit the details of a technical issue. In a series of short questions about their computing environment, online users can quickly convey some of the important keys needed for an accurate diagnosis. Tech Ticket then allows direct communication with eLearning tech support for improved collaboration and information exchange to aid a swift resolution. You can find the link to file a Tech Ticket in the sidebar on Smart Penguin’s main post page, among our links at the bottom of that page, or in the following post on Smart Penguin:
That’s the Ticket!
By Scott, on January 24th, 2010, 9:26 pm
I recently received notification from Blackboard regarding a security risk with the Course Archive Tool, advising that access to this be turned off to all users. We have complied and you will no longer have this available in your Control Panel. In addition to notifying our faculty of this, I want to ask that you keep any previously archived files secure.
This process revision gives us an opportunity to review the options available. Actually, there are better course saving tools available for faculty use. This is because the file produced with the Course Archive tool does not allow you to fully restore a course without a tool only available to the Blackboard Administrator, and it involves a lengthy process if student enrollments must be rebuilt. This is rarely done anyway, since our policy here in eLearning is to leave all course shells on our Blackboard servers for two years. After that time, they are archived and then removed from our servers. Pre-shells are never removed unless you request me to do so.
Download Gradebook Tool
There is an important distinction to make regarding the separate nature of student enrollments and Blackboard course content. It’s easy to assume that copying a course also copies the enrolled students and their coursework, however that is not the case. If the students are no longer registered at Clark, they will fail to reappear when the course is restored, no matter how you save the course. This is because the enrollment database is in a constant state of flux, with only currently registered students accessible each quarter, while the Blackboard content database is more constant, only changing when faculty make adjustments to their courses. You could think of course shells as virtual classrooms which you can build, maintain, or change as you see fit. The students, however, will come and go – just as they do in the face-to-face environment… Your only record of them is what you store or have recorded in IBC. This is why it’s important to save your Gradebooks from Blackboard using the Download Gradebook tool at the end of each quarter, before I run our snapshot process and the student enrollment files change. The date that this will occur is posted in our Faculty Blackboard Planner page, as well as my end of term email announcement.
Course Export and Import Tools
The best tools for saving a personal copy of a course are Export and Import. Keep in mind that these tools will not store or restore the students and their work, only the course content and structure. The following are important points to consider:
- Exporting a course creates a downloadable package of the course content (compressed .zip file) that can later be imported into a Blackboard shell
- Because the exported file can be imported as the whole course or as selected parts of the course through Import Package, it’s recommended that you select all areas when exporting a course
- The saved file can only be viewed by being imported into Blackboard
- Importing does not overwrite any existing information in the destination course in the following areas: Content, Discussion Boards, Gradebook Items, Groups, Tests, Surveys, and Pools. Imported information in these areas is added to existing information in the destination course.
- Importing does overwrite Course Settings (if selected) in the destination course (other than the Course ID and Menu Settings).
Course Copy Tool
Although the Course Copy tool doesn’t provide a personal copy of each course, which could later be moved to another Blackboard installation or reimported, it is the most common method for transferring courses from quarter to quarter or section to section. This wizard based tool won’t overwrite any existing content, so it’s easy to unintentionally duplicate items, unless copying into an empty shell. Use of the Recycle tool can help clean out excess content when necessary. To help with this process, here is a short video about how to use the Course Copy tool:
Course Copy Process
I hope that explains the options now available for saving courses… Please feel free to comment or contact me in eLearning for more information.
By Cindy, on January 7th, 2010, 1:49 pm
The Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC) is pleased to announce the Student Completion Initiative.
Washington state community and technical colleges may submit grant proposals in one or all of the three of the following project areas: Open Course Library; Re-Thinking Pre-College Math; and I-BEST Model Expansion. All Clark College faculty members, full and part-time, are encouraged to: review the RFP, listen in on one of the Bidder’s Conferences, and explore the opportunity to participate in this important initiative.
Grant awards will be made based on a competitive process.
- Grant applications became available on January 4, 2010. Faculty Course Designer Grant
- Grant proposals are due on February 17, 2010.
- Grant awards will be made by March 18, 2010.
The number of grant awards and the grant award amounts can be found in the Student Completion Initiative Overview on the SBCTC website.
Colleges are encouraged to participate in one or more of the Bidder’s Conferences scheduled for January 11 and January 15. Both ITV and Elluminate sessions will be scheduled on both days.
