Category: Instruction

Teaching Tips Fall 2019!

Six Strategies for Learning Students’ Names Quickly:

  1. A common strategy is to take photos of students wearing name tags on the first day of class and then create flashcards to practice outside of class time.
  2. Create rhymes to aid your auditory and visual memory: “Fred eats monkey bread.”
  3. When students tell you their names, say it back to them and confirm that your pronunciation is correct.
  4. Identify a unique physical feature and then think of a funny sentence involving that feature and the student’s name: “Tim has a tiny tooth.”
  5. Have students on the first day form into teams of two and interview their partners about favorite family rituals, hobbies, what they’re proud of, where they plan to be in ten years, and how they plan to get there. Then individuals introduce their partners by name to the class and synthesize what they learned.
  6. Use name tents until names are learned.

Teaching Tips Fall 2019!

11 Strategies for Reducing Cognitive Overload

  1. Introduce New Content with Video – Support students’ understanding of what is to be learned. Use videos from Youtube Learning, Khan Academy, and MIT Opencourseware. Also, ECU students, staff and faculty have access to lynda.com, an online library of instructional videos teaching the latest software tools and skills.
  2. No Scrolling – If possible, keep information about a subject on one handout page, one slide, or one screen.
  3. Eliminate the Redundancy Effect – Don’t add text to a slide when the visual is self explanatory. Don’t read a text-heavy slide word for word. (Source: Elliott, Kurz, Beddow, & Frey, 2009).
  4. Frontload Vocabulary – Provide definitions of difficult vocabulary before learners begin reading.
  5. Highlight Important Content – On handouts, use bold font for key terms. When presenting, say, “This next idea is a critical concept to remember.”
  6. Provide an Advance Organizer – These can be in the form of a graphic organizer, concept map, narrative, timeline, outline, or analogy.
  7. Demonstrate Complex Problems – To help students with difficult procedures, show a worked example or partially worked example.
  8. Deliver it Slow, Chop it Down – If the information is complex, reduce the amount of content and slow your pace.
  9. Tell a Story – Narratives make lectures memorable.
  10. Apply the Modality Effect – Present “information in two ways — for example, by showing an image and talking about it.” (Source: Petra J. Lewis)
  11. Chunk into Categories – Break content into smaller categories. For example, “The American & French Revolutions could have similarties & differences … Specific topics could have paired problems & solutions.” (Source: DateWORKS)

Want to take a peak?

And see what is coming.  Reminder there is a forum tomorrow at 3:00 in the “new” Black Box Theater!

Demo Courses

Two ECU courses were imported into Canvas. You may log in and view these courses as a student using the access information below.

Canvas

Login: https://ecu.instructure.com/login/canvas | E-mail: faculty | Password: ecufaculty

To test drive canvas as an instructor, visit Canvas LMS Try to set up an account and build a course.

BrightSpace D2L

Login: https://ecu.brightspacedemo.com | Username: faculty | Password: ecufaculty

To test drive BrightSpace as an instructor, visit Try BrightSpace to set up an account and build a course.

Blackboard Ultra

Login: https://blackboard.coursesites.com/ | Username: faculty | Password: ecuFaculty2019!

You may also test drive Ultra using Blackboard CourseSites. Register to begin building a course.

Something is coming and you don’t want to miss it!

And it may be a new LMS on the horizon.  Please take time to attend one of the LMS Spring Demonstrations.  They will be held both on East and West Campus, and if you haven’t check out the new student center here is a great excuse.

“ECU is undertaking a review of our current and future learning management system (LMS) needs to determine next steps as our LMS hardware requires replacing in the next two years. The timing of this hardware replacement combined with significant changes in the LMS market make this an opportune time to evaluate LMS options to determine which system will best meet our needs.

The LMS (Learning Management System) is a critical tool in teaching and learning.

 Objectives

Read more

One week

And finals begin.  As we all say where did the semester go?  Take note of what went well this semester and what did not.  Put a calendar reminder if you are not sure you will remember.  Ready to try something new for Spring Semester.  Various training’s are offered by OET and on Cornerstone.  Think about lecture capture and desktop publishing for those winter weather days!  Want to get students more involved try clickers, flipped classrooms or ?????

Let’s explore!

Team work

I have blogged about Microsoft Teams and asked if anyone wanted to join.  The question is what do they do and how will they help myself and my students.

“Microsoft Teams brings conversations, content and apps together in one online interface for faculty, students, staff and even non-ECU collaborators.

Join us Wednesday, October 17, when Microsoft expert, Manny Sandhu*, will discuss how Teams can enhance campus experiences, empower faculty, create optimum student engagement and elevate your institutional performance.”  Click here to find what session might work for you!

First week links and tips!

Need some BB help?  Check out BB YouTube channel or my course OET 8000 Kiosk of Information 

Need help with My Mediasite check out their tutorials, or my blog

Disability Services

Graduate Orientation New Students

Software Downloads

ITCS’s new home page provides links to most items you may be looking for.

Contact this office to setup training for yourself or your class and take a deep breath it will all settle down!

5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and

Fall Semester 2018 begins.  Some start up tips/reminders

How do I make my course available to students?
Control Panel > Customization > Properties > Set Availability > Yes

How do I copy my course from one semester to the next? Blackboard Course Copy Guide

How do I merge (or collapse) two or more course sections? Blackboard Course Collapse Guide

Why can’t students see a recently added course? 
Blackboard enrollments require 12-24 hours to update.

Is my class being recorded?  Have you submitted your lecture capture request? Lecture_Recording_Request_distributed Mediasite_Single_Rec_Req_distributed 

Embed Mediasite into Blackboard – click here

Reusing Mediasite Recordings? – go to Control Panel, Mediasite Options and Click Submit to update the Spring Semester Settings.

Want to use Mediasite Desktop Recorder check out it’s upgrade!

Saba Web Conferencing – click here

WebEx – click here

Turning Point Cloud – click here

Some tools to consider Voice Thread and Blackboard New Inline Grading Tool.

First week success check out this link!

Anything else?  Contact OET for assistance!

Welcome back!

Using Mobile Devices instead of Clickers

So easy now and just as easy to integrate into your Grade Center,

Students can connect via phone, tablet or computer.  You don’t even need the usb device just get a session id once Turning Cloud is launched.  To get there from a computer it is https://student.turningtechnologies.com/#/profile and they would click Sign In and enter their ECU credentials.

Student Regisitration http://www.ecu.edu/cs-itcs/clickers/upload/TurningRegistrationInstructions_ECU_1.pdf

Participant List http://www.ecu.edu/cs-itcs/clickers/upload/tp_8.pdf

Frequently Asked

How do students obtain their license?

Licenses will be automatically distributed when students register their clicker or mobile device in Blackboard.

Is there still a cost for a physical clicker?

Yes. Students required to use a physical clicker must still purchase a clicker or use and existing one.

Is there a cost for the mobile app?

No. To use an Android or iOS mobile device, students download the free app from the Google Play or Apple App Store. Students not using an Android or iOS device can participate in polling through a Web browser on their mobile device or laptop.