Teaching in Pajamas: Online Teaching Summer Camp

May 29-30, 2018

Online courses are becoming increasingly attractive for colleges due to the flexibility they provide, space they save, and the opportunity faculty have to reflect on multiple modes of delivery. However, online teaching is much more than just putting your slides online and having a few online discussions. Good course design is essential to student learning outcomes: how can you keep technology from being a hindrance? what is appropriate load? Is the course accessible? How do I orient students to the course? To answer these and many other questions, we invite you to come to these two-day camp (Tuesday, May 29-Wednesday, May 30, 2018), during which the Adams Center will work with you to help make your online course more effective, efficient, and appealing. Click here for your packing list. Please RSVP to rsvp2ac@acu.edu or call (325) 674-2981 to reserve your spot.

Camp Packing List:

-Your syllabus (digital and paper)
-A laptop computer
-Smartphones, iPads, or other devices you use to access a course
-Assessments you usually require in class
-Assignments you usually require in class
-Any pills that may help with allergies to technology
-In lieu of bug spray and itch relief, make sure your computer and devices are “bug-free” and ready to use. If needed, work with Team55 before the camp, as we will not be able to fix specific computer problems during the camp. Specifically, check if you have updated your Flash, Browser, Operating Systems, etc.

Summer Faculty Institutes

ADVANCING AS AN ACADEMIC: Moving Toward Tenure and Promotion
May 15- May 17, 2018
The workshop will be lead by Kara Poe Alexander, Director of the Baylor University Writing Center and accomplished scholar. The sessions will run from 12:00-3:00 Tuesday, 9:30-3:00 Wednesday, and 9:30-1:00 Thursday.

Sessions include:
1.The Art of Getting Published in Scholarly Journals
2.Creating Effective Writing Groups
3.Making Your Case for Tenure/Promotion
4.Looking Ahead: Drafting a Five-Year Plan and Setting Goals

You can go ahead and RSVP by emailing rsvp2ac@acu.edu for ADVANCING AS AN ACADEMIC here or call 325-674-2455. Looking forward to having you there!

DIGITAL STORYTELLING WORKSHOP
May 15 – May 17, 2018

The Learning Studio will also be hosting a Digital Storytelling workshop May 15-17. This three-day workshop leads you through the process of creating a media project. Participants will learn media storytelling strategies as they develop skills in audio recording and image/video editing, so we hope you’ll join us even if you’ve never worked with media before.

Here is a quick summary of the workshop:
DAY 1:  Talk about the elements of story, begin sharing stories and working on scripts
DAY 2:  Gather images, begin editing stories and recording audio.
DAY 3:  Finalize editing and production and screen all films. (should be finished early-afternoon)

There are a limited number of slots, so please RSVP today if you can join us by emailing rsvp2ac@acu.edu or call 325-674-2455.

Lunches will be in the Adams Center and then all participants will be invited to a final dinner Thursday night (optional).

See the video above to hear from faculty who participated in past workshops. Hope you can join us.

The transformational power of Study Abroad for our students is inextricably linked to place. One of the ways that scholars talk about the theory of “place” is that it sets the stage for human encounters. As ACU students live and study in the communities of Leipzig, Montevideo, and Oxford, they embody these encounters – when they explore, worship, and learn, even buy groceries – and through them begin to consider other versions of themselves and the world.

In anticipation of the Leipzig Villa Grand Opening, the Adams Center, the CAS Dean’s Office, and the Center for International Education wondered what kinds of faculty conversations and experiences could happen in Leipzig to further our goals for study abroad, especially in light of the experiential learning focus of the strategic plan.

One of the purposes of the trip was to give faculty the opportunity to experience places that are part of students’ curriculum, such as a city walking tour and excursions to Wittenberg and Buchenwald. However, most of the work of the trip was spent in making connections in the Leipzig community and thinking deeply about outcomes of Study Abroad, how to increase student participation, and what obstacles need to be addressed.

On our first afternoon in Leipzig, we considered what it means to think about a city as a text – to encounter Leipzig intentionally and incarnationally, not as tourists. We talked about cultivating habits of attention, mastering the vocabularies needed to interpret a place, and connecting small details to larger historical, political, and sociological questions.

