December 1, 2009

Electronic Information Literacy: Promoting Netiquette in your Class

The campus migration to Gmail provides us with an opportunity to revisit how faculty and students use e-mail for communication. Capitalize on this opportunity by discussing e-mail netiquette with students in your class.

The introduction of electronic communication (e-mail, online threaded discussions, Twitter feeds, etc.) to class interaction poses a new set of challenges for instructors: Teaching students to communicate professionally in electronic media. Faculty might initially think of this issue mainly in terms of their own response to inappropriate language from students in e-mail (Hey! Missed class yesterday. Did I miss anything?) and posts to online discussions (i don’t get the reading this week – booooooring  : - (   will this be on the test?).

Effective communication through electronic media is an important skill. Help your students develop this skill with the following strategies:

• Establish some guidelines and communicate these clearly at the beginning of class. Put your guidelines in your syllabus along with your guidelines for appropriate conduct in class. Post your guidelines with course materials and in the instructions for threaded discussions in an online course.
• Guidelines for effective communication through e-mail might include the following:
• Create meaningful subject lines. Some instructors require students to identify the course number in the subject line. Faculty can use this information to filter and label messages from one class and redirect these messages to a specific group outside the inbox in Gmail.
• Subject lines should briefly describe the topic of the message.
• Describe appropriate (and inappropriate) salutations. If you have a preference, state how you would like to be addressed. Students appreciate direct instruction about how their instructor wants to be addressed in face-to-face interactions, too.
• Senders should clearly identify themselves. Who is Jen who mails from hothonney@yahoo.com? Remind students of the impression these informal e-mail addresses have when students use them for professional communications.
• Pay attention to whether you are using reply or reply all to avoid distributing private messages to unintended parties.
• Remember to attach attachments.
• Encourage students to think of e-mail communication and posts to online discussions as a form of academic writing, which requires the use of standard grammar, spelling, and punctuation.

Good web guidelines on netiquette can be found at the following:

Virginia Commonwealth University
Center for Teaching Excellence
http://www.vcu.edu/cte/resources/OTLRG/04_12_Behavior.html

Texas Tech University
Teaching, Learning, and Technology Center
http://www.tltc.ttu.edu/content/asp/webct/student/netiquette.asp

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April 7, 2009

Micro-lectures: Just-in-time teaching for critical topics and skills

Attaining competence with some concepts and skills requires repetition and practice. Instructors can use class time more efficiently if they create short electronic modules that discuss a particular concept or demonstrate a skill that students struggle to learn. Create an out-of-class assignment in which students view the micro-lecture and then complete an activity, small project, or written assignment that entails applying the concept or using the skill. Micro-lectures can be as short as 60 seconds to 5 minutes or as long as 15-20 minutes.

• Micro-lectures should focus on a specific concept or skill. This technique works best with content that can be explained or discussed in small chunks. An advantage is that narrowly-focused micro-lectures allow students to access instruction on a specific concept or skill they need to practice. They do not have to wade through a longer presentation to review one specific topic. Students can return to a micro-lecture any number of times to get the practice they need.

Use micro-lectures to:

• Provide an overview for a particular concept or small group of related concepts.
• Demonstrate a single problem-solving procedure (e.g., solving a particular type of problem in physics, chemistry, statistics, algebra, etc).
• Provide step-by-step instructions and demonstrate completion of a task or laboratory procedure.
• Create the micro-lecture as a narrated PowerPoint, a short video, or an Elluminate session. The Academic Technology Center can provide guidance and technical support if you need help creating a micro-lecture using this technology (http://uwf.edu/atc/).
• Structure the micro-lecture carefully. Prepare a 15-30 second introduction and conclusion for each micro-lecture to create an appropriate context for the content presented or the skill or procedure demonstrated.
• Include an activity, example problem, or written assignment as a follow-up assignment. Require students to apply the learning from the micro-lecture. Students overestimate their understanding and need concrete feedback to determine whether they have adequately learned the material. If they need to see the demonstration again, micro-lectures are short enough to allow students to view them as often as needed.
• Upload the micro-lectures into your course content in D2L. Students are more likely to use micro-lectures and complete the application activity if the work is a course requirement that contributes to the final grade. You might be able to construct a quiz for content material in D2L that provides immediate feedback to students about the quality of their learning without increasing your grading burden during the term.

Shieh, D. (2009). These lectures are gone in 60 seconds. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 55 (26), Page A13.

Want to create a micro-lecture and need help?
Contact the Academic Technology Center: http://uwf.edu/atc/

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February 3, 2009

Use online technology to engage students with assigned readings and improve class discussion

The ELearning system can be used to encourage students to read assigned material before class. Instructors can create a “quiz game” in which students take a short quiz to accumulate a “high score” for the assignment. Each quiz might contain only 4 or 5 multiple choice questions on the assigned reading from a larger set of 12-15 questions. The questions should be selected to help students focus on target issues that will be discussed during class. Quizzes can be structured (using D2L or Respondus) so that students answer different questions each time they take the quiz. This can be a low-stakes assignment, but some credit should be assigned so that students complete the activity. Advance completion of the quiz will improve the quality of discussion during the face-to-face class.

Thanks to Xuan V. Tran, MBA, Ph.D. and Assistant Professor in HLES for this teaching tip.

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September 9, 2008

Using Technology to Create Community and Engage Students with Course Content

Lang (2008) argues that building community can be difficult if the only opportunity for interaction occurs during regularly-scheduled class time. In contrast, the online environment provides access to asynchronous discussion 24/7.  Threaded discussions can play an important role for building community in both online and face-to-face courses. These discussions can also encourage students to read course materials before coming to class.

Make sure that threaded discussions are relevant and “matter” for class performance

Using technology for threaded discussions will be effective for community building only if students are actively engaged in the discussions. If participation is optional, students won’t participate. If the discussions and student postings are not used during regular class meetings and discussions, students will perceive threaded discussions as “make work.”

One way to create an engaging and relevant threaded discussion is to require that students post a 2-paragraph response to the reading for a given week. Skim the postings before class to identify specific topics or questions posed by students. At the beginning of class, briefly discuss high-frequency comments and address important misconceptions or questions included in the posts. When you connect the content of classroom discussion to the content of the threaded discussion, students will know their posts have an impact on the class.

Grading the posts will also motivate students to participate in this activity. But grading should not be onerous. D2L will automatically track the number of posts by each student. One simple grading strategy would be to base a student’s participation grade on the number of posts to the threaded discussion.

Lang, J. M. (2008). On course: A week-by-week guide to your first semester of college teaching.  Cambridge: MA: Harvard University Press.

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January 29, 2008

Students who prepare for class are more engaged with their learning.

Create a module in D2L that students must complete before they arrive to class for discussion. Students must read material in the module and prepare themselves for the discussion and activities in the class. When students arrive prepared, they can engage in class activities more effectively and learn more from these activities.

 

 

Updated 09/30/10