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Mobile Learning: A Designer's Guide to Fighting Learner Distraction One of the biggest issues in eLearning is distractions. The brain is constantly bombarded with stray thoughts even when users exert great self-control. The problem is yet more pronounced in mLearning, as devices themselves may cause distractions such as phone calls, email alerts, and the knowledge that the user could easily be doing something different.

I follow this blog although it is primarily for course design. In any case, this topic seemed relevant to our course design assignment.

This is a great research guide designed to help faculty who wish to incorporate UDL into their classes. See especially the UDL syllabus rubric page (listed under the tab "UDL Course Changes"

An excellent guide to use when developing a course and wanting to be able to effectively reach a multitude of devices (student-content interaction)

The number of distance education courses offered by nurse anesthesia programs has increased substantially. Emerging distance learning trends must be researched to ensure high-quality education for student registered nurse anesthetists. However, research to examine distance learning has been hampered by a lack of theoretical models. This article introduces the Community of Inquiry model for use in nurse anesthesia education. This model has been used for more than a decade to guide and research distance learning in higher education. A major strength of this model lies in its direct applicability for guiding online distance learning. However, it lacks applicability to the development of higher order thinking for student registered nurse anesthetists. Thus, a new derived Community of Inquiry model was designed to improve these students' higher order thinking in distance learning. The derived model integrates Bloom's revised taxonomy into the original Community of Inquiry model and provides a means to design, evaluate, and research higher order thinking in nurse anesthesia distance education courses.

This guide to syllabus construction from Vanderbilt reiterates many points from our readings and is not specifically concerned with online teaching. However, one thing I had not yet seen in other readings that concerns us here is the importance of choosing the right tone for introducing the class to students. I am not sure that the warm and friendly approach recommended here is always the right one but it makes sense for us given the difficulty we will have in any case making personal connections with students in the online environment.

I think this is an important point. I had to revise some of my syllabi for exactly this reason. I guess when I first started teaching, I wanted to sound official and proper, but then a few years later discovered that I did not even recognize the person behind the formal, detached voice of the syllabi, and perhaps along the way, that a good instructor did not need to sound official or proper! Good reminder for me this time around, so thanks for posting this!

Thanks, Yu, I am just seeing this now. I think my draft syllabus was too formal and scary, but on the other hand I want to be super clear up front about expectations. I will need to tweak this,

In this article the author describes the design and development of an online learning resource: 'Video Guide to Audacity.'

This is great. I use Audacity in my Sound Design courses as one of the many design platform options.

Smashing Magazine is one of my go-to sources for ideas when it comes to designing or publishing anything on the web. This piece is a very thorough how-to about producing and publishing a podcast. In my courses, I try to teach how to produce media, but also how to publish and circulate that media. I'm considering having students in my graduate composition practicum course develop a podcast related to the subject of each week's class.

"Technology integration is the use of technology resources -- computers, mobile devices like smartphones and tablets, digital cameras, social media platforms and networks, software applications, the Internet, etc. -- in daily classroom practices, and in the management of a school." I found this article helpful largely because it just reiterated that we need to set educational goals and then choose technology which is helpful, not the other way round.

This UCF website, prepared by Carissa Baker, explores the way in which many literature professors are "trying innovative technology strategies within the literature classroom to increase knowledge and engagement." With theoretical as well as practical sources, the site offers many ideas on student engagement and literature immersion; it also has a few videos with ideas for staging virtual worlds; and a starter bibliography with 10 articles on a range of topics, including virtual literature circles; native avatars, online hubs, and urban indian literature; victorian novels and technoRomanticism; using Tweeter in the Literature Classroom (hmm...); online teaching Old English; and hypertext use to enhance students reading experiences, among others.

Although the target readership is grade 6-12 instructors, I find the methodology in this article applicable to what we are trying to do. Give it a read and see what you think.

This article outlines some ways to evaluate online courses - get faculty involved from the start and develop the rating scales...Is this authentic evaluation?

This paper describes a team based approach for on-line course development- focusing on team roles in course design using theoretical frameworks to guide development and evaluation. Team roles are identified using the Quality Matters rubric.

This link includes a useful summary of virtual team technology tools. I like this list because it is categorized by the function/goals for the team and needs for collaboration. A way for us to consider guiding our exploration of team tools for educational groups.

"...information about online repositories, curriculum-sharing websites, sources for lesson plans and activities, and open alternatives to textbooks."

As we move into different modalities, it is nice to remember that our students will arrive in our classroom familiar with these technologies. As the use of on-line tools increase in public education, our students will arrive with a baseline comfort level with the google tools, which still remain robust for many activities. These graphics really bring this home.

http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2014/06/handy-google-hangout-cheat-sheet-for.html This is a cheat sheet for the Google Hangout...

Resources for Web 2.0 technologies and composition pedagogy From Writer/Designer: A Guide to Making Multimodal Projects By Kristin L. Arola, Jennifer Sheppard, & Cheryl Ball

Here are some more Classroom Assessment Technique resources!