Wix

The other day while my four-year-old was watching Youtube, I heard a commercial talking about Wix. So I checked it out. It is a great source to create amazing website and blog site. Wix.com

Plicker

Plicker is the perfect tool to collect classroom feedback without the need for student devices. It has been used widely in K-12. How about using it in higher education? It is a bit prep work to prepare the Plicker card for multiple answers but instructors can reuse them. And the best thing is, instructors can instantly see who selects what answer, which is not exposed to student peers. It is still fairly low risk for students to make mistakes but huge opportunity for inform teaching.

Office Mix

When you would like to add audio to your PowerPoint slide and Adobe Presenter is not compatible with your newest format of PowerPoint, try Office Mix. It is a free add-in for PowerPoint 2013, easy to make and easy to share. I am planning to get my newest PowerPoint 2013 and can’t wait to make my first Office Mix.

Flipgrid

Flipgrid (http://www.flipgrid.com) is designed to further student classroom conversation and discussion in a fun and interactive way. The ability to share ideas, opinions, and thoughts in 90 seconds or less is what makes the tool so unique and why, in this integration document, we focus on a more exploratory approach to creating discussion questions/prompts. While Flipgrid can be used to demonstrate students’ factual knowledge on a topic, we encourage you to create more reflective, open-ended questions to enhance their critical thinking skills. The beauty of Flipgrid is that it puts students on a level playing field which keeps them from feeling embarrassed or left out. For example, if you have students that require varying levels of instruction, the questions you pose can be general enough to tailor to their individual needs. The opportunities for generating meaningful discourse are endless and this guide will help you think about forming questions in new and creative ways while also tailoring them to your classroom needs.

From http://flipgrid.com/support/assets/pdf/Flipgrid_Integration.pdf

 

Notes from the Keynote speaker from the Teaching Professor Technology Conference

More content = more learning?

What can we learn from teaching online?

  1. Step away from the lectern (it is hard to lecture in an online course)
  2. Let the students do the heavy lifting: sense of responsibility; deeper understanding; student-centred content; consideration of audience
  3. Keep it real: authenticity increases motivation; motivation is critical for engagement
  4. Make time for writing reflection
  5. Actively teach Information literacy: To under how learning is structured, actively teach information literacy and let the students discover the weakness and the strength
  6.  Foster social connection: immediacy behaviours improve learning outcomes; “online I have so many more opportunities to connect every single students.”
  7. Use common sense(s): we learn best when using multiple senses; visual images are more powerful than words

Keynote speaker: Marie K. Norman

With Marie

Padlet

Padlet works like a sheet of paper to put text, images, videos, documents anywhere, from any device such as pcs, tablets, and phones, with anyone.

Padlet could be used for teaching, brainstorming, note-taking, discussions, making a list, instant feedback, Q & A and more. Padlet already has over 5 millions walls.

I have used Padlet in the Cohere conference presentation, both in the PowerPoint and in the presentation as the back channel.

padlet1

Check out how we used Padlet in the Cohere presentation.

Also check out how one workshop in Teaching Professor Technology Conference used Padlet for feedback

Now here is a brand new wall for us to brainstorming what e-learning technologies you use in your teaching and learning

 

Open Classroom —- Meet Bradly Kilb

I had great honor to observe Bradly Kilb’s lesson this morning. He is teaching PHED 349 – Activities in Alternative Environments and he is fantastic.

He used his first half-an-hour class time to summarize the learning last time and introduced new techniques, followed by an-hour experiential learning in the Kinesiology pool.

His lecture was so engaging, interesting and fun. I did not feel bored at all even with my short attention span.

His rich experience of canoeing and coaching just lightened things up. I followed the class to the pool and really enjoy watch him coach his students to apply new skills with encouragement and humor. He is so approachable and kind that I want to take his class too.

Great learning experience!