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Weekend MBA

I am giving a guest presentation at the Weekend MBA Student Orientation on Saturday. Video and PDF handout can be found here.
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Technology Tuesdays: Apple iPads in the Classroom

iPad

The next Technology Tuesdays presentation will take place on the 31st August. The focus this month is:

Apple iPads in the Classroom

The Apple iPad has been flying off the shelves in recent months. An estimated three million iPads were purchased in the first eighty days since the tablet computer launched in April. In this exciting session you will have the opportunity to discover how the iPad can be used at DePaul and in the classroom. Topics that will be covered include:

  • Wifi vs 3G
  • Presenting on an iPad using classroom projectors
  • DePaul e-mail integration
  • Connecting to DePaul’s wireless network
  • Educational applications
  • eBooks and eTextbooks
  • What works (and what does not work)
  • Remote connectivity (VNC)
  • Suggested accessories

To RSVP please visit this page.

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Camtasia: Windows XP to Mac OS X

Camtasia

Had an interesting issue today whilst attempting to export a Camtasia camrec file on Windows XP. The export kept on failing (the program stopped responding).

Luckily, there is a way of getting the camrec file onto the OS X version of Camtasia:

“In Windows Explorer, right-click on the .camrec file and select Extract. An .avi file is created in the same folder.”

Problem (mostly) solved….

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DePaul Drive Mapper Widget (for OS X)

Drive Mapper


DePaul Mac users, your calls have been answered. DePaul now has a widget that you can download
here that will allow you to easily map your network drives.

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Google Seminars for Success

I teach Internet Marketing courses. Every so often I get asked if there are other courses available in Chicago. Google runs Seminars for Success which cover AdWords, Google Analytics and Website Optimizer.

Some of these events take place in Chicago.

More information can be found
here.
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Gorilla is hiring in Chicago

Gorilla


Attention students, Gorilla in Chicago is hiring for these positions:

  • .Net Web Developer
  • Mid-Level Designer, Interactive + Ecommerce
  • Front-End Web Developer / Designer
  • PHP Developer
  • Java Web Developer
  • Project Manager

More information can be found here:

http://www.gorillachicago.com/About-Gorilla/Careers

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D2L and CSS

I have been messing about with CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) in D2L (Desire2Learn). My preference would be to identify a common shared folder on the D2L server, but until then the process of embedding a stylesheet with a Desire2Learn course works.

Instructions can be found here:

http://www.desire2learn.com/access/instructor_resources/HTML_templates/

and here:

http://d2l.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/841/~/accessible-html-template
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Desire2Learn (D2L) Resources at the Teaching Commons

Desire2Learn

Desire2Learn (D2L) is DePaul’s new Learning Management System (LMS). DePaul’s Teaching Commons has published a series of guides as PDFs. These can be viewed and downloaded from the Teaching Commons website.

The topics covered include:

  • Chat
  • Checklists
  • Classlist
  • Course Builder
  • Discussions
  • Dropbox
  • Grades
  • Groups
  • Homepages
  • Intelligent Agents
  • Navbars
  • News
  • Profiles
  • Question Library
  • Quizzes
  • Self Assessments
  • Surveys
  • Widgets

If you need help with any of these guides please do not hesitate to contact the Teaching Commons at dtc@depaul.edu or FITS (Faculty Instructional Technology Services) at fits@depaul.edu

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Testing the Entourage eDGe

eDGe

The nice folks at enTourage Systems and CDW-G have let me borrow an Entourage eDGe to test for the next 30 days.

The eDGe is an interesting device – it is a dualbook, with an e-ink e-reader screen on one side, and an Android-based tablet on the other. The concept is that this could be the perfect student device – it would allow students to conveniently carry all their textbooks in a way that made taking notes very easy.

The box contained:

  • eDGe
  • USB Cable
  • Power brick
  • Instructions card

Over the next few days I will be experimenting with the device. The final report will end up here, but I may blog about some of the discoveries on my personal blog.

enTourage eDGe™ Specifications

  • Dimensions: 8.25" by 10.75" by 1.0" (closed)
  • Weight: approx. 3 lbs.
  • Internal Memory: 4 GB (3 GB for user)
  • Reader File Formats: ePub, PDF
  • LCD Touchscreen (Tablet) Display Size: 1024 x 600 (10.1")
  • E-paper (Reader) Display Size: 9.7" E Ink® (1200 x 825), 8 shades of gray
  • E-paper (Reader) Input: Wacom Penabled®
  • Operating System: Linux® with Google® Android™
  • Screen Rotation: 90 and 180 degrees
  • Connectivity: Wi-Fi™ 802.11 b/g, Bluetooth® capability
  • Battery Life: 16+ hours utilizing the reader or up to 6 hours running the tablet
  • Battery Type: Lithium-ion polymer
  • External Memory: SD card slot, 2 USB ports
  • Audio and Microphone Jack: 3.5 mm each. Includes internal microphone and speakers.
  • Audio playback: MP3, WAV, 3GPP, MP4, AAC, OGG, M4A
  • Video playback: 3GP, MP4, Adobe Flash Lite® (H.264), AVI (DivX encoded), AVI (Xvid encoded), MOV, WMV
  • Input: Stylus input on reader and tablet. Virtual keyboard. USB keyboard (optional)

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Reflections on Annual Conference on Distance Teaching and Learning Conference

Annual Conference on Distance Teaching and Learning

I attended the Annual Conference on Distance Teaching and Learning in Madison last week. I believe this to be one of the most productive conferences in the field of online learning, and try to attend each year.

