Design Meets Disability

In a new book, "Design Meets Disability" Graham Pullen discusses how designing with disability in mind can help all of us. http://www.dwell.com/articles/eight-questions-for-graham-pullin.html In this interview he discusses what has been done and what he would like to see happen.

Information on the book can be found at:
http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=11673

Online asychronous groups successful in

An artcle in the lates issue of JOLT, "Making Online Collaboration Work by Transcending Gender Stereotypes: A Study of Two Mixed Gender Online Groups" http://jolt.merlot.org/vol6no4/ritke-jones_1210.pdf reported that postings of two online groups were coded and the researchers found:

"A small online group of mixed genders may be a more fertile environment for women and men to embrace parts of themselves that they cannot in a physical space. In order for a collaborative group to succeed, all group members must take initiative and assert their voices, characteristics attributable to the masculine, while simultaneously negotiating and yielding on issues and nurturing and supporting their group mates, characteristics attributable to the feminine."

What if we did not use Social Media for one week?

Harriburg University of Science and Technology blocked the use of social media on its college network for one week. http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/opinions-mellow-on-social-media-blackout-at-harrisburg-u/28657 In the beginning students and faculty were upset, but, by the end of the week, many students found that they were less stressed, had greater concentration, found lectures more interesting, ate better and exercised more.

Self Plagiarism

Can we plagiarize ourselves? According to this article http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/12/03/zirkel
it is possible, and it is also unethical.

Making Online Learning Accessible book

An excellent book for teachers of online classes is

Combs, N. (2010). Making Online Learning Accessible: Inclusive Course Design for Students with Disabilities. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
http://www.josseybass.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470499044.html


It gives practical suggestions for the use of major tools such as Word, Excel and PowerPoint. The final chapter addresses the need for Institutional Support.

Papers written by others

In this article The Shadow Scholar the author claims that s/he makes over $60,000 a year writing college papers for others.

Do I believe it? Unfortunately, I do. I have always suspected that college application essays, for example, are written by parents or older siblings, and some have even confessed that they did this. I think the teacher needs to give enough writing assignments to get a feel for what the student can do and then it is easy to spot the fake. However, this means that the institution should not overload the number of students in the teacher's class.

Online education and ADA

As the number of online courses increase, there is growing concern about the use of multimedia and the problems that this may cause for ADA students. http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/ada-compliance-a-major-vulnerability-for-online-programs/28136 Often there are not even formal policies. Higher education institutions do not realize that the law does pertain to online courses, but it does. A good introduction to the subject is the book "Making Online Teaching Accessible: Inclusive Course Design for Students with Disabilities" by Norman Coombs, published by Jossey-Bass. http://www.josseybass.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470499044.html

Collaborative writing assignments

Many teachers like to do collaborative assignments, but find it difficult to structure an assignment so that all participate equally. This site http://wac.colostate.edu/intro/pop2l.cfm gives good suggestions about projects. It also has suggestions about peer review and grading.

Winners of Merlot 2010 Exemplary Online Learning Resources

Merlot, the online source for multimedia learning and teaching has just announced its 2010 awards. All can be found by searching Merlot.
The winners are announced at:
http://grapevine.merlot.org/#features01

Cheat sheets online

Students have used CliffsNots for a long time. Now, according to an article in the New York Times, they are turning to their computer, their IPod or their cell phones to get the same information for free. The problem is when this substitutes for the reading of the real book. The newcomer is Schnoop which contains a feature called "Why Should I Care?" and trivia, such as the fact that Shakespeare probably imagined Hamlet as heavy. Gertrude, his mother, notes he is ""fat and scant of breath" (5.2.269) during his duel with Laertes." Reference

Online dropout rates

A recent post in the Chronicle of Higher Education examined the drop out rate in online courses: http://chronicle.com/blogPost/blogPost-content/27108 I have found that if you count the students who remain after the first ten days of class then the drop out rate is not that high. I think some students think online will be easier and when they find out it is not then they drop the course.

