CTL Blog
Look and ‘C’ Sessions Begin Monday, September 29th in the CTL
Not sure what the MCC 4’s are and want to learn more? Ready to use the C’s, but not sure which ‘C’ aligns with your course? Want to see examples of how faculty plan to assess MCC’s 4Cs in their courses? Do you want to participate in SOC’s assessment pilot this spring? If you answered yes to any of these questions you should attend one of the Look and ‘C’ Sessions beginning Monday, September 29th in the MCC Center for Teaching & Learning.
4C’s? What are those?
Through the leadership of the Student Outcomes Committee, MCC has adopted Institutional Student Learning Outcomes, the MCC 4C’s, that are consistent with the Vision, Mission, and Values of Mesa Community College and reflect our commitment to Individuals and Community, Innovation, Integrity, Learning, and Service Excellence. These 4C’s are Communication, Civic Engagement, Critical Thinking, and Cultural & Global Engagement. All faculty are encouraged to incorporate the C’s into their courses.
This Fall you will get a chance to dive deeper into each of these Learning Outcomes at a special Look and ‘C’ Session. Sessions will be presented by members of the SOC Committee and by faculty who are incorporating one or more of the 4C’s into their courses. Participants in the hands-on sessions will walk away with an in depth knowledge of each ‘C’ including the criterion and scoring rubrics. Additionally participants will get a chance to see the each ‘C’ in action and to brainstorm ideas for adding an aligned activity, assignment or project to one of the outcomes.
Register Now for Look and ‘C’: Diving into Civic Engagement
Civic Engagement encompasses actions to promote the quality of life in a community, through both political and non-political processes.
Choose from one of the following sessions:
Monday, September 29th 12:30-2:00pm in the CTL Lab
HRMS Course#002179, Session #0001 – Register now through HRMS
OR
Friday, October 3rd 1:00-2:30pm in the CTL Lab
HRMS Course#002179, Session #0002 – Register now through HRMS
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Important Canvas User Notices
New Canvas 101 for Students Launched at MCC
The MCC Canvas 101 Student Orientation course has been updated! This self-enrolled, self-paced course was first made 2 years ago when MCCCD transitioned to Canvas. It is given out by faculty to orient students to Canvas. It is also published on our MCC eLearning web site, Center for Teaching & Learning Canvas Tutorials and other locations. It is highly recommended that you encourage those students new to Canvas to take this course. This will not only help them be more successful in navigating Canvas to access important course information/activities, it should also save instructional time otherwise spent on technical issues. The easiest way to share this course is to include the web link in your syllabus, welcome letter, getting started activities, etc..
Canvas 101: Student Orientation to Canvas Course – http://tinyurl.com/learncanvas
Keep Your Browsers Current & Clean!
Many of the issues users face with Canvas relate to the web browser. Canvas supports the latest two versions of all the major browsers (Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Safari and Firefox). Although users may be able to access Canvas with older browser versions, they may experience a variety of issues including loss of functionality and worse, loss of work if the browser crashes.
In addition, it is important for browser health and for the usability of Canvas and Canvas features to regularly clear the browser cache. We recommend that users mark their calendar to do this maintenance at least a few times per month or whenever they experience issues like being unable to record video or audio using the Canvas media tools. Some Canvas features also require Flash and the Java plug-in.
A few words on security. Canvas is a secure environment and this can sometimes cause issues with certain multimedia features like embedded videos and tools working or displaying properly due to browser security. It is important to provide links to media and tools, as well as the embedded versions to ensure that students are able to see and interact with course material.
Learn more about Canvas and browser compatibility including security. **Bookmark this resource and give it to students it is extremely valuable!
Resources for Clearing Browser Cache
When in Doubt, Switch Browsers!
One of the first things a user should try when they are experiencing an issue in Canvas is to switch browsers. It may sound like a Help Desk cliche, but a little flexibility in browsing preferences can save a lot of time and frustration. Currently most users are preferring the functionality provided by Google Chrome or Firefox. Internet Explorer is supported, but not recommended.
Canvas Update Cycle
Canvas is on a 3-week update-release cycle. The next beta (preview) release is on 9/15, production notes will follow on 9/22 with the release and documentation to follow on 9/27. Follow the release schedule on the Canvas Updates Calendar.
