Multimedia Infused Freshman Comp
From: soul4real
Presentation for the TYCA-West conference in Clarkdale, AZ. Using podcasting in freshman composition courses.
Tips for Students Using Utterli
I was fascinated with Utterli the moment I saw it. I just thought it was coolest thing to be able to send text, pictures, audio and video from your cellphone to a blog on the web. It’s a true example of mobile blogging. But what was most exciting to me was the way it lets people add multi-media to blog posts and invites a conversation or discussion around it. I have many ideas for how I want to use this in my classes, but for now I’m using it as a way to leave some valuable tips for students to help them be successful in my classes.
ENG102 Screencast: Getting Started with Delicious
Getting Started with Delicious
This screencast covers the basics of signing up for a delicious account, installing the delicious toolbar/buttons, saving a website, and updating your personal profile.
To learn more about delicious and social bookmarking, check out the Common Craft video below, Social Bookmarking in Plain English.
ENG102 Screencast: Summaries & Bedford Bibliographer
Assn. #1: Summaries & Bedford Bibliographer
The screencast will walk you through completing assignment #1: writing your summaries and inputting them and the article bibliographies into Bedford Bibliographer.
ENG102 Screencast: Formatting Assignments
Formatting Assignments
This screencast will show you how to correctly format and save your assignments before you submit them for grading.
http://www.freshmancomp.com/screencasts/PaperFormat/PaperFormat.html
LEARNtech #3: Notifications & Messages in Ning
This lesson covers the Ning Social Network: Turning Off Notifications & Checking Messages.
Are Online Classes Right for You?
If you have registered for ENG101 or ENG102 Online, you have come to the correct place. These sections of ENG101 and ENG102 are taught completely online, and we will be using Blackboard as the course management system. To participate in this class, you will need to successfully log-in to Blackboard and learn to use the system.
If you already know your Blackboard Username (MEID) and Password, log in to Bb and complete the course orientation in the START HERE tab. If you don’t know your MEID, visit https://eims.maricopa.edu/MAW/SPAT.html and choose the option: Forgot Your MEID? If it’s not your first visit, and you know your MEID but you’ve simply forgotten your password, you can look up your password if you have forgotten it, by choosing: Forgot Your Password?
Class begins January 19th for the Spring 2010 Semester. The Blackboad site will be available by the 11th. You must enter Blackboard and begin the class by Wednesday, January 20th or you will be dropped for no show.
When you enter Blackboard, read the current Announcements and complete all the orientation activities. (If you need help navigating around Blackboard, watch any of the first six orientation video clips: http://www.maricopa.edu/blackboard/help.html
If you have any questions, call or email Dr. Cooper at 
or 602-325-3259
.
Distance Learning Facts
1. Distance Learning students sometimes can end up neglecting their course work because of personal or professional circumstances, unless they have compelling reasons for taking the course.
2. Some students prefer the independence of Distance Learning; others find it uncomfortable.
3. Distance Learning gives students greater freedom of scheduling, but it can require more self-discipline than on-campus classes.
4. Some people learn best by interacting with other students and instructors, but Distance Learning may not provide much opportunity for this interaction.
5. Distance Learning requires you to work from written directions without face-to-face instructions.
6. It may take as long as two or three days to get comments back by e-mail from your instructor (such as over a weekend or holiday).
7. Distance Learning requires at least as much time as on-campus courses and in many instances up to three times as much.
8. Distance Learning uses computers and other technology for teaching and communication.
9. Printed and/or online materials are the primary source of directions and information in Distance Learning.
10. Distance Learning classes often require written assignments and projects.
11. Students who have dropped a college class often don’t have the self-discipline or motivation to work independently and complete an online course.
Based on IS ELI FOR ME? by Bob Loser, Joan Trabandit, Barbara Hatheway, and Teresa Donell.
©1989, 1998, Extended Learning Institute, Northern Virginia Community College.
New Player for ENG101 Podcast
I’ve been experimenting with flash players for my weekly podcasts in my freshman composition courses. I this one from MyFlashFetish.com was pretty cool. I’ll paste the code into the course blog and see how students like it.
I made this music player at MyFlashFetish.com.
Students are Loving the Network
I’m trying out a social network in my ENG101 and ENG102 courses this spring. I’m trying to make English fun, but there are also some very useful features built into the Ning social network. So far I’m loving just about everything but the adds. I’m not ready to fork over cash to get rid of them, but if I can make a compelling enough argument, make my division chair might consider picking up the tab. We’ll see.
One thing that is really neat is that the students just naturally pick up on the fun things there are to do in there. I instructed that there were only two required parts: discussion forum and personal blog posts. Everything else they do is just for fun and up to you if you want to participate. Well, it didn’t take long for them to fill up the site slide show. It’s neat to see all their faces and their families too!
Find more photos like this on Freshman Comp
I’ve been using it to post my weekly podcasts too. It has an embeddable player that I can add mp3s to. I can either upload to the site or upload via a web link. I like to upload my content on my own servers and then link to it. This will save me later with having to deal with bandwidth and file size. Here’s our podcast player from the network.
Find more music like this on Freshman Comp
In case you’re wondering, most of the content in our class network is private, so content that students create for the class and a grade is private – only members can see it. But adding photos and videos is optional, not class related, and acknowledged that it will be public because it shows up on the front page. I could make the whole site including the front page private, but then my announcements won’t have a RSS feed and I won’t be able to subscribe and feed them into Blackboard or offer email subscriptions. So I leave the front page public, and protect the rest.
I’ll post more about this experiment as we play with it more. So far we’re all loving it.
LEARNtech #2: Signing Up for Ning Social Network
http://www.freshmancomp.com/screencasts/Learntech2ning/Learntech2ning.html
Hi. This is Professor Cooper and this is a screencast for the ENG102 course. This screencast is one in a series called “LearnTech in 5 minutes or less with Dr. Cooper.” This lesson will cover signing up for Ning, our class social network. It’s kind of like Facebook, but better and private – just for students in my classes.