Clark College ITV group session will be held in the Cannell Library Monday January 11th at 9 AM and Friday January 15th at 1:30 PM.
To participate in an Elluminate session, you will need to be at a computer with speakers and a microphone. Elluminate sessions will be recorded and can be accessed on the Student Completion Initiative web site after the live sessions.
Bidder’s Conference Schedule:
January 11: ITV in the Clark College Cannell Library
9:00 am Introductions and Purpose
9:15 am Open Course Library: Cable Green
10:15 am Break
10:30 am Re-Thinking Pre-College Math: Bill Moore
11:15 am Break
11:30 am I-BEST Model Expansion: Tina Bloomer
12:15 pm Conclusion
January 11: Elluminate Recording
1:30 pm Introductions and Purpose
1:45 pm Open Course Library: Cable Green
2:45 pm Break
3:00 pm Re-Thinking Pre-College Math: Bill Moore
3:45 pm Break
4:00 pm I-BEST Model Expansion: Tina Bloomer
4:45 pm Conclusion
==================
January 15: Elluminate Recording
9:00 am Introductions and Purpose
9:15 am Open Course Library: Cable Green
10:15 am Break
10:30 am Re-Thinking Pre-College Math: Bill Moore
11:15 am Break
11:30 am I-BEST Model Expansion: Tina Bloomer
12:15 pm Conclusion
January 15: ITV in the Clark College Cannell Library
1:30 pm Introductions and Purpose
1:45 pm Open Course Library: Cable Green
2:45 pm Break
3:00 pm Re-Thinking Pre-College Math: Bill Moore
3:45 pm Break
4:00 pm I-BEST Model Expansion: Tina Bloomer
4:45 pm Conclusion
Please consider becoming involved in this major state-wide initiative! Additional grant documents are linked to this page under the heading Documents. Feel free to contact me in eLearning if you have questions or need assistance, if I don’t have the answers I will put you in touch with the people at SBCTC who do.
Cynthia Foreman, Associate Director of eLearning
By Scott, on January 3rd, 2010, 5:14 pm
 Faculty, please note that Clark College no longer sends paper mail to students and will now send correspondence to their Clark Gmail accounts instead. Since this includes important college information for students (registration notices, wait list information, financial aid notifications, etc.) it’s important to let them know. You can help spread the word to students and be sure they understand that these accounts must be activated to work. Also, you should know that Blackboard has these Gmail addresses entered by default (appearing with suffix @students.clark.edu, not @gmail.com) and Gmail will NOT send bounce receipts from inactivated accounts back to the sender. I’ve recently posted about this to students on the Smart Penguin Tech Blog, including the option to set up forwarding in the Clark Gmail account to their preferred email address. You may refer your students to the specific Gmail post on Smart Penguin, the Student Services Gmail website, or just send them directly to the Clark Gmail sign up page. Clark Gmail support for students can be reached at 922-2010 or gmailhelp @ students.clark.edu. If you have any general questions about the Clark Gmail accounts, please contact IT Services.
By Scott, on December 8th, 2009, 5:46 pm
We now have a new page on The eLog called, “Faculty Blackboard Planner.” …You’ll find it in the page links above. It’s a Blackboard activities calendar where you can see what dates we have planned for various events such as quarter shell availability, when to use the Blackboard Gradebook tool to safely store your grades before the snapshot process removes that information, and many other timely events, most of which I will also make reference to in the usual email notifications. I will be posting dates in this planner as soon as they become known to us here in eLearning and I hope you find it useful. As always, be sure to let me know if you have any ideas or suggestions.
By Scott, on December 2nd, 2009, 11:09 am
I often get questions from faculty about the various user roles available in Blackboard. The differences among them are mainly in the Course Control Panel accessibility. Privileges range from that of Instructor with full access, to that of Student with no Control Panel at all. Instructors have the unique ability to make courses available to students, whereas students can only participate in courses that have been made available to them and that they are enrolled in. Besides that of Instructor and Student, there are other useful roles such as Mock Student, Temporary Student, Teacher’s Assistant, Course Builder, and various organization roles.
A Mock Student is a fictitious user with a student role whose login credentials are assigned to an instructor. This can be useful for an instructor who wants to see exactly what the student sees and experiences. Once the Mock Student role is in place, it will remain throughout the course.
