OET has received many positive comments from the participants of last week's workshops on Emerging Technology and Intro to Social Software.

That being said, I want to share with you two ways to stay informed about upcoming NITLE workshops.

You can keep an eye on what's coming up at this web page; http://www.nitle.org/index.php/nitle/opportunities/programs/upcoming_events. For those of you who know about RSS readers you can subscribe to the RSS feed of new opportunities at: http://www.nitle.org/index.php/nitle/rss/feed/calendar.xml

NITLE picks up the full tab for participants at their workshops - travel, hotel, food, workshop fee, etc. (At least that's how it is through June 2008. ) So I'd encourage you to take advantage of any workshops that interest you this year. You can sign up for a workshop by contacting our NITLE liaison, Rick Holmgren.

Note that some workshops suggest a team attend from a given institution - sometimes a faculty - IT team, sometimes faculty - librarian, sometimes faculty -faculty. Since NITLE pays for all of us, don't be shy about asking your instructional technologist to join you at a workshop!

Posted by James Fadden at 10:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A while back I posted over at the techNOcool blog about a new tool from Yahoo called Pipes. Recently, I got to play with Pipes to mashup the various OET Feeds into one RSS feed that contains all the updates from OET as they happen.

The Allegheny Educational Technology Feed provides faculty information about workshops, services, department news, and links to educational technology resources. There are many ways to subscribe to a feed whether through your web browser or through a news aggregator like Bloglines.

Posted by James Fadden at 03:03 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

As the Horizon Report and the 2006 Netday Speakup Survey forecast the arrival of academic gaming in the near future for many college campuses, I have added the Academic Gamers | Gameology blog to the OET Blogroll.

If this sparks your interest please check out the Emerging Technology workshop from NITLE that OET will host this May.

Posted by James Fadden at 02:19 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

The LMS group, the group charged with investigation of online course tools to replace WebCT, needs student input to help guide the process of selecting a new learning management system.

Your responses will provide the LMS group a more complete understanding of the online tools central to learning and the general landscape of online course tool use at the College. This survey is not just for WebCT users but for all students, whether or not you are currently enrolled in courses using the web or web-based tools.

Start Survey

Posted by James Fadden at 11:26 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

As of roughly 4:30 on Friday, Technical and Networking Services brought the WebCT server back online. The license and hardware issues have been corrected. If you experience oddities using WebCT in the next few days please contact the Help Desk.

Posted by James Fadden at 05:06 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

The WebCT server was back up an running for a short time before noon but continued to have issues recognizing the new license sent by the company. Over the lunch hour members of Technical and Networking services attempted a new set of fixes suggested by Blackboard's technical support staff. Currently, the server is down being worked on to correct the issues found yesterday and this morning.

Posted by James Fadden at 02:40 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

The WebCT server is currently being worked on and thus inaccessible for the time being. The work being done is to correct the out of date license message users experienced yesterday.

Technical and Networking Services has identified the causes of yesterday's out of date license message users experienced when trying to access a course. They are currently fixing the hardware and software problems they determined were the cause to the problems experienced yesterday. It is expected that WebCT will be operational sometime this morning.

Posted by James Fadden at 08:59 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

This morning it was reported that faculty and students entering a WebCT course are greeted with this out of date license message.

We have not seen that this warning is causing difficulties using any of the tools within a WebCT course. At this point, we are recommending that you click ok and continue as you would normally. If you notice that WebCT is not responding as expected please do not hesitate to contact the Help Desk with a description of the problem you are experiencing.

We are currently waiting for Blackboard/WebCT to send us license key that will correct this problem.

Posted by James Fadden at 12:59 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (1)

Today on Blogs for Learning, I found a post with advice on commenting on Blogs.

Blogs for Learning | Articles - Comments of Gold: Advice on Giving and Receiving Comments

Posted by James Fadden at 01:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This year Time Magazine Named You person of the year. (TIME.com Read/Print Article)

You were named Person of the Year as You have collectively changed how the internet is used. The Internet has gone from a place of commerce to a conduit for communication and community. This change, dubbed Web 2.0, is still evolving and is characterized by sites and services that allow one share, create and connect.

There are a growing number of faculty integrating the tools of Web 2.0 into their course work. If you are using Web 2.0 in your courses, OET would like to learn from your experience. Feel free to comment on this post or contact your instructional technologist with details.

Posted by James Fadden at 11:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Last year, OET signed a multi-year agreement with WebCT that allows faculty to continue to use WebCT through the end of Fall 2008.

In preparation for the end of the service agreement, a group has been formed to investigate software systems, commonly known as Learning Management Systems.