Online enhancements may make it hard for blind students

Blind students may have a difficult time with multimedia technology. http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/08/23/accessibility Arizona State was forced to abandon a pilot project that used the Kindle DX because it had an inaccessible menu. Other institutions also discontinued their projects.

Faculty Pictures in an Online Class

Does faculty appearance affect evaluations? This recent article suggests the answer is "Yes." http://chronicle.com/article/Do-Good-Looks-Equal-Good/45187/

And good looking faculty often feel that their looks can be a problem too!http://chronicle.com/article/Hot-Hot-Hot/43995/

Copyright ruling

One interesting development in Copyright Law THIS WEEK: The Library of Congress has revised rules on what faculty can do with copy protected videos. Now, for the first time, http://www.copyright.gov/1201/ copyright protection can be circumvented provided that “circumvention is accomplished solely in order to accomplish the incorporation of short portions of motion pictures into new works for the purpose of criticism or comment, and where the person engaging in circumvention believes and has reasonable grounds for believing that circumvention is necessary to fulfill the purpose of the use in the following instances.” Notice it is still only for “short portions” but this is certainly positive for faculty.
What is also interesting is that this rule may not be subject to judicial review of any kind http://larrydownes.com/copyright-office-weighs-in-on-awkward-questions-of-software-law/

Social Networking Tools

This article http://chronicle.com/article/How-Social-Networking-Helps/123654/ discusses how professors want to learn more about these tools. However, few use in their classrooms.

The one that interested me most was http://www.eyejot.com/ a free way to produce video mail. You do, of course, need a video camera but as of now the service is free.

Does technology make us stupid?

Here is a link to an article about technolgogy making us stupid: http://chronicle.com/article/Is-Technology-Making-Your/66128/
. The responses are interesting.

Other articles on the subject: The laptop and the lecture: http://www.springerlink.com/content/41252460v7037172/

and Mind Over Matter
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/11/opinion/11Pinker.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=%22mind%20over%20mass%20media%22&st=cse

Extreme way to stop cheating

To stop cheats, colleges learn their trickery

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/06/education/06cheat.html?scp=1&sq=To%20stop%20cheats,%20colleges%20learn%20their%20trickery&st=cse

The University of Central Florida has become aggressive in stopping cheating. No gum, no cell phones, no pens, scratch paper is stamped and must be turned in at the end of the test. The computers are recessed so the proctor can easily see each student.

Colleges have noted that not only do students plagiarize papers, but they also copy homework. None of that is new, but now colleges are fighting back by using technology to nab the offenders.

Writing goals and objectives

Goals and Objectives
Students have trouble writing good goals and objectives. I had a problem searching a site to help them. Most are either too involved or too sketchy. I found one site I liked but it spelled “analyze” as “analise” so I decided that reflected on the site itself. Here is the best one I found:
http://www.park.edu/cetl2/quicktips/writinglearningobj.html “Writing Quality Learning Objectives” from Park University.

Meditation Improves Mindfulness

An interesting study
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20363650
found that even short, brief meditation training can have a positive affect. In four sessions "brief mindfulness training significantly improved visuo-spatial processing, working memory, and executive functioning." I realize we cannot force students to do this, but it may help teachers!

Plagiarism:

The article "Four reasons to be happy about Internet Plagiarism" http://www.stu.ca/~hunt/4reasons.htm has a catchy title, but the message is interesting. The author believes that teacher's reliance on term papers as an evaluation mechanism is challenged by the ease of Internet plagiarism.
He also decries the emphasis on grading, the fact that knowledge “is stored information and that skills are isolated, asocial faculties” and that we should concentrate on encouraging students to learn how scholarly research really works.
It is an thought-provoking article, with examples.

Recources for group work

Group work is difficult online. I know some teachers believe that the formation of groups is easier online because often online students do not "want to be with their friends" but I look for the early posters and the late posters. I want the early posters to be together because the frustration is high when some in the group want to get started and others are "last minute" people.

