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Category: Integrating Technology

Guidelines for Faculty in Dealing with the Use of Generative AI Tools

A manual typewriter with the words "artificial intelligence" typed in large-sized font on an otherwise blank white page.

Discussions about the uses and misuses of generative artificial intelligence entered the broader public discourse of the United States in November 2022. The University of Alabama offers a considered response to these discussions and the issues they present to the campus community. To learn more about guidelines from the Office of Academic Affairs, please see the Guidelines for Faculty in Dealing with the Use of Generative AI Tools on this site hosted by our Office for Academic Affairs.

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The Rise of ChatGPT Can Make Student Writing Better 

The 5-speed gearshift pattern, which may indicate the metaphor for "shifting gears."

by Amy Dayton and Amber Buck, English On campuses across the US, faculty, administrators, and students alike are talking about ChatGPT. If you haven’t heard, ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence tool that mimics human conversation and writing using predictive text. It can expound on almost any topic, from climate change to literary criticism. It can write emails, sonnets, stories, and brochures. It can suggest revisions to specific sentences and phrases (such as resume bullet points). And it can write academic […]

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Notes from an Introductory Immersion into ChatGPT

by Jeffrey Melton, Department of American Studies Here is a basic fact for anyone interested in student learning: artificial intelligence is and will be involved. How teachers and students respond to rapidly developing AI technologies remains uncertain, but it is clear that we all must grapple with a seismic shift in education. Many teachers are rightfully concerned about the use of AI technology to subvert the development of critical thinking skills gained as students research and compose analytical essays, a […]

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Teaching how to do college: helping students read for learning

old desk with feather pen in an inkwell beside a tattered notebook.

Nathan Loewen, Department of Religious Studies Learning to read is a crucial skill for higher education. Student reading has changed due to the shift, and back, from going entirely online. When you order textbooks for your courses, are they mostly digital? (e.g. Access granted) Or, to make your course affordable and expose students to cutting-edge scholarship, do you forgo textbooks and post all your readings in Blackboard? When your students do research, are they using the Libraries e-book holdings or journal […]

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Teach Your Students Active Reading: Assign Texts in Blackboard with Hypothesis

bookshelves that spell the word "read"

by Lauren Horn Griffin, Department of Religious Studies Your Blackboard course menu includes Hypothesis on your “build content” menu. Hypothesis works with files you add to your course. It also works with any website. Hypothesis is a teaching tool that allows you to have your students “show” how they are reading your course content. With the Hypothesis tool, anyone in the course may add annotations with text, images, websites, and LaTeX equations. Anyone in the course can reply to those […]

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Webcameras that Facilitate Better Conversations Virtual Guests: Perhaps “OWL” Being See You…??

OWL camera in carrying case

by Nathan Loewen, Department of Religious Studies What is this? Have you tried using a basic computer web camera to capture conversations in a classroom? Prof. Loewen has experimented with dozens of methods since 2009. With the arrival of the REL digital lab at UA’s Department of Religious Studies in 2021, things have changed. Among the digital tools being collected by Prof. Jeri Wieringa is the OWL Pro, which is a 360-degree camera, mic, and speaker combined into one device. […]

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Discussing Readings with Hypothesis: Tips to Create Small Groups

laptop, phone, and notebook on a desk

by Nathan Loewen, A&S Faculty Technology Liaison Hypothesis is a tool in Blackboard that makes students’ reading active, visible, and social. It is quite easy to add a Hypothesis-enabled reading to a Blackboard course shell. Your students can then annotate, as well as read and reply to annotations posted by all other students in the course or section. All of this happens online. If you wish to break the class up into smaller cohorts to read and annotate in separate […]

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Using Flipgrid for Class Discussions: Tips and Precautions

outline of person doing a backflip

by Nathan Loewen, A&S Faculty Technology Liaison Melissa Green recently hosted a Blackboard RoundTable where she remarked that Flipgrid is now among the UA-licensed platforms. Anyone can use their UA email (username@ua.edu or username@crimson.ua.edu) on the Flipgrid Sign Up page to “Sign up with Microsoft.” My colleague Jennifer Roth-Burnette suggested I contact members of the Instructional Design Team at the College of Continuing Studies. Here are some excellent tips and precautions for successfully using Flipgrid from Miranda Webster, Alison Lewis, […]

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Preparing Today’s Students for Tomorrow’s Workforce: An Adobe Creative Campus Collaboration Recap

infographic sketch of Bennett and Loewen's presentation

by Nathan Loewen, Department of Religious Studies Meagan Bennett and Nathan Loewen presented remotely to the Adobe Creative Campus Collaboration event. They discussed some aspects of how UA approaches the extraordinary conditions of 2020-2021. If you scroll down a few paragraphs, you will see what Sebastian Distefano took away from our presentation, he wrote, “Knowing the importance of a creative and digitally literate workforce, leaders from the University of Alabama (UA) explored how they are preparing students for our changing […]

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Using Discord + GitHub to Organize Small Group Active Learning

tips of a fiber optic cable

by Nathan Loewen, Faculty Technology Liaison & Department of Religious Studies Based on an interview and materials shared by Dr. Traci M. Nathans-Kelly, College of Engineering at Cornell University I recently spoke to Dr. Traci Nathans-Kelly, who is a partner teacher for Games Design courses at Cornell University, where they have used Discord for Spring 2020 and 2021. This was a unique challenge for these courses that rely heavily on in-person teams and live playtesting. Dr. Walker White is the instructor […]

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