On Wednesday, the President/Rector of HTWK, Leipzig University of Applied Science, welcomed us, and we toured science labs and media production spaces, in anticipation of partnerships for ACU faculty and students studying in Leipzig.

On Thursday, we applied design thinking principles to consider high-impact practices for our students and to be frank about obstacles for students, faculty, departments, and degrees.

On  Friday, as we wrapped up, faculty were all over Leipzig meeting with potential partners in hospitals, engineering labs, art galleries, and student service providers.

As one might imagine, the time in Leipzig was full of conversation between faculty, administrators, advisors, and trustees: about Leipzig, about our disciples and connections among them, and about the dreams we have for our students and their opportunities to change the world.

(Don’t forget that the Leipzig Faculty Fellow is an opportunity to participate and cultivate these conversations in Leipzig.)

The Adams Center will host 5 Reading Groups this Fall. If you have questions or would like to register you may call Tammy at 325-674-2023 or send an email to rsvp2ac@acu.edu. Times and dates are below.

Faculty Fusion 2017 — August 18

Transform

Join us in thinking about transforming our teaching, our students, and ourselves this year in the Adams Center. We’ll kick off our year with Faculty Fusion on Friday, August 18, 2017, 8:30am-1:00pm. Come for breakfast, learning, and lunch!

You can RSVP for activities here, by emailing rsvp2ac@acu.edu, or by calling the Adams Center at 325-674-2455. Registering saves your spot in each session and allows us to know how many to expect. We look forward to seeing you!

8:30-9:00 Continental Breakfast: Adams Center

9:00-9:50 Session 1

Using screencasting to give students feedback (The Woods) — Berlin Fang

If you find that you spend too much time typing feedback, only to be ignored by students, perhaps you should try using screencast to give feedback to students.  Research shows that students perceive such feedback favorably. Students are also more likely to use such feedback to improve their work. Come to this session to learn how to create screencast feedback and use it to improve student learning!

Engaging Spiritually with Students (The Classroom)  — Amy Boone

What are college students thinking about faith? What are they wondering? What frustrates them about religion? Come explore tangible ways to engage spiritually with students in and out of class.

Introduction to Specifications Grading (Bamboo Room) — Suzie Macaluso

In this session we will introduce you to Specifications Grading as developed by Linda Nilson. We will look at syllabi from Specifications graded courses and actual assignment details. Following this introduction there will be a book group that meets throughout the semester in which we discuss the book and workshop course syllabi to include Specifications Grading.

10:00-10:50 Session 2

20/20 Innovation Grants: What We Learned in the First Year (The Classroom)

In this session, you’ll hear from a few of the 2016/17 recipients of the 20/20 Envisioning the Future of Education Teaching and Innovation Grants about their projects’ successes and failures and what we learned from those. In addition, find out how you can apply for future 20/20 grants.

What did you read on your summer vacation? (Bamboo Room) — Laura Carroll

Come find out what we’ll be reading in our three reading groups this fall and share what’s been on your reading list this summer, from heady academic reads to pulpy beach fiction

Using screencasting to give students feedback (The Woods) — Berlin Fang

If you find that you spend too much time typing feedback, only to be ignored by students, perhaps you should try using screencast to give feedback to students.  Research shows that students perceive such feedback favorably. Students are also more likely to use such feedback to improve their work. Come to this session to learn how to create screencast feedback and use it to improve student learning!

11:00-11:50 Session 3

Media Spaces for Students and Faculty (Bamboo Room and Learning Studio) — Kyle Dickson and Melissa Henderson

Interested in assigning a media project or sharing audio or video with your class? Come see the redesigned One Button Studio and media production suites upstairs in the Learning Studio. We’ll share tips for teaching with media and describe how we provide training and web resources to support your students.

Designing Assignments for Student Success (The Woods) — Laura Carroll

Research indicates that that creating transparent assignments “boosts students’ success (and especially underserved students’ success) significantly in three important areas: academic confidence, sense of belonging, and mastery of the skills employers value most when hiring.” Join us to learn about the principles of transparent assignments and to have a chance to think about your own assignments.

Engaging Spiritually with Students (The Classroom)  — Amy Boone

What are college students thinking about faith? What are they wondering? What frustrates them about religion? Come explore tangible ways to engage spiritually with students in and out of class.