Here is an interesting resource on tools for groups.
http://www.ratedcolleges.com/blog/2009/50-fabulous-web-tools-for-group-projects/

Course Management Systems (CMS)

Blackboard 9 is now released. I look forward to the newly enhanced features, such as blogs. However, the release has not be greeted with univeral applause, as this review in the Chronicle of Higher Ed reports:http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Blackboards-Next-Generation/24539

Some faculty believe that they can cobble together their own CMS: http://chronicle.com/blogPost/WordPress-a-Better-LMS/23050/I understand their point, but I worry about any system on the Web and not on the institution's secure site.

Wikiuniversity

Wikiuniversity is a wiki"http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Wikiversity:Main_Pa that invites teachers, students and researchers to submit educational resources. It is hosted by the Wikimedia foundation, which also hosts wikipedia. All work submitted becomes available to others under a Creative Commons license but also through a GNU Free Documentation License, and that means that commercial use of the product. There has been discussion of closing this site down. It is agreed that the site needs more work and maybe better editing. Interesting.

Electronic Literature Directory

Electronic Literature Directory
http://eld.eliterature.org/ The Electronic Literature is a Web-based cooperative endeavor catalogue (wiki) in which electronic literature is catalogued. The site is searchable. The sites are peer reviewed. This is a good example of a wiki.

Social Media Use by Professors

The Chronicle of Higher Education's "Inside Higher Ed" blog reports on a recent survey about the use of Web 2.0 by college professors. http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/05/04/socialmedia
While 52% of professors in the survey reported using Web, the use was uneven: one fifth of those reporting use directed their students to YouTube videos, but less than 5% used Twitter. FaceBook and LinkedIn were used mainly to connect with colleagues. All professors did agree that social media are supplements to their teaching, and not replacements.

PowerPoint and understanding

In the news is the PowerPoint slide presented to Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the leader of American and NATO forces in Afghanistan. It depicted, in a chart with many multicolored segments and connecting lines, the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan. As the article explained, McChrystal’s said, when he saw the slide: “When we understand that slide, we’ll have won the war.” The room “erupted in laughter.” http://blogs.geniocity.com/friedman/2010/04/there-is-no-shortcut-to-thoughtful-decision-making-it-requires-critical-thinking-and-discussion-and-powerpoint-not-only-doesnt-help-it-hurts/

There is a concern that PowerPoint can overwhelm, not add to, learning. I have seen many online teachers' proposed slide shows with multiple transitions and many colors and I think it detracts from learning. I do believe that PowerPoint can be effective in giving a talk to large audiences, but as for distributing reading material online the use may be limited.

Online courses Increase in community college and open courses

Online Learning Increases in Community Colleges

http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Distance-Educations-Rate-of/22540/
Enrollment in community college is growing. In the 2008-2009 academic year enrollment increased 20%. Meanwhile administrators find that “, the greatest challenge in distance learning was a lack of support staff needed for training and technical assistance.” Faculty find the greatest challenge in work load.

Open courses backed by Learning Research
Carnegie Mellon has a grant to develop Open Courseware
Instructors are allowed to incorporate these “Open courses, backed by learning research” into their curriculum.
http://oli.web.cmu.edu/openlearning/

Teaching tips? from a professor who has the students do all the work

In a humorous article, a English teacher views the teaching style of a colleague who seems to have the time factor beat. http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/04/13/galef

The article is making fun of the professor who puts most of the responsibility for the class on the students, but the responses to this post are interesting. Many respondents say that the teaching techniques are valid if not overused.

Online courses taught by Masters Degree students from India.

Can online teaching be outsourced to professionals in other countries?

A recent Chronicle of Higher Education post http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/04/05/statistics entitled “The Specialists” recounts how http://www.Statistics.com hopes to produce college credit courses. It now produces courses, designed by college faculty and private sector statisticians, for professionals.

However, the article states that: “The company outsources grading and other work to master’s degree-holders in India for much less than it would cost to employ similarly qualified teaching assistants in the United States.” This would seem to indicate that the company owns the copyright to the courses and that they then use Indian professors, presumably at a lower salary, to do the actual teaching.

