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Great description of using twitter in an English literature / history class in order to help students make the connections and see the bigger picture.

Study of student perceptions of a hybrid course in a Greek university

Lessons from a Texas A&M professor who flipped a 400-student "Introduction to Ancient Rome" course.

I'd love to hear some real world examples that address one point in the article: "Content delivery is the easy part. The hard part is figuring out what to do in class that keeps students engaged, and motivated to prepare for class." If anyone in our group knows of some specific tricks teachers usually employ for this, please let me know. (lil' quizzes? Q&A discussions? or something more interesting?) I'm wondering if there are other sorts of multimedia activities I could make that would serve similar function.

Warren, good question! The peer instruction approach of Eric Mazur et al. (see http://mazur.harvard.edu/research/detailspage.php?rowid=8) is a popular in-class technique. Here are some of other methods OSU hybrid faculty use to link online and face-to-face spheres: 1 - A low-stakes weekly quiz online prior to each class meeting. 2 - A discussion that flows from online to face-to-face and back again. 3 - A very short online essay turned in before each class meeting that builds on the online content, and is tied directly to in-class discussion or group work that follows. 4 - An interactive multimedia lesson online that provides a foundation for or extends in-class learning. (Examples: I recommend looking at Simon Driver and Megan McDonald's hybrid EXSS 444--I can connect you.) 5 - Group work online (e.g., formulating a debate position or a solution to real-world problem) that feeds into the next f2f class activity. 6 - A quiz at the start of each class meeting based on the online content. Whatever the method, a key is that the learning activities online channel rather directly into the in-class activities and vice versa. Think of it as a long ping-pong volley between learning activities in the online and f2f spheres from the first day of the term until the final exam or project.

I thought this was a funny and insightful explanation into why smart academics find it impossible to write directly or clearly. It's kinda long (ironically?) but eventually starts listing a few good (specific) insights. Thought yall might enjoy from a "how can we improve communication and content" perspective.

Great article -- and a real issue in some online courses, where we often need more of a technical writing style, such as numbered lists for directions instead of super-long paragraphs. Thanks for sharing!

This site gives examples for each of the "Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education" from Chickering and Gamson (1987) and also references Chickering and Ehrmann's (1996) "Implementing the Seven Principles: Technology as Lever."

"Two-stage examinations consist of a first stage in which students work individually as they typically do in examinations (stage 1), followed by a second stage in which they work in groups to complete another examination (stage 2), which typically consists of a subset of the questions from the first examination." Q: What are ways to successfully apply this strategy in online courses?

Program, course, and teaching assessment handbooks -- great references!

Interesting blog post about how VR is being used in nursing education - having students experience the world from the patient perspective. Curious how this approach might be used in courses that we're developing - public health, etc?

An oldie but a goodie -- a WCET paper on designing courses and policies to promote academic integrity

A resource for translating seat time and credit hour requirements to online activities from Penn State

"Teaching positively means that we intentionally consider how we can enhance learning environments, while at the same time increase the ways learners can be successful. Teaching positively aims to not only motivate learners but rather emphasizes how to increase their personal ability to achieve the course learning outcomes."

An interactive site that helps faculty select and implement social media for use in their teaching based on Bloom's levels, types of content, instructional methods and forms of assessment in the course.