There were over 170 presentations, choosing the right event to attend was sometimes frustrating.

Here are some of my notes from the conference.

To begin, the conference organizers helpfully package proceeding papers as a PDF. This year I was sporting an iPad, and found this a great way to work through each of the papers. The iPad worked well as a note-taking device during presentations. I will be using this at my next conference.

Albert and Trudi Johnson (Memorial University of Newfoundland) gave a particularly enlightening presentation on “Students' perceptions of effective teaching in distance education.” These guys were prepared – they provided DVDs to the participants, and shared their findings at http://distance.mun.ca/survey/ and http://distance.mun.ca/survey/SPETHE_Final_Report.pdf

What I found particularly helpful was the relative ranking of what students wanted in an online course:

On Campus

  1. Respectful
  2. Knowledgeable
  3. Approachable
  4. Engaging
  5. Communicative
  6. Organized
  7. Responsive
  8. Professional
  9. Humorous

Online
  1. Respectful
  2. Responsive
  3. Knowledgeable
  4. Approachable
  5. Communicative
  6. Organized
  7. Engaging
  8. Professional
  9. Humorous

This seemed to reinforce some of my observations. I hope DePaul can participate in a larger rollout of this study.

Karen Ford, Susan Tancock and Michael Putman (Ball State University) presented on “Redefining online discussions: A taxonomy to encourage in- depth interaction.” My hopes for this presentation were never likely to be fully met – I am always looking for the holy grail of getting online discussion to totally work - but I found this session to be very helpful.

I appreciated discovering their taxonomy of respondent characteristics:

  • Counselor
  • Information Filter
  • Pessimist
  • Reflective Practitioner
  • Reinforcer
  • Restator
  • Supporter

And discussing how students might be gently pushed towards Reflective Practitioner. This is something I see myself returning to.

Jon Aleckson (Web Courseworks) has an account with the rather impressive SonicFoundry – he used this to record his presentation for posterity. His presentation (Micro-collaboration: Team sharing to build highly interactive online activities) will be extremely useful to anyone running or creating an instructional design department. Jon also shared a couple of useful URLs that I made sure to note:


CoI Model


On Friday, Phil Ice’s (American Public University) presentation (Using the Col framework survey for multi- level institutional evaluation) was my highlight of the day. The Community of Inquiry model has proved extremely useful in a couple of DePaul research projects I have collaborated on. Phil used the CoI model to analyze the effectiveness of courses at American Public University. The sheer scale of the operation was both humbling and frightening – the data is being used to continuously improve quality and highlight the effectiveness of new technologies.

My presentation (Teaching with Twitter and Google Wave: Real-time social media) was in one of the last slots on Friday. Google had announced that week that Wave would be cancelled, which resulted in some of the presentations I wanted to see being cancelled. Luckily, my presentation demonstrated some of the issues that Wave created – so the presentation was still of value. I enjoyed getting to chat with folks afterwards.

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DePaul Social Media Guidelines

DePaul Social Media Guidelines

The university created a set of guidelines for participants in social media sites managed by DePaul. These guidelines explain how the university expect commenters to behave on our sites, and what actions we will take if they violate them. For example, if people post ads for outside entities, DePaul will take them down. Those who post must remain civil or their posts will be removed.

You can see the guidelines at

http://www.depaul.edu/socialMedia/guidelines.asp

The guidelines are designed to be applicable to any type of social media site.

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Apple in Education: Resources



Jack McLaughlin at Apple shared this resource with me: Apple in Education.

The site has a wealth of videos and tutorials that are of use to Apple users here at DePaul.

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Barnes & Noble NOOKstudy now available

Barnes & Noble NOOKstudy is now available to download (free) for PC and Mac OS X. More information can be found here:

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/nookstudy/download/index.asp
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Teaching with Twitter and Google Wave

I am due to present at the 26th Annual Conference on Distance Teaching and Learning on Friday, August 6th, 2010 (Teaching with Twitter and Google Wave). Somewhat ironically Twitter is down and Google has announced that it will discontinue Wave. So it goes.

The presentation is from 12:45 - 1:30 p.m. in the Hall of Ideas J. Come along and say hello.

Handouts and more information are on the website.

If Twitter works, then I will be tweeting with the hashtag #DTL_2010_jmoore
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