TT1351: 23 Things...

23 things online teachers need to learn:

1. Create a blog and publish posts, either for personal, professional development, or instructional use
2. Create a wiki and consider how this could be used as a learning tool
3. Learn the difference between a blog and a wiki
4. Learn how to use tools that allow you to collaborate synchronously with your students
5. Learn how to use tools that allow you to collaborate asynchronously with your students
6. Decide when and how you will be available to students and how long they can expect to wait to hear back from you
7. Explore the options available for ready made content for your course
8. Learn about the copyright rules that go along with using content that someone else created in your course
9. Explore how you could create your own multimedia content for your course
10. Learn how to use basic computer tools such as a web cam and microphone
11. Learn about different file formats for video and audio files, and the difference between downloading and streaming
12. Consider how you could use social media to engage your students
13. Decide if you want students to have access to your personal social media accounts
14. Learn what options are available within your LMS settings to promote honesty and integrity in the online classroom
15. Learn what a MOOC is and think about how it will effect the future of education as well as how they can help you and your students now
16. Figure out how you are going to organize and share all of these great ideas you find, such as with a social bookmarking tool
17. Learn what tech support options are available at your school for instructors
18. Learn what tech support options are available at your school for online students
19. Investigate how to make your course accessible to all students including those with physical or learning disabilities
20. Ask your online students for feedback or reflections about what is working and what is not
21. Learn where you can learn more about online teaching and learning (such as Master Online Teacher courses)
22. Be flexible – with a course dependent on technology, something is bound to not work as planned
23. Accept that your online course is never a finished work and will continue to grow and change as you grow and change as an instructor

TT1351: Quizzes and Surveys

There are a number of great free tools available for creating quizzes and surveys outside of a learning management system.  Some tools for quizzes include http://www.quia.com/web or http://www.proprofs.com/  or for surveys  http://www.surveymonkey.com/ or http://www.zoomerang.com/  Other students in the class also mentioned using http://chnm.gmu.edu/research-and-tools/ or http://fluidsurveys.com/
I created a survey using Survey Monkey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/MXKF6V8
This survey is designed to learn about the student enrolled in a discrete math course.  I chose to use Survey Monkey as I have taken a number of surveys on this site, but I have never been the one creating the survey.  I tried using several different types of questions just to see how to set each type up.  Overall, the process of registering with Survey Monkey and creating the survey was pretty quick, though the "matrix" style of questions gave me a bit of trouble.  I'm interested to see what the results look like as they come in to see if that leads me to modify the format of some of the questions.

TT1351: Creating Content

My Jing video on solving a quadratic equation can be viewed at http://screencast.com/t/NpvkCbJF0

I have been using Jing to make short videos for a few years now.  I find that the program is fairly simple to use (I didn't need any training, just some trial and error initially) and I appreciate that the videos are hosted on their screencast site.  To make this video I used Jing, a Wacom Bamboo tablet, and the built in microphone on my laptop.  I use these types of videos in response to student questions by email or on the discussion board, as I find that I can make a Jing video in about the same amount of time it would take me to type all of the math expressions.