Since late June, when the university announced its decision to have students on campus and enable a combination of in-person, hybrid, and remote classes, LSA Technology Services quickly took action to enable an unprecedented delivery of the LSA liberal arts mission. In two short months, we’ve invested, improved, and implemented technology and services to not only meet the… Read More »
Throughout the summer many units, including the Teaching and Technology Collaborative (TTC), have been producing workshops and training sessions under the umbrella “R2GB.” Current and upcoming training sessions are listed in this link. Recordings of similar, past, ITS sessions may be found in this playlist. Recorded topics include, Student Engagement Online, Zoom For Teaching, Recording Techniques for Online… Read More »
Boardwork is an essential part of any course that requires free-hand writing, for example math or languages with non-Latin scripts. If you support faculty who use boardwork as part of their teaching, here are two options from LSA Technology Services that achieve the same effect online. Digital whiteboard: The first option is to use an electronic whiteboard. This… Read More »
Prior to the pandemic, enrollment for spring and summer field classes at the U-M Biological Station were at an all time high. Students eagerly planned to live away from home, at the BioStation near Douglas Lake in Pellston, Michigan. When the university announced that spring and summer courses would be virtual, faculty and staff at the BioStation had… Read More »
LSA Learning and Teaching Technology Consultants have shared tips for structuring course material in a way that feels grounding and reliable to students while teaching online. Consultants write that organizing materials and activities in Canvas can help both online and hybrid classes go more smoothly for both students and instructors. It’s important that students know where to find… Read More »
Assistant professor of computer science Birhanu Eshete says he didn’t know what kind of response he’d get when fellow professor Di Ma asked if he’d try to get a student organization going to support their burgeoning cybersecurity program. So he started simple, sending out an email inquiry to gauge if there was any interest. Within a couple hours,… Read More »
LSA Learning and Teaching Technology Consultants have shared advice for creating clear online assignments. They emphasize the importance of explaining an assignment’s context and defining its purpose, task, submission format, and success criteria. Read more on the full article.
LSA Learning and Teaching Technology consultants have written a short article with tips on preparing teaching teams for remote teaching. The article offers advice for both senior instructors and graduate student instructors, covering tools like Canvas, Zoom, and Bluejeans. It includes linked resources and concrete steps and tips, as well as further reading.
The first step of preparation for hybrid teaching, with some in-person time and some remote time, is to plan what activities will have the strongest impact done synchronously (live, at the same time). Synchronous time, whether in-person or via videoconference, is a precious resource in hybrid courses. Do not use your synchronous time for extended lectures, demonstrations, or… Read More »
Accessible materials are a good basic practice precisely because they are often easier for all students to understand and process. Creating accessible materials helps all learners in your course and provides them with equal access to course materials and learning opportunities. Digital accessibility like consistent semantic markup and clean links makes it easier for everyone to navigate and… Read More »
Transitioning to online lecturing may seem daunting at first, but LSA Learning and Teaching Technology Consultants have shared some tricks and tips for making it easier. According to the consultants, recording an hour-long lecture with slides to mimic a typical, in-person meeting reduces information retention and effectiveness of the instruction. Instead, lecturers should consider making shorter video lectures… Read More »
LinkedIn Learning is a leading online learning platform that helps anyone learn business, software, technology, and creative skills to achieve personal and professional goals. Information and Technology Services (ITS) and Organizational Learning (OL) have partnered to provide increased access to LinkedIn Learning for students, staff (including temporary workers), and faculty. “This is an incredibly valuable and strategic tool… Read More »
In response to feedback from faculty and students, LSA Technology Services has been increasing its support for digital scholarship and digital humanities by piloting services that offer new types of consultations, platforms, and community engagement. One of them, an integration between MiVideo and Omeka, improves streaming performance and increases storage capacity for video and other rich media content. Omeka is a… Read More »
Tandem, a research-based tool that supports students working in teams and the faculty who teach and mentor student teams, was one of five faculty projects honored with the 12th annual Provost’s Teaching Innovation Prizes. Tandem uses data gathered weekly to provide students with a graph that clearly shows how a team rates itself on key measures of team… Read More »
To support the university community in preparing for the fall term, the Center for Academic Innovation (CAI) has just launched Online Teaching at U-M, a new website hosting resources and learning experiences to help faculty and instructional staff learn to teach effectively online. While the original focus of CAI’s work was intended to extend U-M’s reach and impact through… Read More »
ITS Teaching & Learning is hosting a series of live Canvas workshops called “Teaching Online with Canvas Workshops: From Good to Great.” Sessions are held daily at noon. Topics will change based on need and interest. Please share this information with faculty and staff in your units who might be interested. Visit the Canvas training page to register. All sessions are… Read More »
The Collabrify Roadmap Platform, a set of free, customizable digital learning tools developed by the Center for Digital Curricula at the College of Engineering, provides K-12 teachers with scheduling templates that can be customized to include all the activities that would normally take place in their classrooms. Created last summer as a supplemental tool to make educational resources… Read More »
As universities around the country transitioned to online instruction, faculty and staff members had to quickly change how they teach and work. The shift has been filled with challenges, but also new opportunities. The University Record recently featured stories about how four faculty made the quick transition to remote teaching: Ginger Shultz’s chemistry students would no longer have… Read More »
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Enriching Scholarship has been cancelled for this year. However, many workshops will still be offered remotely throughout the coming months. You can view all upcoming workshops on the TeachTech website, including a full slate of upcoming sessions on remote teaching. In addition to in-person sessions, you may also be interested in the IT4U Webinars offered by ITS.… Read More »
Michigan Online contains more than 180 learning experiences and is available free to U-M students, faculty, staff, and alumni. For students, it is a place to take courses, participate in Teach-Outs, and earn degrees all from the comfort of their own homes. Especially during these difficult times, it is a great way for anyone to broaden their knowledge, complement… Read More »