12:00 Lunch: Adams Center

In a recent Adams Center session on making classrooms welcoming places for international students, Lucy Dawson from the Center for International Education, Dr. Carly Dodd (Professor of Communication), Dr. Monty Lynn (Professor of Management) and Dr. Lori Houghtalen, Assistant Professor of Engineering and Physics) and Berlin Fang shared some challenges faced by international students studying at ACU, as well as possible solutions.

We have found that these are the top four challenges international students face.  We will also share a few strategies to help address these challenges:

1. Learner participation in the classroom:  International students may have difficulty participating in classroom discussions due to language barriers, varied cultural expectations, limited understanding of social norms and lack of prior exposure to group discussions.  Group projects was also mentioned as particularly challenging for international students, perhaps due to the lack of welcome by domestic students and a hesitation to contribute by international students.
2. Academic integrity: Some international students may have limited understanding of how their professors define academic integrity. Sometimes they lack training in proper citations in academic work.  There is also a concern that some students do not know the boundary between individual work and group work.
3. Expectations for assignments and assessment: Among international students, there is often confusion on the number of assignments, and confusion about some academic jargon such as “outcomes” and “rubrics”.  Some show frustration over the speed of professors’ speech or the volume of assigned reading.  Participants mentioned international students had not been taught how to “scan” readings, and perhaps had vocabulary to look up, which also impeded reading speed.
4. The use of resources: There is a lack of awareness of university resources that could be really helpful for international students.  Among these are the Writing Center, the Speaking Center, research help, and the Counseling Center.  Tutoring is provided to students who may be struggling with an academic subject, but sometimes there is variation between tutor knowledge and the faculty’s lecture.

The panelists discussed many solutions, best practices, and tips for faculty to make their classroom more hospitable to international students.  Here are some highlights from this discussion:

1. Use technology to break barriers:  As some international students have a greater ability to read and write, than to listen and speak, including some discussions online may help relieve the pressure to speak in public in a different language. Some materials, such as the course rubric and reading materials should be shared online as well for constant access.
2. Develop a relationship with the students outside of class, and use office hours creatively: ACU faculty use many types of “office hours” techniques to build one-on-one relationship with students, which can be especially helpful for students. One professor mandates a 10-minute meeting with every student to get to know them. Some use walking sessions to have a “mobile” office hour around campus. Some have designated a “help desk” at the library to meet with students in a less threatening environment.
3. Consider offering a specialized orientation for your class.  For instance, provide some training related to reading academic resources (reading strategies). Provide training on using the library website or citation management tools such as Zotero.  Provide training or tours of various university resources such as the writing center, pointing out specific assistance that can be given, and some that cannot be given (for example assistance that crosses into academic integrity violations).
4. Explain social norms:  It is important to explain classroom social norms, including proper class etiquette, appropriate assertiveness, and social spaces.  The key is to help international students form a good sense of boundaries while still feeling encouraged to learn and socialize.

Please also check out this presentation for further tips and more information about this session.  Faculty and staff are welcome to contact Berlin Fang (bxf13b@acu.edu) or Lucy Dawson (lld09a@acu.edu) regarding international students in the classroom at any time.  

Veronica Whitt, the international student services coordinator, can also meet with students individually to help them find the support resources they might need, so please feel free to refer students to her for assistance (vdw09a@acu.edu).

Additional Reading:

• Group work by the Higher Education Academy

As the semester draws to a close, I would like to send a few important reminders as you wrap up your Canvas courses and get ready for the new semester:

1. Read this post for ideas about calculating final grade.
2. Remember to check and change (if needed) the end dates of your courses while you have access.  Check this tutorial for details.
3. Request course for your new semester. Check the tutorial here.
4. If you haven’t chosen the copy option in the previous step, don’t worry.  You can still copy a Canvas course from another shell after a new course is created.  Check instructions here.
5. If you intend to crosslist your courses for the new semester, follow instructions here.
6. We try to put all Canvas tutorials together in this page. You might want to bookmark it for future reference.

If you use Speedgrader in Canvas to mark student assignments, remember that some students may not know where to find your feedback. Here is a tutorial to help you see instructor feedback from a student view. Feel free to share the link to the video if needed: https://youtu.be/97QYgFKw7RM

Professors can also tell whether a student has viewed the feedback from the Speedgrader, as shown below.