Recent Changes
Big changes come in small packages! Many of the recent updates to Canvas have been tiny tweaks to functionality that will make your life and the learning of your students better and better! Review all the recent changes from the 9/6/2014 release.
Canvas Course List All-Stars
The Canvas Course list functionality has been changed to allow all users (students and faculty) to more easily manage their Canvas courses. The previous customize option (to control what courses appeared in the ‘quick list’ drop-down course menu) has been combined with the My Courses page. Now users can view all their courses and select which courses to display (using the new star icons to mark favorites) in the drop-down menu all within the same location.
Your course(s) marked as a ‘favorite’ will correspond to your Courses drop-down menu, Canvas Conversations Inbox menu and Calendar menus so it is worth taking the time to customize your course list each semester!
Additionally the My Courses page includes more information about the status of a course including whether it is published or not. Note: Unpublished courses are listed in gray and include a tag which is visible to faculty and students. When students hover over an unpublished course they will see a message stating – “This course had not been published. Students should contact the course instructor for access.”
Mark Your Calendar & Join the Conversation
Please plan to join us for the 3rd Annual Canvas Conversations event on Friday, November 7, 2014 from 9 am to 3 pm at Scottsdale Community College. This event is open to all Maricopa faculty and staff. This all day event will focus on all things Canvas. Opportunities for everyone – from beginner to advanced! Participate in:
- Roundtables
- Hands-on workshops
- Show and tell
- Dialog with colleagues
Registration will open soon! Check the MCLI web site for details!
Submit a Proposal to Present at the Conference
We know you are doing awesome work in Canvas; please consider sharing your ideas and expertise by submitting a proposal today! Proposals are due by 11:59 pm Sunday, October 19, 2014.
Registration Open for the 2014 Student Success Conference
The Division of Academic and Student Affairs & Maricopa Center for Learning & Instruction
REGISTER TODAY
Expectations, Aspirations, and Achievement
The 26th Annual Student Success Conference will be held Friday, October 17, 2014, at the Sheraton Phoenix Downtown Hotel. Please reserve this date on your calendar and register today to engage in systemic conversations focused on student success and completion. Detailed information regarding the keynote speakers, breakout presentations, and registration can be found at:
http://mcli.maricopa.edu/success/2014
Location:
Sheraton Phoenix Downtown Hotel
340 N. 3rd Street, Phoenix
(Conference parking available to attendees)
Keynote Presenters:
Pedro Noguera, Peter L. Agnew Professor of Education New York University, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Development and Executive Director, Metropolitan Center for Urban Education
Terry O’Banion, President and Senior League Fellow League for Innovation in the Community College and Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Graduate Faculty, North American University
For questions regarding the Student Success Conference contact:
Dr. Ramona Cox at 480-731-8300
ramona.cox@domail.maricopa.ed
Webinar: Improve Completion Through Redesigning Developmental Courses
Hosted by Mesa Community College and sponsored by the Maricopa Center for Learning and Instruction
Mesa Community College, AS-170 CTL Conference Room
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
10:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.
FPG: Not Offered
Register Today:
http://mcli.maricopa.edu/events/improve-completion-through
Description:
An Academic Impressions Webinar. Note: this session must be attended at the campus location specified. Users cannot attend virtually due to licensing agreements.
Research indicates approximately one-half of all incoming students need remedial work in at least one subject. While the majority of colleges offer developmental coursework, about 75% of students who enroll in these courses do not finish their degrees.
Join your colleagues and learn how Austin Peay State University redesigned their developmental courses using the Linked Workshop (or SLA) model. This redesign significantly increased student persistence rates and was recogniz ed by the National Center for Academic Transformation (NCAT).
What is the Linked Workshop (or SLA) Model?
This model provides remedial/developmental instruction by linking workshops that offer students just-in-time supplemental academic support to core college-level courses. The model also integrates supplementary instruction, tutoring, learning communities, and accelerated learning—all considered best practices in developmental coursework—into core college-level courses.
View the full webinar agenda.
Who should attend?
Academic leadership involved with coordinating and improving academic support and developmental or remedial programs will gain new ideas from this case study. More specifically, directors of developmental programs and directors of academic support programs including student success, learning, tutoring, or writing centers will brainstorm ideas for improving your support initiatives.
