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Document Sample
Online Teaching Tips, Secrets, and Practices –
Things That Really Work
Title Providing Useful Links & A Special Offer
Pedagogical Objective Provide practice quizzes in an online environment that simulated the testing
environment; improve students’ writing skills
Online Teaching Help students improve their grades by providing practice quizzes and a
Idea/Approach/Strategy personalized offer to help them with their papers
Comment About 3 weeks before the paper is due I offer to edit it WITH them to help
improve their grade. The key: they have to come to my office LIVE with a
first draft of the writing assignment and work with me as I edit the grammar
with them. This “special offer” provided an opportunity to meet and work
one‐on‐one with students who were willing to make the extra effort (about
20% of my students take me up on this).
Contact Mary Cassoni mcassoni@palomar.edu x2491
Notes:
1
Title Online Test Directions
Pedagogical Objective Combine reasonable test security and student convenience
Online Teaching Use combination of Blackboard test deployment settings
Idea/Approach/Strategy
During the online testing period, students would email me claiming that their
Comment browser failed while taking the exam and requesting that I reset their exam. While
their browser may indeed have failed, I was concerned that these students would
have an unfair advantage since they have would have seen the test questions and
would have time before I reset the exam to research the answers to these
questions. This is my solution:
Set the timer for the exam.
Do NOT select forced completion. This way, if students get locked out of their
exam. they can quit Blackboard and then login again and continue to take the
exam. In most cases the student’s exam is still active and the only “penalty” is that
students lose a minute or two of exam time. One thing that is a bit confusing to
some students is that if you do not select the forced completion option then, when
the student opens the exam, it says” Force Completion This Test can be saved and
resumed later. Since the clock continues to run even if you save the exam, students
should be warned if they attempt to save the exam and resume it later they will
exceed the time allotted for the exam.
Below is the policy statement I give to my students. It has worked very well for me.
Feel free to use it.
Saving and Resuming Online Exams
When you open your online exams, there will be a line that says: Force Completion
This Test can be saved and resumed later. However, if you save the exam, THE
TIMER WILL CONTINUE TO RUN and if you go over the time limit for the exam,
points will be deducted from your score. I strongly recommend that you do NOT
save the exam and return to it at a later time, since then you will not be able to
complete the exam on time.
Blackboard or Browser Failure
If you have a problem with Blackboard or your browser while taking an online
exam you should immediately restart your browser, re‐enter the course web site
and resume taking the exam. You should start taking the exam again as soon as
possible since the timer on your exam continues to run and you will NOT be
allotted any additional exam time because of the browser failure. If you are unable
to resume taking the exam, you need to email your instructor immediately with the
details of what happened. In most cases you will be asked to take another version
of the exam on campus.
Comment: This has stopped all student requests for resetting exams.
Contact Mike Lockett mlockett@palomar.edu x2651
2
Title Stock Market Contest
Pedagogical Objective Help online students establish a social connection with each other as well as
apply supply/demand to financial issues
Online Teaching Award points to students for working in groups and applying economic
Idea/Approach/Strategy principles
Comment After students “meet” each other through their web pages, I encourage
them to organize in their groups based upon common interests. Then they
can “invest” money in the stock market. Most students write that they
enjoyed investing and connecting with classmates through this activity.
Contact Jose Esteban jesteban@palomar.edu x2421
Notes:
3
Title Discussion Board Application
Pedagogical Objective Engage students to help them learn and apply terms/concepts
Online Teaching Students post to a discussion board thread twice – once before they have
Idea/Approach/Strategy learned about the terms and concepts in an upcoming reading assignment
and once afterward
Comment On the Discussion Board everyone posts a reaction to a video (for example)
and so all comments are public. Then the next assignment is a homework
assignment involving them going back into the Blackboard comments and
pulling out quotes that serve as examples of the concepts. That way they
feel a little freer to use another student's comments without fear of
seeming to criticize them. I have even had students use their own comment
as an example. I've found this to be the best pairing of public sharing of
attitudes and private discussion of them.