The group, Linda Bills, Helen McCullough, and Susan Fenton with James Fadden serving as the facilitator, is in the very early stages of the process. In the coming months, the group will work with faculty and students to learn needs, investigate options and select a LMS to pilot.

The process is being documented online at http://oet.allegheny.edu/lms. The group invites comments and feedback either through the site or by contacting any member of the group.

Posted by James Fadden at 03:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

As the semester draws to a close the Office of Educational Technology wishes to remind faculty members using WebCT to backup their courses.

By creating a backup of a completed course faculty have an archive of the course and the ability to course creation time the next time the course is taught. It is also advised to compile and download calendar entries, compile and download discussions, download quiz questions, and zip and download the My-Files folder.

Faculty considering using WebCT as part of a Spring 2007 course are encouraged to request course space before the end of the semester.

Posted by James Fadden at 11:05 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

The college is addressing requests for classroom renovations through a working group headed by Ben Haytock. This committee is charged with identifying and prioritizing classrooms renovation projects.

New requests for classroom renovations and improvements should be directed to this group through Ben. Those who previously requested renovations that included technology will be contacted by Ben individually regarding the new process.

Posted by James Fadden at 02:02 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Gardner Campbell, Director of the Center for Teaching, Learning and Technology at the University of Richmond, makes proposes an interesting idea on his blog today.

Gardner Writes - APGAR for Class Meetings

He proposes a five item self-evaluation students can use to rate their readiness for the class session. He proposes the following questions:

1. Did you read the material for today’s class meeting carefully? No=0, Yes, once=1, Yes, more than once=2
2. Did you come to class today with questions or with items you’re eager to discuss? No=0, Yes, one=1, Yes, more than one=2
3. Since we last met, did you talk at length to a classmate or classmates about either the last class meeting or today’s meeting? No=0, Yes, one person=1, Yes, more than one person=2
4. Since our last meeting, did you read any unassigned material related to this course of study? No=0, Yes, one item=1, Yes, more than one item=2
5. Since our last class meeting, how much time have you spent reflecting on this course of study and recent class meetings? None to 29 minutes=0, 30 minutes to an hour=1, over an hour=2

He also suggests having the instructor complete the questions and technologies that might help facilitate this. The post is worth a read particularly the comments responding to the idea. Is this just an interesting idea or an idea needing to be implemented? Keep an eye on Pedablogy as Steve Greenlaw plans to attempt this in a seminar class.

Posted by James Fadden at 09:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

When you surf the web, you have probably seen little orange buttons on your favorite web sites like CNN, NPR, Yahoo, Google, etc. These buttons are to links to the site's newest postings formated as an xml file. When you click on that button you see a bunch of text that is not easy to read so an RSS feed, also called a site feed or a news feed, is of little use with out an RSS aggregator . RSS Aggregators, commonly referred to as news readers, reformat the xml to make it easily readable. The use of news feeds and readers allows users to find the latest headlines from their favorite sites in one place. There are many varieties of news readers but mainly they fall into two categories, online or computer based.

c|net recently reviewed online news readers check out their reveiw if you are searching for a news reader.

via [Librarian in Black]

Posted by James Fadden at 10:04 AM | Permalink

Faculty Tech Studio is a podcast from Elon's Center for Teaching and Learning. The creators, Tony Crider and Megan Conklin, are CATL scholars at Elon who produce this cast monthly to discuss emerging technologies used for teaching at the college. It is only 2 episodes old but worth a listen.

Posted by James Fadden at 09:02 AM | Permalink

Browsers have always allowed you to bookmark your favorite web sites. Now browsers like Firefox allow you to create a live bookmark of site feeds so that you can quickly go to the newest content of the sites that you care most about.

A site feed is a text file that allows a webmaster to share new content with an audience. Site feeds can take many formats including xml, rdf, atom and rss. Site feeds are often referred to as a newsfeed, feed, blog feed, rss or atom.

No matter the format or the name they all do the same thing allow you to get web-based content without having to visit a site.

Learn more about making a Live Bookmark using a new tutorial on the subject.

Posted by James Fadden at 03:48 PM | Permalink

As of Tuesday at 1:15pm, students are being added to WebCT courses. New students will be added to courses everyday at 1:15pm and 5:15pm until the last day a student can add a course. Students adding to a course will be be able to log on to WebCT within a day of turning their add cards to the registrar. Please contact your instructional technologist if students are not being added to WebCT.

Students who drop your course will not be removed from the class as that potentially causes problems with discussion boards and other tools in WebCT. It is recommended that you make students who have dropped your course inactive if you want to limit their access to your course materials.

