Due to the importance of Dr. Watrall’s topic, and the winter storm warning that has just been issued for the Lansing area, the Breakfast Series scheduled for Wednesday, February 10 has been canceled. Dr. Watrall will be rescheduled for a later date.
Thank you, and be safe!
Attention, faculty! The deadline to submit your online or blended course for the 2010 AT&T Awards Competition in Instructional Technology is Friday, February 12!
To proceed, take a look at the previous winners then view and submit the Call For Entries form.
Is this your year?
Think of the amazing feeling you get when you encounter that shining student, who engages not only in their course work and campus communities, but strives to make the university a better place for students, staff and faculty alike. I have the fortune to know one such student, MSU Catalyst Megan Gebhart.
Megan has entered the Next Bright Idea competition in her quest to showcase the incredible things taking place at Michigan State University. Are you a professor who integrates blogging in the classroom? Are you interested in effective electronic communication? Let Megan know what you’re up to, and help her be the creator of the region’s next big idea!
As of January 5, 2010, http://computing.msu.edu/videoconferencing/ is live and ready to answer your questions about videoconferencing facilities and contacts at Michigan State University. If you’re interested in videoconferencing and looking for a place to start, check here for resources, troubleshooting and planning tips. For the future, keep your eyes open for user community opportunities and chances to connect with others interested in MSU’s videoconferencing resources. Contact your producer, or e-mail me if you run into snags, or have additional questions.
MSU Virtual University Design and Technology (vuDAT) invites you to attend the next session in our ongoing Breakfast Series: Conversations on Online Pedagogy and Best Practices
DATE: Wednesday, February 10, 2010
PLACE: MSU Main Library, North Conference Room, 4th floor, west wing
TIME: 8:45am – 10:00am (8:30am for refreshments)
TOPIC:
LMS Optional: Using Open Access Resources to Teach Online
PRESENTER:
Dr. Ethan Watrall
Assistant Professor, MATRIX
Assistant Professor, Department of Telecom, Information Studies and Media
Assistant Professor, Department of History
Principal Investigator, Games for Entertainment and Learning Lab
OVERVIEW:
Computers are ubiquitous. Whether we are in our cars, our planes, our houses, our hospitals, or our classrooms, computers are now part of the infrastructure of everyday life. In his classes, Dr. Ethan Watrall embraces an open access model comprised of WordPress, Twitter, Mediawiki and more.
The combination of these tools creates a communicative, connected and flexible course experience for students outside of the ANGEL system. Join us as Dr. Watrall discusses how the platforms selected not only provide a medium for completion of assigments, but also immerse students in the increasingly digital, Web 2.0 world in which we live.
From MSU’s own Dr. Ethan Watrall, this announcement may strike those of you interested in online and blended teaching as a cool conference, taking place right here on MSU’s campus. Any and all of you that know of and/or follow this blog qualify! Announcement follows:
Announcing Great Lakes THATCamp
Held on the campus of Michigan State University on March 20th and 21st, Great Lakes THATCamp (The Humanities And Technology Camp) is a user-generated “unconference” on digital humanities originally inspired by the Center for History and New Media (CHNM) at George Mason University.
At THATCamp 2009, CHNM floated the idea of holding regional camps around the country, an idea that quickly took hold, leading to events in Austin, Texas (THATCamp Austin) Washington state (THATcamp Pacific Northwest), Columbus, OH (THATCamp Columbus) as well as planned events in California (THATCamp SoCal), and Paris (THATCamp Paris).
Carrie Heeter forwarded me this article from the New York Times that I found to be a really interesting implementation of Skype. In short, students watch lectures “together” with Skype facilitating their ability to ask questions, speak to each other, etc. Skype has been a great tool for me, and I’ve shared it with many of the faculty members I’ve had the opportunity to work with. To download it free, visit http://www.skype.com.
To anyone who has attended a workshop I’ve been involved with, the fact that Techsmith’s SnagIt gets my vote for “work flow revolution product of the year” is no secret. However, previously all demonstrations of the product came with the caveat “unfortunately, SnagIt is only available for the PC.” Not anymore.
The end is nigh! As we enter finals week, keep the following important dates in mind:
Finals week: 12/14 – 12/18
Final grades due to Registrar’s Office: 12/22 at 4 PM
University closed: 12/24, 12/25, 12/31, 1/1
Spring semester of 2010 begins 1/11.
Wherever you may go, whatever plans you may have, I’d like to wish you a safe and happy winter break on behalf of Virtual University Design and Technology. Good luck with your semester wrap-up!
From Byron Brown:
The last “Explorations in Instructional Technology” brown bag seminar for this semester will be presented by Brendan Guenther, MSU Virtual University Design and Technology. His topic will be “Using MSU’s Google Apps in Your Teaching and Research.”
TIME: Friday, December 4, from 12:00 noon to 1:00 p.m.
PLACE: 105 Natural Science Building.
As most of you know, MSU has signed a contract with Google to provide our own Google Apps service for members of the MSU community. MSU Google Apps, a suite of “cloud computing” applications now available at http://googleapps.msu.edu/, provide unique opportunities for collaboration and sharing both for instruction and research. Join us on Friday to find out how you can benefit from MSU Google Apps in your own work.
Added bonus: (I hope.) In the Spring 2010 semester LC&T, and the Colleges of Education and Engineering are collaborating on a mini-conference on Google Apps tentatively scheduled for February 19, 2010. So here’s your chance to participate in the conference as an active presenter/sharer. Attend the session on Friday, then create some ingenious, creative use of MSU Google Apps, and in February share what you know with your colleagues!
Everyone is welcome to attend.
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