A Temporary or Generic Student is a temporary account I can set up for wait-listed students, by faculty request. In this role, students must be instructed by faculty to observe only and not participate, much like a wait-listed student in a face-to-face class. Several potential students may use this same account to access the course syllabus and view the assignments. After the wait-listed students have been officially added to the course, with their own accounts and associated ID’s, their class participation may begin and I will then automatically remove these temporary accounts.
The Teacher’s Assistant role has access to many of the same areas as the Instructor role… Both have full access to the Control Panel, however only the Instructor will be shown under the students’ Courses tab or through Course Search. Teacher’s Assistants also cannot change the course settings, do a course copy, or modify a course name and description. If the course is unavailable to students, they may still access the course, just as the Instructor role can.
The Course Builder role has access to most areas of the Course Control Panel, except for student grades and outcomes. It is intended for those faculty who wish to share course content with each other or for providing cohesion within departments. Course Builders can copy course content, modify settings, or change the course name and description. If the course is unavailable to students, they may still access the course.
In Blackboard Organization shells there are corresponding roles available such as Leader (which has similar privileges to the Instructor role), Organization Builder (which is comparable to the Course Builder), and Participant (which is equivalent to the Student role).
Faculty may contact me directly to request specific roles; however, to enter a class taught by someone else, you must have permission from the Course Instructor before I can proceed. The instructor can provide me with the specific information and permission by email or by phone.
By Naomi, on November 12th, 2009, 3:55 pm
Join this Elluminate session* about Open Education Resources hosted by Cindy Foreman
- Date: 11-18-09 (Wednesday)
- Time: 3:00pm (Please plan to arrive 10 minutes early)
- Location: Library Room 103 (will be via Elluminate)
- Contact Info: Brendan Pust, x2012 or bpust@clark.edu
Part 1: “Open Textbooks from an Author’s Perspective” (30 min)
Bio: Robert Beezer is a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, WA. He joined the faculty there in 1984 after receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois. Besides advocating for open textbooks, he is also a developer for Sage, a comprehensive open-source program for mathematics.
What motivates someone to write an open textbook? How much of the editorial and production process is within reach of an individual? How is the experience different from writing a traditional textbook? What is different about teaching from an open textbook? I will answer these questions with examples from my experiences writing and publishing a mathematics textbook, “A First Course in Linear Algebra.”
Part 2: “Another Perspective on Authoring an Open Textbook” (30 min)
Bio: David Lippman is a professor of mathematics at Pierce College Ft Steilacoom, a community college in Lakewood, WA, where he has been teaching since 2000. He is best known in the Washington community college math circle as the guy who created WAMAP.org (aka IMathAS), a free, open-source online course management and math assessment system.
I’ll discuss my journey of writing an open textbook “Math in Society,” including my motivation, how existing open textbooks guided my decisions, using my students as guinea pigs, and my experience with the bookstore. I’ll share some general thoughts on openness and collaboration in textbooks that need consistency and accuracy, and some thoughts about license selection.
*Note: For those who missed it, you may view the recording…
Webinar: Perspectives on Open Textbooks from Two WA Faculty Authors
By Cindy, on November 6th, 2009, 9:58 am
The project formerly under the heading of Online Course Access and Success and commonly referred to as the Course Redesign Project will now be called the “Open Course Library Project”. The purpose of the project is still the same, to redesign 80 existing high enrollment courses to use Open Educational Resources to improve affordability, accessibility, and student success.
The renaming came about in reaction to the first “town hall” Elluminate session held on November 4th. The session was attended by well over 100 faculty, staff and administrators all across the state. There are three more Elluminate sessions to follow, so stay tuned for more updates and modifications to this project. The SBCTC has set up a wiki with current information about this project and they are being very clear that the information is all DRAFT and subject to revision.
http://opencourselibrary.wikispaces.com
If you would like to tune in to one or all of the remaining Elluminate sessions but are unsure how to do that, refer to our blog posting about Elluminate or contact the eLearning Department and we will be happy to assist you.
By Brendan, on October 28th, 2009, 12:10 pm
I have been a big fan of Open Source Projects throughout my years of being interested in computers. Now for those of you who aren’t familiar with the term Open Source, there are two competing main entities in the computer programming world.