Contact Terry Humphrey thumphrey@palomar.edu x2337
Notes:
4
Title Orientation Video
Pedagogical Objective Orient students to class requirements in a personal way
Online Teaching Working with ETV, Judy made a video in which she described the class to
Idea/Approach/Strategy students and visually showed them how to access the class and course
requirements.
Comment A web link to the video could be sent in advance of the class’s start date and
would also be helpful for those who missed the on‐campus orientation.
Contact Judy Dolan jdolan@palomar.edu x2875
Notes:
5
Title Powerful But Underused Blackboard Feature: Course Links
Pedagogical Objective Focus students’ attention and facilitate their access to course resources
Online Teaching Use the Course Links feature of Blackboard
Idea/Approach/Strategy
Comment If I have recently added something to, say, the Course Documents area but
realize that students may not access that area each time they log into the
course, I will post an announcement (that they are sure to see) that calls
their attention to the new item and I also put a course link in the
announcement so all they have to do is click on the link to get to the new
item. I also place course links to specific Discussion Board forums in each
chapter folder (e.g. in Course Documents/Chapter 10 area there is a link to
the Chapter 10 Discussion Board forum).
Contact Haydn Davis hdavis@palomar.edu x2341
Notes:
6
Title You Must Read The Syllabus
Pedagogical Objective Encourage/Require/Force students to read the course syllabus carefully
Online Teaching Blackboard’s Adaptive Release feature will allow the instructor to set up
Idea/Approach/Strategy contingencies: Students can access the course resource only after they have
done X
Comment Students’ reading of the course syllabus is often , shall we say, incomplete.
Students gain access to a critical course document only after they have
achieved a score of 85% on a quiz that tests their knowledge of the course
syllabus
Contact Kathy Grove kgrove@palomar.edu x3950
Notes:
7
Title You May Not Print
Pedagogical Objective Reduce the likelihood of online cheating
Online Teaching Prevent students from printing a Blackboard assessment
Idea/Approach/Strategy
Comment Students love the convenience of taking online assessments. Instructors are
concerned about online cheating. While there is no measure that will
eliminate cheating, if you want to allow students to take online
assessments, there are some measures that will reduce the temptation to
cheat. Probably the issue online instructors worry about the most is that
one student will print the test and give it to others. This strategy prevents
that possibility. Simply place the code below, exactly as is, into the
Instructions area of any quiz or test.
<style type=”text/css”>@media print {BODY{display:none
!important;}}</style>
Note: Thanks to Shay Phillips, Academic Technology, for discovering this
Note 2: I made a screen capture tutorial about how to do this; if you like,
send me an email and I’ll send it to you.
Contact Haydn Davis hdavis@palomar.edu x2341
Notes:
8
Title Using YouTube for Educational Purposes
Pedagogical Objective Making an academic concept more relevant or engaging to students
Online Teaching Embedding YouTube videos into PowerPoint presentations
Idea/Approach/Strategy
Comment This was something Shay Phillips in Academic Technology discovered. By
copying and pasting some code from the YouTube video, with a very slight
modification, the video plays right in PowerPoint. Note: you have to be
connected to the internet for this tip to work. The following link is to a
tutorial about how to embed the videos into PowerPoint.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4yzUxNbi1h4
Contact Haydn Davis hdavis@palomar.edu x2341
Notes:
9
Title Online Archaeology Films
Pedagogical Objective Provide Streaming content for online classes
Online Teaching Widens topics for discussion boards and allows presentation of
Idea/Approach/Strategy archaeological materials graphically.
Comment One of the most vexing problems in conducting an online class in
archaeology is the inability of the instructor to present physical artifacts,
excavation techniques, and site overviews. The use of films greatly
facilitates the conveyance of these concepts. The films also move the
discussions away from the basic outline of the text into more nuanced
areas.
Contact Jim Eighmey jeighmey@palomar.edu 760‐744‐1150 x3936
Notes
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