Arrranging content in a Web site

Scrolling vs Print Type Interfaces
http://casanchez.faculty.asu.edu/pubs/scroll.pdf
To Scroll or Not to scroll:
According to a recent paper many students retain more if the material is presented in print-like format, on separate pages.
Arizona State University Christopher A. Sanchez, Arizona State University, Mesa, and Jennifer Wiley, University of Illinois at Chicago

Students were presented with material that they had to scroll to read or as material in separate pages, navigating by the next-back functions of the browser. The students who used the material in separate pages did better in reading comprehension.
I wonder what this implies for sites like Blackboard, where you can break content into Folders or arrange in a Learning Unit. It probably says that having all content in one Item is not a good way to arrange information. However, I find that students who print out all material prefer that form of presentation.

Wikipedia

http://www.insidehighered.com/advice/instant_mentor/weir22
Many teachers discourage students from using Wikipedia as a source. The author Rob Weir assigned a 750-page exercise titled “Does Wikipedia Suck?” Students picked a topic, did research and then consulted Wikipedia. None found any inaccuracies. Most commented that the information they found was clear and well organized. They did, however, find the information to be general, not specific and that it was only a good starting place.
One of the replies pointed to this site http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Wikipedia in Wikipedia itself!

Do Students Cheat More in Online classes?

Do students cheat more in an online course?
According to a recent study the answer is NO, they cheat more in a f2f class. Moreover, cheaters are less successful in their school work – maybe cheating does NOT pay!
http://www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla/spring131/watson131.html

Keystroke Commands

Keystroke commands
This is an interesting Web site with shortcut computer commands. It reminds me of the old World Processor Word Star, when it really WAS necessary to know this.
http://www.randalldean.com/Randy_Favorite_Keystroke_Combos.pdf

Even today some of these commands can be very useful, especially the copy and paste.

Divided attention

This article, about the attention of multitaskers, published in the Journal of Higher Education, cites a study that found that “"Heavy multitaskers are often extremely confident in their abilities." Clifford I. Nass, a professor of psychology at Stanford University states: "But there's evidence that those people are actually worse at multitasking than most people."
The article refers to a 1956 paper by a then-Harvard psychologist postulated that working memory consists of about seven units, and, if people are stressed they can store much less.
The article is interesting in that it discusses the implications of this research on the classroom. One professor will not let students use computers or take notes while in a lecture class. He put the material online and in a podcast, but while they are in the class he wants them to pay attention to him.

More on E-books in higher ed

E-books and Higher Ed
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/02/23/ereaders
The results are in from the first survey of students who used the E–reader for course work. They felt the inability to highlight and to open many documents at once was a problem. They did enjoy using them for outside reading, but many preferred textbooks for school work.

Publishers are now getting into the act too:
http://chronicle.com/article/Format-War-Heats-Up-Among/64323/ “Major textbook publishers are firing the first shots in a format war over their electronic editions, with several players hoping to control distribution to students and to make used textbooks extinct in a future they see as increasingly digital.”

Chesklist for online facilitators

This checklist for online facilitators http://www.humboldt.edu/~aof/aof.htm just became available. It is from CATS, the Community of Academic Technology Staff:http://cats.cdl.edu/

Free online textbooks may have a future

Free online textbooks http://collegeopentextbooks.org/businessbooks.html The Community College Open Textbook Collaborative* (CCOTC), funded by The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, is a collection of colleges, governmental agencies, educational nonprofits, and other education-related organizations is working to develop online textbooks for community college students.
NC State gives students access to free online textbooks http://chronicle.com/blogPost/North-Carolina-State-U-Gives/21238/
It looks like the era of free online textbooks is approaching. Some older students may print out the content, but I bet the younger students will be reading online.