- Closed Source- some examples are: Internet explorer, Microsoft Office suite, Adobe Acrobat, All Microsoft and Macintosh Operating Systems.
Vs.
- Open Source- some examples are: Mozilla FireFox, Open Office suite, All Unix and Linux Operating Systems.
*Note* Source Basically refers to the code running in behind the scenes. These Files can be hard to read and understand.
Closed Source means you can’t make changes to the code to give it the features you want and you usually have to pay for this kind software. Having trouble understanding? Picture it like this; Closed Source is like a company recipe for Italian Bread sticks. They would never give you their recipe to be able to make your own Bread sticks, let alone your own style of Bread sticks, or make some kind of profit off of their bread sticks. Though their bread sticks are really good and filling, is there more you can do with this recipe?
This brings us to Open Source. It is code that is ’open’ for editing the code (though many don’t have the ability to edit the code). Open Source is also free for all to obtain. Mainly communities and small groups of people Collaborate to meet an end goal (Like Ubuntu Linux). Where is the money in this you might ask? There isn’t a whole lot. The majority of Open Source programmers either ask for donations or write programs for the ‘bragging right’ one might say (I would be pretty proud of myself if I could write make a Program that thousands of people use every day).
Some Positives and Negatives on both
- Closed Source
- +Geared for most people
- + or – Quality can Vary (i.e. Vista, Windows ME)***
- +Technical Support by companies who usually care about the customers experience and help users work through their problem.
- -Can Cost a lot of money depending on the software. Especially when getting new versions as technology expands
- +Can have some pretty advanced features
- Open Source
- -Not really geared for everybody**
- + or – Quality can vary****
- -Technical support isn’t available***
- +Free to download and use
- +Can have some pretty advanced features
Resources for Open Source Software
The most legitimate gateway site for Open Source Software is Sourceforge.net
Some Great Open Source Software is:
- Mozilla Firefox -Internet Browser (like Internet Explorer)
- Open Office- Office Software(like Microsoft Office)
- XMind- Brain-Storming Software/Mind-Mapping Software
- Ubuntu- Operating System(such as Microsoft XP, Mac OSX)
**Some programs use technical wording, and confusing menus, thus worsens the user experience
***Google and Forums is your best friend
****Quality usually is in relation to how popular it is
By Cindy, on October 27th, 2009, 8:47 pm
SBCTC has secured one large grant covering four separate projects under the heading of Washington State Student Completion Initiative. All four projects are tied together under the heading of Retention and Student Success. From the eLearning perspective we fit into the first project – Online Course Access and Success. The goal is to redesign 80 courses to use Open Educational Resources (OER) to improve affordability, accessibility, and student success. The courses were selected on the basis of High Enrollment and Low Completion, with predominantly young students who are from lower income households. That is who the Gates Foundation is most interested in helping. He has targeted Community Colleges in four different states with similar programs. There is a list of 81 courses, 80 existing courses and 1 proposed course. Money from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will fund the first 25 courses, Ford Foundation and State money is being used to add the additional 56 courses. That list may be modified between now and the end of the calendar year.
Executive Summary
Full text of Grant
The basics = redesign these 81 courses so that they are taught using digital resources available for little or no cost to the students. Those redesigned courses will then be made available to the world-wide web. Instructors and students from anywhere in the world will be able to access these course materials to use as they see fit. Our own faculty members within the state of Washington will be able to access these course materials and use them as they see fit in online, hybrid or F2F classes.
Redesign Courses
There will be room for instructional designers, librarians, eLearning staff, bookstore administrators and others to participate in the redesign project alongside the faculty members who are chosen. The process for determining who will participate in the grant has not been finalized. There will be a series of informational sessions held via Elluminate over the next month. These sessions are open to whoever is interested in listening and/or participating. (If you have not ever used Elluminate please review the information posted by Scott and take advantage of a little advance training.)
Washington State Student Completion Initiative – Course Redesign Project “town hall” meetings:
- Wednesday, November 4: 3:00 – 4:30pm
- Monday, November 9: 10:00 – 11:30am
- Tuesday, November 17: 1:00 – 2:30pm
- Friday, December 4: 2:00 – 3:30pm
Elluminate recordings for all meetings: Open Course Library Wiki
By Cindy, on October 27th, 2009, 12:24 pm
Read about the latest projects and developments coming from the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges in their quarterly Newsletter – The Browser. FALL09 EL Newsletter FINAL (2)
The Clark College eLearning team are following the Lecture Capture RFP very closely so that we will be set to take advantage of this new exciting technology as soon as it becomes available. I have previous experience with lecture capture using the Tegrity system. My online students found the video streamed mini-lectures a helpful addition to predominantly text-based course content.