Creating a syllabus is a daunting task.  Once created and shared with students, does your course actually reflect what you have written in the syllabus?  Having the course one way and allow the course to deviate is like a builder having a blueprint for a house and then you deliver an apartment or mobile home to the customer.  (I am not sure if this metaphor works, but I hope you get the idea.) This is especially problematic when you put content in a learning management system. Here are three main problem areas and some suggestions.

Content:

Most syllabi describe a list of topics presented in a particular order.  Make your course reflect that. When using your LMS to organize your course, do not use the course space as a landfill to dump everything without a particular logic to it. Use modules to organize your content in folders.  Arrange the folders in chronological or topical orders as you have described in the syllabus.

Dates:

In the syllabus you may have a course calendar marking the dates of readings and course activities, but your course may not show some of the due dates, or show old due dates you inherited from the last iteration of the course.  This would almost always cause confusion. I would recommend that you set the dates in LMS for activities that you can assign dates, which will create calendar events, which in turn will be tied with personalized notifications students receive.

Grades:

Last but not the least, the most frequent problem is the mismatch between syllabus and course in grades. In your syllabus you may have categories for various types of assignments. Each category may be worth a certain percentage of the total grades.  For instance, quizzes will be worth 20%, papers 30%, exams 40%, In many courses online we find that the grade book does not reflect what you say in the syllabus.  You can fix that by creating categories and weigh them according to your syllabus. If you have done that, your grade book will automatically calculate grades (including final grades) for you and the students. This really helps students to keep track of their progress all the time. You will save yourself time by not having to calculate the grades with Excel or calculator.

If you use letter grades, remember that the default grading schema of your LMS may not be what you have described in your syllabus. For instance, your LMS may make 95%-100% worth A, while you have 90%-100% to qualify as an A. Usually you can create your own schema to reflect descriptions in the syllabus. For instance in Canvas, you can define your own schema from course settings.

Once you get these problems straightened out, I promise that you will have fewer housekeeping emails, greater student satisfaction and more quality time with your students.

If you want any help aligning your course with your syllabus, contact the Instructional Team for help.

The Adams Center will host 4 Reading Groups this Fall. If you have questions or would like to register you may call Tammy at 325-674-2023 or send an email to rsvp2ac@acu.edu. Times and dates are below.

As we prepare to begin a new school year, the Adams Center staff would like to reflect upon and share with you the variety of work we did in 2015-2016. Click on the link below to see our end of year summary and learn about some new projects.

Adams Center 2015-2016 Summary Report

We look forward to 2016-2017 and the opportunity to support you in your teaching, scholarship, and the ways you live out the mission of ACU and God’s calling everyday.

8:30-9:00 Continental Breakfast: Adams Center

9:00-9:50 Session 1

• Save Time, Prevent Cheating, and Provide Swift Feedback: Testing in Canvas  (Woods) — David Christianson and Berlin Fang
  If you still use Scantrons or paper and pencil for quizzes and exams, come find out how using Canvas can make grading easier, testing more secure, and feedback to students more effective.
• Welcome to Stage 1: Faculty Video Projects (Meet in Foyer of Adams Center) — Melissa Henderson
  If you haven’t toured the redesigned main studio upstairs, we invite you to a hand-on introduction to Stage 1. Whether you have a couple lecture videos you’d like to record or would like to try out the new greenscreen or Lightboard setup, Melissa Henderson will show you how even first-timers can give their video project a professional look.
• Teaching Like a Christian? (Classroom) — David Kneip
  Christian faculty sometimes struggle to find ways to integrate their Christianity and their pedagogy. Come encounter ideas for deepening the connections between your faith and your teaching and discover ways these methods connect to tried-and-true Christian practices.
• iF (Innovation Foundry, 3rd Floor) — Marisa Beard
  The Innovation Foundry is a new teamwork and technology hub in the ACU library located in the southwest corner of the 3rd floor. We offer coaching and support to help connect your students to the resources they need in designing and publishing their work to the web, as well as other real-world applications.
•  Creativity Challenge (Collaboration Space)— Nil Santana

