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Really outstanding but lengthy session on how to use a wiki in teaching. Within the first 20 minutes he talks about using a wiki for his own course notes--he can access from any computer when he has a thought; an example, he says, of "cloud computing." He also explains how he started using a wiki for student note-taking. None of his students were taking notes because his lecture was "making sense." Instructor's (Richard Buckland) worry was that maybe later it WOULDN'T make sense. He tried handing out notes to studetns, each student taking turns keeping notes, and others. One student suggested a wiki and he says it's worked fantastically! COLLABORATIVE LECTURE NOTES. Now when he lectures he displays a brief outline of his notes which students then mark-up for themselves. Students now own their notes! He reviews at night and sees where students have trouble. He does NOT change the notes. He waits because often students will comes back to fix. But if he sees the error persists by the next lecture, then he knows he needs to correct a misconception.

Vesely, P., Bloom, L., & Sherlock, J. (2007). Key elements of building online community: Comparing faculty and student perceptions. MERLOT Journal of Online Learning and Teaching, 3(3), 234-246. Vesely, Bloom, and Sherlock (2007) document that essential to the learning process is the student/student and student/teacher interaction, and building this community of learners is more challenging in online. Students in blended courses felt interaction may be better than in traditional courses. Students who feel silenced in onsite class discussions are more apt to contribute online. Seeking help can be a determining factor in successful learning. In the online communities, help is available virtually around the clock from the instructors and fellow classmates. Furthermore, through their experiences in the blended course, students would better understand the significance of managing their time, cultivating their study environment, regulating their effort, seeking appropriate support, and learning from classmates. In my experience, students reported that their online interaction with classmates had greatly assisted in their comprehension of course materials. Central to how they felt about blended learning was the quality and quantity of student and faculty interaction. In blended courses, students are often required to engage actively by reading and responding to discussion forum postings that become a permanent record of their participation and learning, rather than passively attending classes. Perceptions of interaction from faculty are also positive for blended courses. Faculty renovate their teaching methods by placing onsite lectures online and adding supplementary activities to aid student learning. Blended teaching and learning transforms education from "a command and control structure to a connect and collaborate environment" (Moskal, Dziuban, Upchurch, Hartman, & Truman, 2006) which is more student-centered than faculty-controlled. For faculty, the quality

Students hate discussion boards and mostly feel like they don't get anything out of them. They go into check box mode and real dialogue is lost. How can we fix them?

I used discussion board for 2 full semesters. I received feedback from my students in both ways: course reflection and my performance evaluation. The feedback was very positive. The assignment for the discussion boards would include an actual company with specific operations (inventory, quality, process design, etc.). Students were free to answer any questions and required provide a feedback to at least one of the classmates answer. Students felt connected to their classmates, shared different views, had an opportunity to learn from each other.

The title is a bit misleading but some of the recommendations discussed can definitely spark some life into DBs. DBs are a good way to foster engagement but unless properly done can mostly be seen by students as a one and done exercise.

I have used this in my classes and love it! The free Poll Everywhere mobile app is perfect for responding to polls, presenting polls, and clicking through PowerPoint presentations. Use it to... 1.) Respond to polls: Audience members can use the app to respond to the presenter's questions live. 2.) Poll an audience: Presenters can ask the audience questions and display poll responses live. 3.) Navigate in Powerpoint: Presenters can control the flow of Powerpoint presentations using a smartphone as a wireless remote. Participants Audience members or students can easily respond to polls or vote using the app on a smartphone or tablet. Aside from the app, they can respond via web browser, text message, or Twitter. Presenters Professors, teachers and presenters can create and display questions on the fly, including Q&A and multiple choice polls. Questions can be presented directly from the web or embedded in a PowerPoint or Keynote presentation. Audience responses are displayed in real-time. Great for classroom participation, or gathering opinions from the audience. PowerPoint Remote Presenters using PowerPoint can use the Poll Everywhere mobile app as a presentation clicker, to navigate through your PowerPoint presentation with ease. It has a slick, streamlined design and a set of polling controls built-in. Key Features: * Create or answer multiple choice, true/false, open ended, ranking poll, and clickable image questions. * Participants are automatically shown the presenter's current question, for quick and easy participation. * Watch results update live. * Click through a PowerPoint presentation with the included Presenter Remote feature.