Clark College has two Quality Matters certified courses: “Math 107 Math In Society” developed & taught by Jennifer Farney and “WS 201 Women Around the World” developed & taught by Ann Synder. Our eLearning Senior Instructional Designer Kathy Chatfield is a Certified Quality Matters Master Reviewer. Watch for upcoming Quality Matters training events throughout the year.
The new Gates Grant and course redesign project will require a series of posts! I have reviewed the entire grant and will be participating in a number of Elluminate sessions over the next two months. This is a major statewide project and Clark College will definitely want to be involved.
Stay tuned for more information!
By Scott, on October 26th, 2009, 6:11 pm
 Here in eLearning, we often consider the possible effects any disaster could have on regularly held classes and the demands it could put on Blackboard and the other software systems we maintain. As Clark’s eLearning Systems Administrator, I have seen the use of Blackboard increase dramatically, as our faculty discover its potential. However, Elluminate has not seen the increase in usage which would reflect its capability, especially with the current budget situation curtailing travel for meetings, our universal drive to conserve fuel and energy, and the latest news focusing attention on a Swine Flu pandemic.
Our version, called “Elluminate Live” and provided free through the State of Washington, includes an audio component, a typed chat area, and an interactive whiteboard for drawing, showing images or displaying PowerPoint presentations. You can share your desktop or demonstrate something in a software application, use breakout rooms for collaborative learning, or take advantage of the quiz manager or polling feature. You can also do synchronized web browsing, transfer files, and (for math and science) there’s a graphing calculator and a math symbol library.
Although Elluminate has been well established as a virtual meeting and collaboration tool, some of Clark’s own faculty, such as Willy Cushwa, have been experimenting with its use as an online classroom as well. It seems to be a hit with his students. Sally Keely has also remarked on the useful features of this specialty software and her ideas for increasing its usage beyond online office hours. Although the video feature isn’t always recommended for bandwidth reasons, many of the other features seem to captivate and engage most users. Generally, the moderator uses a mic or headset and the whiteboard area while the participants listen, observe, and use the chat area, responding to the moderator by typing or raising their “hands” to ask questions. Though these sessions are conducted synchronously, Elluminate sessions can also be recorded and made available later. For those students or participants with less technical experience, there is a five minute orientation available on the Elluminate website.
Elluminate is sophisticated, yet straightforward to use. I encourage all faculty and administrators at Clark to go through the online moderator training and discover this new tool. As a moderator with audio capabilities, a headset may be required, unless your computer is already equipped with a built-in mic and speakers – contact ITS (x2425) to purchase any necessary equipment. The links below should help get you going… After you complete the training, just contact me (scoffie@clark.edu) and I will set you up with your own meeting space or classroom where you may join the ranks of the Elluminati!
Check your computer for technical requirements
Five minute orientation for student participants or meeting attendees
For meeting or classroom moderator training, sign up for the two live training sessions using the link below. The sessions are:
- “Getting Started with Elluminate Live for Moderators”
- “Next Steps with Elluminate Live for Moderators”
Sign up for free training and select a time you would like to attend
Once you are comfortable with the basics, you may be interested in some of the more robust features:
Additional documents and recordings for advanced training of moderators
By Cindy, on October 19th, 2009, 3:34 pm
 Cindy Exploring the World As the new leader of the Clark College eLearning Department I would like to welcome you to the eLog. We hope you will come here often to share your ideas, ask questions, and explore what is happening in the world of eLearning. I will be using this site to pass along the latest information from the State Board of Community and Technical Colleges regarding distributed education, instructional technology, and various state-wide initiatives that may be of direct benefit to Clark College.
The eLearning Department has a great team of individuals who will be sharing their expertise on this site as well. They are ready to assist both students and faculty with their technical challenges. Be sure and check our Smart Penguin blog for the very latest tech support issues. If you are on campus I encourage you to stop by our office and meet the eLearning team. We are located in the breezeway between the library and Gaiser Hall. Our office is open Monday through Friday from 8 AM to 5 PM.
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