10:00-10:50 Session 2

• Sparking Creativity in the Classroom, (Classroom) — Kyle Dickson & Mike Wiggins
  What part does creativity play in the university? In what way is creativity related to our work as scholars, researchers, and teachers in a range of disciplines? As part of the 20/20 Teaching Innovations program, Mike and Kyle will introduce upcoming opportunities to reflect upon and practice the creative process to better understand its role in 21st-century teaching and learning.
• Big Classes and Big Questions, (Woods) — Rodney Ashlock
  Large classes pose many pedagogical challenges for teachers. This session will focus on how to create a positive classroom environment so that learning can take place even when lecture is the dominant mode of instruction.
• New Integration, New Look: Using Turnitin Feedback Studio in Canvas (Bamboo Room)— David Christianson and Berlin Fang
  Some of you may use Turnitin mainly to detect plagiarism, but the tool can actually be used for more than that. It can make grading easier. It allows you to give dynamic feedback, facilitate peer evaluation and even does word count for you! In the past three months, both the integration of Turnitin in Canvas and the Turnitin interface itself have changed. In this session, the instructional designers will demonstrate how to use the new Turnitin in Canvas.
• Creativity Challenge (Collaboration Space) — Nil Santana

11:00-11:50 Session 3

• Teaching Like a Christian? (Classroom)– David Kneip
  Christian faculty sometimes struggle to find ways to integrate their Christianity and their pedagogy. Come encounter ideas for deepening the connections between your faith and your teaching and discover ways these methods connect to tried-and-true Christian practices.
• What did you read on your summer vacation? (Bamboo Room) — Laura Carroll
  Come find out what we’ll be reading in our three reading groups this fall and share what’s been on your reading list this summer, from heady academic reads to pulpy beach fiction.
• Welcome to Stage 1: Faculty Video Projects, (Woods) — Melissa Henderson
  If you haven’t toured the redesigned main studio upstairs, we invite you to a hand-on introduction to Stage 1. Whether you have a couple lecture videos you’d like to record or would like to try out the new greenscreen or Lightboard setup, Melissa Henderson will show you how even first-timers can give their video project a professional look.
• Creativity Challenge (Collaboration Space) — Nil Santana

12:00 Lunch: Adams Center

Some of you may have heard of “Adobe Voice”, a super-easy way to create a digital story with graphics and perhaps some background music. Some of our faculty and students have already been using it. Adobe also had a tool called Adobe Slate that you can use to create media-rich pages.  In the past we had to use these separate apps on mobile devices, which may discourage use.  What if you have some content on your computer, and some on your iPad.  A fluid user experience is key.  Check my article on “fluid learning” here if interested.

Adobe has merged its Adobe Voice and Adobe Slate into “Adobe Spark”, a cloud-based application for you to create graphics, pages, or videos. I have been using it since the change, and I really love it. Here are three things I especially love about it:

1. The best feature, after the merging of several products, is the ability to sync content between devices. You can start a project on your computer, and then you realize you have some graphic on your iPad, you can access the same project on the iPad, and pick it up on your computer.
2. Another of my favorite feature is the ability for you to search for graphics (icons or photos) you may not have on your own. Spark will automatically cite it for you on the acknowledgement page.
3. A third feature that seems to be new is the ability for you to update your content without having to change the link (but you have to update the link to have the content refreshed where you link to it). This allows you to use the same link in your instruction without having to re-generate codes.

Some possible instructional uses:

• Give presentations on a topic, e.g., Principles of interface design.  Try turning your PowerPoint into a video using this tool.  You can work on one slide at a time.  If you mess up on a particular slide, go back to that slide and record your audio again.  I love the granularity of this.
• Give instructions.  For instance, you use screenshots to guide students to navigate your course. Here is an example I produced: Learning Canvas.
• Provide student feedback. You can of course use a screencasting session to go over their work, but if there are only one or two places you would like to go over with a student, you can use a few screenshots and narrate over each of them.
• Create rich media content. Instead of using text only for some of your content, certain elements, such as important quotes, can be turned into a graphic using Adobe Spark’s social graphic functions.

Other thoughts and ideas?

Check out Spark’s home page at spark.adobe.com where you’ll see many examples that may inspire you to do something similar with your content.

If you use Canvas app, you might notice that it shows all the courses you have taught since we started to use Canvas. You can get rid of some of the clutter fairly easily. Please check this tutorial for more information.