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Gather Data, Take a Timely Look, and Make Change
[social-bio] Recently, I read Fetterman, Deitz & Gesundheit’s 2010 article on using empowerment evaluation to renew a medical curriculum. The Stanford University School of Medicine engaged in a process of collecting data about their courses and providing that data back in a timely fashion to faculty and directors who engaged in reflection and discussion to create changes in courses, clerkships, and across the curriculum. Such discussions, timely feedback, and the facilitation by a curriculum evaluation person acting as critical friend were identified as key components of this process. The article provides details including how they addressed challenges for faculty such as balancing demands on time and sharing course and curriculum…
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Syllabus Template Developed For Use at U of S
[social-bio] The syllabus is probably the most important document that you will provide your students during a class. It ideally conveys the learning outcomes, information on the methods of assessment, contact information for the instructor, time and locations for labs, required and supplemental readings, exam information, and other important details about the class. The University of Saskatchewan has a number of required items that must be included in the syllabus for any course (Academic Course Policy, 2011). They include: The type and schedule of term assignments with approximate due dates, as well as the type and schedule of term examinations Learning outcomes of the course and of the assignments and…
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The Use of WordPress for a Course Website
[social-bio] One of my favourite parts of my job is having the opportunity to teach pre-service teachers in an undergraduate course in the College of Education. I teach ETAD 470 – Design and Use of Online Resources. This course covers the pedagogical and technological aspects of using things like blogs, wikis, podcasts and other types of tools in teaching and learning. I taught this class for the first time in Term 2 of the 2011-2012 academic year. As part of the course I created a course blog using Google’s Blogger service where I shared weekly resources with the students and a Google Site where I listed all of the required…
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Registration Open For TLt 2013
[social-bio] The 2013 Teaching and Learning with the power of Technology (TLt) Conference will be held this coming May 1 and 2 at the University of Saskatchewan. This year’s theme is “Making IT Mainstream: Everybody’s doing IT”. With ubiquitous use of smart-phones, tablets and laptops by students and faculty the days of speaking of educational technology in future or fringe terms are long past. It is now mainstream so conversations at this year’s TLt will focus on the mainstream integration of learning technologies at both the level of the institution and individual instructor, what is what working and what is not, and how all of this is and will continue to…
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Digital Citizenship for the U of S Community
[social-bio] In my recent post on the basics of educational technology I mentioned a bit about what not to put online. “Never post anything online that you wouldn’t want your boss, mother or grandchildren to see. Facebook is not private. Twitter definitely is not private. Even email can end up in the hands of the wrong person (have you accidentally had autocomplete come up with the wrong name and then you sent the email without noticing or had someone forward a message they shouldn’t have?). I also point out the grandchildren part because the Internet is the new permanent record.” In the undergraduate course that I teach for the College of Education I cover…
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Getting Started With Educational Technology
[social-bio] For a number of years I’ve given workshops to faculty (both at the U of S and my previous institution) and I teach an undergraduate course in educational technology. Regardless of the group that I’m speaking with, I always give the same few points of advice and thought it appropriate to share them here. Start small. Pick one or two tools to try out instead of trying to do everything at once. Don’t start a blog, join Twitter, introduce clickers into your class, take a crack at blended learning, and try to redo all of your presentations in Prezi. You’ll only get frustrated and likely won’t stick to using…
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Call Opens for TLt 2013
[social-bio] The 2013 Teaching and Learning with the power of Technology (TLt) Conference will be held this coming May 1 and 2 at the University of Saskatchewan. This year’s theme is “Making IT Mainstream: Everybody’s doing IT”. With ubiquitous use of smart-phones, tablets and laptops by students and faculty the days of speaking of educational technology in future or fringe terms are long past. It is now mainstream so conversations at this year’s TLt will focus on the mainstream integration of learning technologies at both the level of the institution and individual instructor, what is what working and what is not, and how all of this is and will continue to…
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Happy Holidays
[social-bio] Educatus will be taking the rest of December off, but will be returning the first week of January. From all of us at the GMCTE, have a very happy and healthy winter break.
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Instead of a MOOC, How About a SOOC?
[social-bio] This post was originally published on Heather Ross’s blog on October 3, 2012 There’s been a lot of talk about MOOCs lately. I’ve even written a couple of posts related to them here and here. We were talking about them during a recent staff meeting and the term SOOC came out of my mouth. My boss said I should trademark it, but I’m not sure that A) someone else hasn’t already said or B) trademarking such a term would be in the spirit of what I’m advocating. A SOOC is a “small open online course” (as opposed to the “massive open online course”) and I’m currently building one for…
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BE VOCAL: Characteristics of Successful Online Instructors – An Article Review
[social-bio] If I had to recommend just one article for instructors new to online education, it just might be BE VOCAL: characteristics of successful online instructors by John R. Savery (Savery, John R. (2005). BE VOCAL: characteristics of successful online instructors. Journal of Interactive Online Learning, 4(2), 141-152). In it, Savery describes many of the best practices that I suggest to instructors and faculty who are designing or teaching online courses in what he calls the VOCAL model. VOCAL is an acronym that stands for Visible, Organized, Compassionate, Analytical, and Leader-by-Example. Visible refers to what we often call “instructor presence”. In an online course, an instructor cannot see their students…