Host & Support:
Helice Agria, Instructional Technologist, Mesa Community College
For more information please contact:
Dr. Ramona Cox
District Director, Academic Affairs Support Programs and Services/Maricopa Center for Learning and Instruction
Maricopa Community Colleges District
(480) 731-8295
ramona.cox@domail.maricopa.edu
Adobe Connect Pilot at MCC this Fall
What is Adobe Connect?
Are you interested in conducting online live classroom sessions or office hours? Adobe Connect might be for you!
Adobe Connect is the premier resource for online live classroom and web conferencing solutions for eLearning and business applications. Their comprehensive product provides a safe platform for faculty to deliver virtual real-time class presentations and host office hours with features such as: screen and file sharing, video/audio capture, mobile device support, session recording, live polling and more! Learn more about Adobe Connect features.
Call for Pilot Participants
MCCCD is currently looking for 25 faculty at each campus to pilot Adobe Connect for instructional applications (live classroom presentations, office hours, etc.) in the Fall 2014. Interested persons should complete the MCC Google Form for Join the Pilot.
Purpose of Pilot
This trial will help MCCCD determine if Adobe Connect can meet our live classroom needs and help us build a license and support structure for a district wide implementation. Pilot participants will be expected to provide feedback to the college on their experience with Adobe Connect via a survey and to attend a virtual meeting using Adobe Connect to learn the product.
Contact the Center for Teaching & Learning for more information at
ctl@mesacc.edu or (480) 461-7372.
Course Design: A Blueprint for Success
Are you looking for tools to take your course to the next level? Do you want to incorporate design strategies that focus on student success?
Join the MCC Center for Teaching & Learning for our Course Design Series. This 3 part series focuses on the best practices in course design pedagogy. Take this opportunity to participate in a highly engaging and collegial process of mapping and aligning your course and building informative assessments linked to your learning objectives! Sessions beginTuesday, September 9.
Review the full schedule below! Course building teams welcome! Faculty Professional Growth (FPG) pending approval for Part 2 & 3.
Register through HRMS (Time & Labor System) Registration Instructions
Having Trouble? Call us at (480) 461-7331 and we will register you.
Part 1: Curriculum Mapping & Lesson Design – FPG Approved!
Learn more about Faculty Professional Growth (FPG), including how to apply.
Session Description: In this session, you will design a curriculum map based on the most relevant concepts related to your course and competencies to build thematic units. Using this map, you will create a unit alignment by writing measurable learning objectives that connect your course materials and assessments to the course competencies.
Session Dates: (Select from one of the following)
Tuesday, September 9, 3:30pm – 6:30pm
COURSE #001760, Session #0009 Register through HRMS
Friday, September 19, 9:00am – 12 noon
COURSE #001760, Session #0010 Register through HRMS
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The New MCC Canvas 101 – Student Orientation to Canvas Revamped!
The MCC Canvas 101 Student Orientation course has been revamped. This self-enrolled, self-paced course was first made 2 years ago when MCCCD transitioned to Canvas. It is given out by faculty to orient students to Canvas. It is also published on our MCC eLearning web site, Center for Teaching & Learning Canvas Tutorials and other locations.
What’s New? MCC Canvas 101 Reloaded
The course had become a bit out-of-date so we took the opportunity to overhaul the entire orientation and have some fun! We beefed up the content to match the wider feature set of Canvas since we created the original Canvas 101 course 2 years ago and made the the content more responsive so that won’t be out of date every 3 weeks when Canvas make an update. We also gave it an overall design facelift and an option for students to either take the full orientation (or approach modules ala carte). Finally we added some engaging gaming strategies with the use of digital badges to encourage students to go through the tutorial.
The improved course includes:
- All the relevant Student Canvas Tutorial Videos (embedded so they will be up-to-date at all times) and narrative with links to guides that are kept current by Canvas.
- Additional assignments for students to try-out Canvas features, specifically working in the Canavs Group Feature.
- A more course like feel with and opening module that explains the purpose of an learning management system and specifically the advantages of Canvas to student learning.
- Narrative and content to cognitively wrap students with a deeper understanding of how Canvas works, the expectations of how they should work in it (profile image professionalism, netiquette) and the resources available to them when they need help (HelpCenter, Canvas Guides, etc.).
- Digital Badges that students can earn for completing each module. This is administered by Credly, a free service. Learn more about digital badges – Educause 7 Things You Should Know About Badges.
