Online Learning and Technology for Faculty

Peer evaluation is a powerful tool for fostering student engagement, accountability, and a sense of community in online courses. By involving students in assessing each other’s work, you can encourage critical thinking, expand perspectives, and improve students' communication and evaluation skills. Successful peer evaluation, however, requires thoughtful structuring, clear expectations, and a supportive environment. 

With the demands of a packed curriculum, students often move from one topic to the next without fully processing what they have learned. Reflective learning encourages students to critically evaluate their experiences, identify strengths and weaknesses, and make connections between new and prior knowledge. By engaging in reflective practices, students gain insights into their learning habits, overcome barriers, and transform passive learning into active self-discovery and growth. In this post, we will explore how to incorporate reflection into your teaching practices. 

We all share the goal of helping our students succeed, but with such a wide range of needs, backgrounds, and learning styles in our classrooms, it can sometimes feel like we are taking on a lot at once. This is where Universal Design for Learning (UDL) can come in – a framework designed to help us create flexible and inclusive learning environments where everyone can thrive. Whether you teach online, on-campus, or somewhere in between, UDL has your back!

In the dynamic world of online education, success hinges on our ability to meet the needs of our students, and the dedication and expertise of our faculty members. Today, we take a moment to extend our gratitude to our esteemed faculty and adjunct faculty for their commitment to enriching online learning environments. 

After teaching two fully online sections of a freshman-level course since 2000, I transitioned to teaching a hybrid section of an entirely different course in 2017 when hybrid offerings were limited and neither students nor faculty were clear about how a blended course function. Even though I had online teaching experience and was a faculty Online Mentor for many years, I, too, had a wobbly understanding of hybrids, not to mention anxiety, given that I had never taught the course in any modality. 

In Parts 1 and 2 of this blog on discussion boards, I included examples of prompts that promote social interaction and metacognition and examples that promote cognitive activities to address the course learning outcomes. In this final post, I give examples of how I try to promote quality student responses to other student’s posts.

In March, we explored how to efficiently use Blackboard Grade Center organization, Last Access and Show/Hide columns. In this post, we will continue our exploration with some time-saving tips for productivity. We want to discuss how CCRI instructors can make their life easier with color coding and Smart Views in Blackboard Grade Center.

Captioning videos in your course allows students who have hearing loss to be able to participate in your online course. It also allows English language learners and neurodivergent students to better understand the videos and content in the course. Including captions also helps to satisfy some of the OSCQR Level 3 standards.

It is important that students connect with each other to help build a learning community and reduce isolation, and this is particularly important in online classes. Discussion boards can help students connect with each other and therefore can address the federal requirement of including Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) and OSCQR Standards 29, 30, 31, 40, 41, 42, 43 and 47 in online courses.

As educators, we aim to provide quality instruction to our students and prepare them for success not just in college, but in their future careers. One way we can make learning more meaningful is by connecting it to life beyond the classroom with authentic assessments that mirror real-world scenarios. Let us explore some ideas for authentic assessments and how they empower more engaged, enjoyable, and effective learning for students.

It is important in online classes that students connect with each other to help build an online learning community and reduce isolation. This can be done through discussion boards. As a result, discussion boards can address the federal requirement of including Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) and OSCQR Standards 29, 30, 31, 40, 41, 42, 43 and 47. These OSCQR standards, in part, satisfy OSCQR level 1 and 3 reviews

Did you know that Blackboard Grade Center is a tool that allows you as an instructor to do so much more than just record student grades? Blackboard Grade Center is a robust tool, from color coding gradebook cells for various parameters to creating filters for your Grade Center. We will cover Grade Center tips and more in the series of blog articles, so keep reading!

Picture a learning environment where every student feels recognized and valued, where diversity isn't just acknowledged and celebrated. As educators, you have the power to create this transformative space, where each student's unique identity and experiences are integral to their academic journey. Let's explore several examples and potential strategies.

Promoting and preserving academic integrity should be a key priority in educational settings. SafeAssign is a plagiarism detection software that instructors can use to ensure students are submitting original work. SafeAssign is integrated in Blackboard and is used for online document submissions. SafeAssign works by comparing the uploaded file's text with millions of papers in its database (academic journals, previously submitted student work through SafeAssign, including other colleges) and any resources on the web.

Colleges and universities across the country are embracing Artificial Intelligence or AI. Arizona State University just announced a new partnership with OpenAI. If you are interested in what AI tools can do and how they have already altered Higher Education landscape, then come join us at CCRI for a series of virtual roundtable discussions dedicated to AI in the classroom.