What a great way to be able to asynchronously poll students and still allow them to remain anonymous. This also gives students to see how well their knowledge compares to other students. It also allows them to see if their way of thinking is similar to other students.

This article describes the use of social media as a bridge between students, teachers, and the online course. Many students are currently using social media such as Facebook and Twitter. The challenge for instructors is to learn how to leverage that as as an opportunity to create value for the student, the course, and for the instructor. The growing trend of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) is commonplace among many campuses and it is now becoming common for institutions to require students to supply their own technology tools.

6 universities participating to crete a database that measures 33 variables for the online coursework of 640,000 students - tracks student performance and retention across demographics.

Interesting article on student study groups. Introduction includes the potential pitfalls, moves on to the potentially enormously benefits, then offers a long list of suggestions for providing structure for study groups so that students benefit from them.

Nice article.. Great compilation of the benefits associated with this.

Recognizing the grave consequences for individual opportunity and more generally for our economy and society, the Carnegie Statway ™and Quantway ™Networked Improvement Communities have embraced an audacious goal-to increase from 5 percent to 50 percent the percentage of students who achieve college math credit within one year of continuous enrollment. As a result of the Carnegie Advancement for Teaching (CAT) work, my college will undergo a pilot program for Fall 2012 where I will be the instructor to achieve college math credit within one year on continuous enrollment. The Pathways Blog provides information about Carnegie's work to create pathways for student success in developmental education in community colleges and makes connections between Carnegie's work and that of others concerned with student struggle. Even though I follow the pathways blog, there are several more blogs from the foundation and are listed blow:

College students who frequently text message during class have difficulty staying attentive to classroom lectures and consequently risk having poor learning outcomes, new research shows. Because it is difficult to demonstrate that texting alone can have a direct impact on students' cognitive learning, researchers used path model analysis to describe the relationships between texting, as a "mediator" or intervening variable, and cognitive learning.

One potential casualty when courses move online - or even when face-to-face courses incorporate web-based technologies - is collaboration. Many instructors fear they will lose opportunities to interact with their students - and that their students will lose the ability to interact with one another.

An interesting piece on effective use of technology by instructors from the students' perspective.

Tools, Technology and Techniques To Keep Your Online Students Engaged In a face-to-face class, students have numerous opportunities to interact with their instructor and fellow students. Creating similar opportunities for collaboration in a web-based course is one of the biggest challenges of teaching online.

A Comparative Content Analysis of Student Interaction in Synchronous and Asynchronous Learning Networks Chou, C. C. A Comparative Content Analysis of Student Interaction in Synchronous and Asynchronous Learning Networks. By comparing the student interactions in synchronous and asynchronous Computer-Mediated Communication systems, this paper scrutinizes the patterns of learner-learner interaction in a distance-learning environment. The study results showed the students spent more time in task-oriented interaction in asynchronous discussions than in synchronous mode.

tools and constructivism

Love that the "practical descriptions of constructivist learning" listed in the article "[C]onstructivist learning should engage students in meaningful learning and ... the critical features are that the learning should be ... * Active and manipulative, engaging students in interactions and explorations with learning materials and provid[ing] opportunities for them to observe the results of their manipulations * Constructive and reflective, enabling students to integrate new ideas with prior knowledge to make meaning and enable learning through reflection * Intentional, providing opportunities for students to articulate their learning goals and monitor their progress in achieving them * Authentic, challenging and real-world (or simulated), facilitating better understanding and transfer of learning to new situations * Cooperative, collaborative, and conversational, providing students with opportunities to interact with each other to clarify and share ideas, to seek assistance, to negotiate problems, and discuss solutions."

Another great source on providing timely feedback throughout the course to enhance student learning.

Student perceptions on online learning

Very interesting indeed. I have always thought that students are more reflective when they post their responses online than when we are having F2F discussions in the classroom. And now it's supported by surveys. In the end it's true though that even if online courses require more self-motivation and time-management skills, student engagement still relies a lot on how the instructor manages the online classroom. Thanks for posting!

Know your students! We can better serve our students if we understand them better. This article gives a great list of facts about online students.

"Facebook pages for college classes? Students say yes, please"