Are you ready to be Googled?
No matter what your current career stage–on the job market, or are applying to present at a conference, or publishing a new monograph–you will be Googled. And the real question is then, what will be found when that happens? Curating an online scholarly identity doesn’t happen overnight, but you can get the ball rolling with
Calming the Anxious Student
This semester has been a tough one for my students. We had illness, car accidents, senior capstone stress, and the typical spring fever–all of which brought a great deal of anxiety into my already-difficult class. As their teacher, I know I’m supposed to maintain a certain amount of rigor in the content and assessment of
Blackboard and Dropbox Education
The Dropbox integration allows instructors to easily link to their Dropbox content into their Blackboard Learn courses by using the mashup menu found in the content area. This integration eliminates the need to manage content in multiple places. Also, students can upload their assignments directly from Dropbox into Blackboard Learn. To learn more about how
Technology to Support Collaborative Learning
Collaborative learning is a pedagogical method often used to help students build advanced skills with material by using a social learning model. It is based in social learning theory, such as Lev Vygotsky’s foundational ideas on the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) (summarized, this means the learning one can achieve by being paired with and
Blackboard Home Page Information
The Home Page has several different modules. A module is a section, block or area on a page; an example of modules is My Announcements or What’s New. Instructors’ Homepage View My Announcements module shows current Announcements for the Course My Tasks module displays personal tasks you have created (this module is personalized and tasks
Create a Personalized Banner for your Blackboard Course
Adding a Header/Banner can visually identify and add a unique look to your Blackboard courses. This template has been saved as a PowerPoint file and can easily be modified to include the course name and any other desired information such as section, date and time and instructor name. Save your header/banner as a JPEG image. To
That time I failed
Yesterday I was talking about final grades with my students. It’s that time in the semester that I tend to lose the interest of my seniors and others who are feeling more enthusiastic about their summer plans than about finishing out their coursework, so I was giving them some advice about seeing it through to
The Future of Learning
As I referenced in a recent blog post, self-determined learners with the motivation, drive, and resources can teach themselves amazing things online. (See the blog here about two boys who taught themselves skills such as driving a car and speaking English.) What does this mean for the future of learning and the future of the
Working with Wikipedia
As instructors, we know that our students consult Wikipedia when they want to learn the basics of a topic. And while this practice can sometimes be concerning, especially if the students solely rely on Wikipedia rather than using it as a springboard for deeper learning, there are many ways to engage the students with Wikipedia
The Self-Determined Learner
This blog was inspired by two young boys. The first, an 8 year old, really wanted a cheeseburger, so he went to YouTube and taught himself to drive. He drove past four intersections and some train tracks with complete control of the vehicle–perhaps even more rule-abiding than the average driver. He was caught at the