- A final certificate of completion that can be earned if a student returns a survey telling us about their experience.
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Interested in Teaching Online/Hybrid or Web-Enabled Classes?
Prepare with CIS 236 & 237 at Mesa Community College this Fall Semester
The CIS 236 and CIS 237 series is designed to help you get started in teaching & learning in the hybrid and online formats or to support you in web-enabling your ground/face-to-face course. First, experience the ‘student’ perspective and discover new digital teaching tools in CIS 236 and then explore course design and content creation in CIS 237. Instructors will complete the series with practical tips, researched pedagogy and a duplicative structure for building and facilitating an online or hybrid format class.
Advantages of the Open Entry / Open Exit Format
Mesa Community College is offering CIS236 and CIS237 in the Open Exit/Open Exit format for the Fall 2014.
Flexible Learning!
- Pick your own start date (8/25 – 10/17)
- Set your own pace over an 8 week period
- No hard deadlines.
Enroll Today
Enrollment through My.Maricopa.edu.
- Complete your Student Information Form
- Register for Class
- Pay for the course, Learn About MCCCD Tuition Waivers: http://www.maricopa.edu/publicstewardship/resources/tw.php
If you have difficulties registering or have questions about these courses, contact the instructor:
CIS 236: Web Based Teaching & Learning I (2 credits), Section #28083
Experience using a web-based learning environment from an online student’s perspective. Use communication tools, submit assignments, use evaluation tools, and navigate an online-learning environment. Introduction to the basics of online pedagogy and lots of hands-on experience with a web-based learning environment and digital teaching tools! Prerequisites: CIS133CA or CIS 133DA, or permission of instructor. Contact instructor for override code.
- Offered fully online during Fall 2014 (Open Entry/Open Exit) – Choose a start date between August 25 and October 17. Students will have 8 weeks to finish the course from the start date.
CIS 237: Web Based Teaching & Learning II (3 credits), Section #28084
Discuss theories, methods, and best practices for designing, developing, and delivering an online course including Classroom Assessment Techniques, Flipped Classroom, Quality Matters and more. Create an online or hybrid course module using a web-based learning environment. Prerequisites: CIS 236, or permission of instructor. Contact instructor for concurrent enrollment code (allowing students to take CIS236 and CIS237 simultaneously).
- Offered fully online during Fall 2014 (Open Entry/Open Exit) – Choose a start date between August 25 and October 17. Students will have 8 weeks to finish the course from the start date.
Canvas User Update: Fall Start-Up
Important Canvas Notices
- Course Copy: The course copy process continues to improve in functionality. Now you can more easily select items that you want to copy from a course, rather than deselect content. Don’t forget to use the Adjust Events and Due Dates option to save yourself time. Please note it can take up to 2 hours for copies of courses from one semester to another to be completed (size and traffic determine speed). Feel free to leave the copy page or logout of Canvas while the copy is being made. Additionally, pay close attention to any error notices at the end of the copy process. Review any alerts reported (posted notice in the import history) and take corrective action. Errors will most often be related to broken links or empty pages. Please see our copy guidelines to get you started.
- Publish Course Items: Publish any quizzes, assignments, discussions, content pages or modules that should be visible to students prior to publishing your course. Publishing the course will not publish items within the course that are still in “draft state”. Learn more about the draft state in the recent update section below.
- Course Publish: Don’t forget to publish your course to make it available to students. To publish the course find the publish notice dialog box on the course home page. Select Publish and follow the screen prompts. Once a course is published you can continue to make changes and updates as needed. Courses cannot be unpublished once students have submitted work to the course. Directions for publishing courses.
- Special Tools & Publisher Integration Changes:Due to recent changes to several of our special integrations in Canvas including ShareStream, Pearson and McGraw Hill you may to re-integrate these tools to ensure that they are working properly. For Pearson integrations users will need to use themaricopa.instructure.com log-in to access Pearson materials. If you are using one of these products, contact the MCC Center for Teaching & Learning atctl@mesacc.edu OR (480) 461-7331 for additional details.
Canvas Update Cycle
Canvas is on a 3-week update-release cycle. The next beta (preview) release is on 8/25, production notes will follow on 9/2 with the release and documentation to follow on 9/6.Follow the release schedule on the Canvas Updates Calendar.
View More Notices
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