Posted by James Fadden at 02:02 PM | Permalink

In Episode 4 of the On Incorporating PowerPoint Series, Glen Wurst discusses his experience with PowerPoint.

Posted by James Fadden at 04:42 PM | Permalink

Faculty who are planning on teaching with WebCT this fall should request course space before August 25th. Course space requested after that day may not be ready for the first day of classes.

Faculty needing assistance designing a WebCT course should contact their instructional technologist. In addition to this personalized assistance faculty, there are still seats available in the WebCT workshops on August 23rd and 24th. Find out more about these workshops online at http://oet.allegheny.edu/rsvp.html

Posted by James Fadden at 08:37 AM | Permalink

Webpub, the student, group and employee web server, has been upgraded. New versions of MySQL, MoveableType (weblog), and PHP have been installed. More information will be coming soon.

Posted by Admin at 04:36 PM | Permalink

Allegheny College will continue to use of the current version of WebCT over the next three years. The campus-wide site license that was obtained several years ago has been renewed to include the next three years.

You may have read articles in the Chronicle of Higher Education or elsewhere about the merger between Blackboard and WebCT, the two top companies who provide Course Management Software. Through the North East Regional Computing Program (NERCOMP), we were able to secure a three-year agreement to continue using WebCT at consortium pricing.

The Office of Educational Technology will evaluate new software products as well as follow the technology trends for liberal arts colleges over the next two-three years regarding the use of course management software. We will be asking for your input as we learn what the viable options will be for future versions of course management software.

If you have any questions or input about WebCT or any CMS product, feel free to contact Karen Stone at ext. 2767.

Posted by James Fadden at 09:49 AM | Permalink

Web Calendar is once again available for faculty use.

The down time allowed for updates to the server and web calendar software.

Also, the email reminder function of webcalendar works. Questions or comments can be directed to the Office of Educational Technology through the Help Desk at ext. 2755.

Posted by James Fadden at 02:14 PM | Permalink

The college web calendar at webcalendar.allegheny.edu will be unavailable from Sunday Feb 5 at 8 am through Tuesday Feb 7 at 8 am. This is so that we can upgrade the server software. We hope this will also fix the problem the calendar has been having with email reminders.

You should print a copy of your calendar, using the calendar print feature, before Sunday at 8 am if you need to refer to your calendar during this period. If you use a PDA, you may want to also do a sync with the calendar before Sunday.

We apologize for the inconvenience and hope to have the calendar working at full capacity again soon.

Posted by James Fadden at 01:13 PM | Permalink

This new feature has been developed to allow faculty to be notified of new content on the OET site through use of RSS and news readers.

By subscribing to the RSS feeds faculty can stay informed about upcoming workshops, additional services, recaps of workshops and general computing news Check out OET Site Content Available in RSS for more details.

Posted by James Fadden at 03:59 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Faculty interested in using WebCT for their courses need to request new courses online.
Instructional Technologists are available to assist faculty with the design and development of WebCT materials. Faculty interested in assistance with WebCT should contact an instructional technologist to schedule an appointment.

Posted by James Fadden at 12:08 PM | Permalink

Each month on the second Thursday from 7:30 to 8:30pm students are invited to join representatives from the Computing Services and the Learning Commons to discuss student technology needs, perceptions, and experiences. In the past the feedback gained at these meetings have influnenced the plans for moving the Gators Den computer lab and study space, anti-virus programs, and the redesign of the Help Desk web site.

This meeting is one way Computing Services involves students in the technology planning process. The meeting is held in the Gold Room (318) of the Campus Center and is open to all interested students.

The next meeting will be held on November 10th when Jonathan Southwick will be invited to discuss the residence hall network.

Continue reading "Student Technology Group" »

Posted by James Fadden at 09:51 AM | Permalink

The Office of Educational Technology shares its Annual Report for 2004 - 2005 with the Allegheny Community. The report identifies accomplishments of OET organized by office goals.

Posted by James Fadden at 03:00 PM | Permalink

Faculty interested in using WebCT as part of a course for fall 2005 need to request course space online. Requests made prior to August 25, 2005 will be available for the first day of classes.

Instructional Technologists are available to assist faculty with the design and development of WebCT materials. Faculty interested in assistance with WebCT should contact an instructional technologist to schedule an appointment.

Posted by James Fadden at 09:31 AM | Permalink

The Office of Educational Technology is looking for students interested filling the two vacant Student Technology Assistant positions.

Contact James Fadden in the Office of Educational Technology if you are interested.

Phone - 332-2984
AIM/Yahoo Messenger/MSN - faddeje
Email - jfadden@allegheny.edu

Posted by James Fadden at 04:48 PM | Permalink