Join Chuck Prescott, Nicole Mooney, and other instructors to view and discuss methods of digital grading. Digital grading can save time and paper, and provide new options for giving feedback to students on their work. Lunch will be provided. Please register by April 10.
This session, led by Peg Cookson and BCC Pride and co-sponsored by the Diversity Committee, will provide information and insights concerning “safe zones” — a program identifying individuals who are safe and supportive allies of GLBTQ students and faculty. Individuals participating in the Safe Zone program will usually place a sticker or other identifying sign on the door of their office or other private space. Lunch will be provided. Please register by April 10
Learning for the Common Good Workshop, Tue, April 24, 1:30pm – 5:00pm (Priority Registration Day – no classes!)
LEARNING FOR THE COMMON GOOD: USING SERVICE LEARNING TO PROMOTE CIVIC ENGAGEMENT
Workshop Presenters: Barbara Canyes, Executive Director, MACC; Karen Chisholm, MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA Director and Jeremy Poehnert, Member Relations Specialist
At BCC, several faculty have used clickers successfully for formative assessment, to increase student engagement, and to review for exams. Some textbook publishers are now offering “clicker-enabled” presentations as instructor resources as well. The article linked below talks about a broad range of clicker uses, and brings into the equation the notion that people are interested in social comparison. That is, they want to know where they stand vis a vis other “members of the tribe.” Perhaps social comparison enabled by clickers can be used as a student motivation factor?
Call for Proposals: The 8th Annual National Symposium on Student Retention Abstracts due April 6
Sponsored by the Consortium for Student Retention Data Exchange at the University of Oklahoma
New Orleans, Louisiana
October 29 – 31, 2012—-Save the Dates
You are cordially invited to participate in the 8th Annual National Symposium on Student Retention. The National Symposium on Student Retention is the premiere conference for presenting and learning about the most current, evidenced-based research on topics related to college student retention and graduation at 4-year and 2-year institutions.
Join us this year as an author/presenter! You’ll have the opportunity to:
Win up to $2,000 for an outstanding contribution to the Student Retention/Success field. Accepted submissions from all topic categories will be judged for:
CSRDE Best Practices Award ($2,000)
Institutional Research Leadership in Student Retention Award ($1,000)
Director’s Award ($750)
The CSRDE Best Poster Award ($500)
Have your work peer reviewed and published in The Proceedings of the 8th Annual National Symposium on Student Retention
Discuss the results of your research with peers
Receive mentoring on the ins and outs of successful proposals and dynamite presentations
Gain further recognition by being selected to present in one of our after-conference webinars
A sign of the times, to be sure. While some attribute this move to the “EB-Killer app” Wikipedia, a more reasoned view is that information is changing so quickly — and our reliance and need for the latest, most accurate news with it — that the print cycle of EB is no longer quick enough. This move also serves as a milestone on the path to our changing educational resources. Whether students start coming to campus with only a tablet in hand in a couple of years, or yet another unseen innovation takes the lead, clearly we are seeing a further step in the evolution toward digital content.
A group of six faculty and staff gathered in the CTL last Friday to consider the 2012 Horizon report (full report is at: http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/HR2012.pdf). The first point noted was that the report lacked any clear information about the accessibility of the two technologies that are impacting us now: mobile apps and tablet computers. (The conversation on other technologies in the Report: learning analytics, gestural computing, etc., took a back seat to these two topics.)
The group felt that this new wave of technology — tablets and smartphones supported by thousands of apps — offers an amazing opportunity to enhance student learning, but also that there is a very dramatic challenge for both faculty and students to learn what and how to use it.
We discussed the proliferation of smartphones on campus and the potential for addressing the digital divide (but see this perspective as well: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/04/opinion/sunday/internet-access-and-the-new-divide.html), which is a very relevant issue at the public community college. Instructors shared stories of students with either marginal or no computer access, or skills, and how this can severely handicap their ability to be successful, especially in technology-intensive courses. There were also stories of students using their smartphones to access Moodle, take quizzes, check assignments, etc. However, there is not evidence that students are submitting writing through a smartphone, given the limited keyboard and screen size of the devices.
One instructor uses mobile devices (iPads) in her class, and shared that the ability for students to interact in small groups with apps, to experiment, and to build shared knowledge, has revolutionized the level of work she can assign.
If mobile devices become a part of the classroom, what will this mean for our (already challenged) Internet bandwidth on campus?
Participants felt that a “freshman experience” course for all students that included building their ability to use mobile devices and apps would serve students well for their future classes and for their careers.
The conversation then bridged into pedagogical considerations in the use of technology. If gestural computing and dictation replace keyboards, does that offer the same critical thinking/processing sequence to the student? How will documents be proofread, revised, delivered? If we use learning analytics to learn detailed information about student learning patterns and use “differentiated instruction” to meet individual needs, will we lose serendipity in the process?
This was a great discussion and an important aspect of technology planning and strategy. Look for more sessions in the future!
This is somewhat in-depth post about a tiff between an app developer “Kno” who produces a tool that generates supplementary digital content from textbooks, and one of the publishers they work with, Cengage.
Inside Higher Ed has its view of the issue, which is multifaceted, but I have my own:
- Is Kno now at the forefront of a movement to “chunk” textbooks into bite-sized pieces, including video, flash cards, etc. (think Spark Notes), that will further chip away at instructors’ ability to get students to read books, digital or otherwise?
- How can we strike the balance between academic freedom for instructors to use whatever supplements they want, but maintain students’ ability to be successful across so many digital domains?
- Which leads to: how do we get students (and ourselves!) to the point of technological fluency where we see that ALL word processors work about the same, ALL LMS’s work about the same, etc., and reduce the learning curve for each new technology that comes along? Since the idea of controlling what technology comes into the campus is a fantasy (students bring their own, on their phones, these days), increasing our tech (and security) IQ seems to be the best answer
This brief post offers a reality check on the techno-hype about the use of technology on the college campus. This instructor presents the ground-level view. You will identify with what he says if you teach at a community college!