Online-teacher-mentor-roles: Criticism and Fair Use

Online-teacher-mentor-roles: Criticism and Fair Use
http://blogs.geniocity.com/friedman/2010/02/archers-daniel-midland-abuses-copyright-law-to-censor-criticism/
I, too, had always thought that criticism was fair use. Obviously, this is not true if the criticism comes in the form of a video.

Vidoes and copyright

Videos and Copyright

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/01/26/copyright
The University of California at Los Angeles has stopping allowing faculty members to post copyrighted videos on their course Web sites after coming under fire from an educational media trade group.
The university had allowed professors to steam video in their password protected online courses. The educational media association, the Association for Information and Media Equipment — a group that protects the copyrights of education media companies – claims that this is a copyright violation.
The university countered that it violated no laws, citing a provision that teachers can use legally purchased videos in their classrooms. The trade group counters that a password protected online course is not a classroom.
The two parties have agreed to settle the dispute outside of litigation. Meanwhile, the professors at UCLA have been told to remove the videos from their online classes.

Social Networking in Online Classes

Social Networking Site Use in Online Classes
http://jolt.merlot.org/vol5no4/ophus_1209.pdf

Should teachers consider using publically available social networking tools in online classes? In the latest issue of JOLT (JOLT Vol. 5, No. 4, December 2009) John D. Ophus and Jason T. Abbitt from Miami University in Ohio explored this issue in the article: “ Exploring the Potential Perceptions of Social Networking Systems in University Courses.”

The authors surveyed their students about their personal use of Social Networking sites and also asked them their opinion of using such sites in online classes. While the survey results indicated students’ receptivity to the use of these sites students also expressed some concerns. They did not want their teachers to see their own personal sites. They also felt that use of these sites might be a distraction.

The article closes with an interesting quote from a student: “using Facebook for school wouldn’t help me learn more, it would probably just make me use Facebook less.”

ADA regulations and online

Students with Disabilities
In their desire for variety teachers often include graphics, video, sound and other multimedia in their online course. While this is a good strategy if it contributes to the educational learning it can cause problems for students with disabilities. A good article that explores this issue is found in

The Journal of Educators Online, Volume 7, Number 1, January 2010 http://thejeo.com

Web Accessibility Theory and Practice: An Introduction for University Faculty David A. Bradbard, Winthrop University Cara Peters, Winthrop University

The authors discuss Web Design, Accessibility, and Web Accessibility

They note that there are four types of disabilities: visual, auditory, cognitive and motor.

Students with blindness, color blindness or low vision have problems with information on Web sites with dark backgrounds, unusual or small fonts, and unclear images.

The article has good references and tables that show the possible accommodations for the disabilities. This should be interesting reading for all online teachers.

E-Books

E- Books
The Wired Campus blog had an interesting article about a professor who tried to test e-book readers for his class.

http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Professor-Faces-Obstacles-in/19415/

The first problem he ran into was that the publishing company of the text he used would not provide a digital copy. The author of the article believes that e-books will not take off until “a standard will need to emerge, so that digital formats do not feel like extra homework for professors and students.”
The comments on the article were interesting. One noted that there also needs to be a business model “that includes the ability to purchase and resell the texts..”

New Year, New Classes

New Year, New Courses
One of my students said his motto is ABC “Always be changing” and I believe that is appropriate for online courses. As I start three new courses I see the changes I have made.

In the undergrad course I am adding video. It will not be required, and is already on the web. In fact, most of the videos have a text equivalent, which is excellent in case students have hearing problems. I also go over the statistics for each of the quizzes I give and remove or revise questions that are not appropriate.

In the graduate courses I must update all the course links. Links do “rot” and are no longer accessible. I’m trying something new this term. Instead of putting my picture I am adding a graphic. I have decided NOT to talk about my family but concentrate on my professional life. Since I am a “woman of a certain age” I do not want to be stereotyped by the students. I am interested to see if it makes a difference. I am active in all my online classes and I hope that not “seeing” me will not make a difference, or make a positive one.

It is always a challenge to start a new class and to meet new students. I look forward to it.