by Nathan Loewen, Department of Religious Studies “We couldn’t find it on Blackboard!” Maybe you heard this about your syllabus? I heard this from my class after I returned their assignments online. Some people could not find their grades. Others could not find the general feedback I wrote about the assignment. Others still could not […]
Read Moreabout Blackboard Pro Tips Part 2: Stepping Up Students’ Blackboard Literacy
by Nathan Loewen, Department of Religious Studies The College of Continuing Studies likely houses the most people on UA’s campus with a total mastery of Blackboard Learn. If you use Blackboard and want to quickly learn how to optimize it for your teaching, then the folks at CCS may well have the answers you are […]
Read Moreabout Blackboard Pro-Tips Part 1: Tweaking Your Course Shell
Do you have an idea for making your online class more engaging but need funding or expertise to get it off the ground? Innovation Scholar award programs give online teaching faculty and content experts the opportunity to benefit from technology funding and Innovation Team consultation and support toward a proposed Innovation project Scholars will present […]
Is there a difference between “course delivery” and “teaching,” or are these equivocal terms? What does it mean to deliver versus to teach? Think about this for a moment in pedagogical terms. Do the following make pedagogical sense? Delivering a learning objective. Delivering formative assessment. Delivering the ability to compare differing perspectives. Delivering the critical thinking. I am not […]
Chase Wrenn, a professor in the philosophy department, teaches an online Intro to Deductive Logic course centered on building skills in formal reasoning. He offers the following advice on managing self-paced, asynchronous online courses. What tips do you have for providing effective feedback online? Be prompt and detailed. As an online instructor, there is a lot of asynchronous communication […]
Allison Hetzel, a professor in the Department of Theatre and Dance, shares how she manages her online courses and offers tips for connecting with distance learners. How do you reduce anonymity and build community in your online courses? I work to connect with my class as often as possible. I make sure that I am part of the class […]
by Andrea Barton, Department of English Introduction From my perspective, a guided reading exercise is any reading assignment that is teacher-annotated. In other words, this is a reading assignment that contains either brief or developed comments, questions, brief explanations, or other such teacher-input that students should encounter while they read. This input functions much like […]
by Alecia Chatham, Department of Modern Languages and Classics In my online courses, I often post short, weekly quizzes that are graded immediately by Blackboard. There are a few different quiz types that I use for certain things. Key concept quizzes sometimes take students a little more time to figure out on their own, though they may only […]
by Alecia Chatham, Department of Modern Languages and Classics I communicate with all students via e-mail and Blackboard announcements. I upload all information, handouts, and useful links to Blackboard for all of my courses. Another great way to use online resources for any type of course is by creating a place for students to check […]
by Alecia Chatham, Department of Modern Languages and Classics Personalized feedback is the best feedback a student can receive. It is the closest to one-on-one teaching possible online short of using Skype! Feedback should always be given either way, personalized or generic. And, if it is generic (i.e., not tailored to an individual student), it […]
