May 24th, Canvas Show and Tell

This Thursday, starting a little after one PM, Pacific, I will be logged into the eLearning Community Collaborate room.  There are many of us in Washington State (and outside Washington) who are currently trying to learn everything we can about Canvas.  I hope others will join me for an informal conversation and show and tell session.

Thanks,
Scott Dennis

Canvas Walkthrough Recording Link Available

Hello All,

It looks like we had 137 attendees at the live Canvas demo and Q&A session that Renee Carney of Lower Columbia College did for us last week.  Wow, a new record!

If you missed the session or what to review, here is the recording link:
https://sas.elluminate.com/p.jnlp?psid=2012-05-17.1144.M.1286F0C21FA258F7D83EE80B8FA025.vcr&sid=2008170

Tegrity Users Conf Recordings Now Available

The Tegrity Users Conference was held in Seattle on April 19th and 20th.  Tegrity has now released a list of session recordings from the conference.  You will find them here:
http://goo.gl/lQ02f

Canvas Walkthrough

Thursday, May 17th, at 1 PM, Renee Carney will conduct a live tour of the Canvas learning management system and answer questions about user experience.  This meeting will utilize the Blackboard Collaborate web conferencing system.  There is no cost and all are welcome to attend.

After a year of research and soliciting feedback from stakeholders, in March a committee with representation from across the Washington community and technical College system and all six state universities chose Instructure Canvas as the learning management system that will replace ANGEL at many colleges and universities.  Lower Columbia College conducted Canvas pilots in winter 2011 and is currently involved in full migration from ANGEL to Canvas.

In case you missed it, Renee as previously presented to this group.  She did a Canvas related presentation on March 15th.

Tegrity and iPads in the Classroom

I’ve been interested for some time in how instructors are using iPads in the classroom so I was particularly excited to attend “Tegrity + Tablets = A win-win for connected instructors” at the annual Tegrity Users Conference last week in Seattle.  Professor Kevin Walters demonstrated an intriguing set of techniques that I couldn’t wait to try myself.  He has figured out a way to walk into any classroom on his campus and , without installing anything on the lectern computer, have the presentation that is displayed on his iPad screen appear on the overhead projector in such a way that he can walk around the room, advancing his slides and writing on them with a stylus.

Step-by-step here is what he does:

1.       Save his presentation to dropbox as a PDF.  He also uses PPspliT, which is a PowerPoint add-in that splits animation effects into different slides.




2.       Open the presentation on the iPad using a ten dollar app called Air Sketch, which lets you annotate PDF documents and images live. On the iPad you can an IP number that you can then copy into the browser window of a computer on the same local network and then annotatefrom the iPad in real time.

3.       Start recording from the lectern PC using Tegrity.

All the processor and network intensive stuff happens on the lectern machine and the iPad just has to run the PDF viewer.

I downloaded Air Sketch and tried it myself.  It worked great on an open network although I have heard of people running into firewall issues on certain campus networks.

Another PDF reader that Professor Walters referenced was GoodReader, which I didn’t try as Air Sketch worked fine.  

Another app that I downloaded (for $5 this time) was Splashtop.  With Splashtop you can do an install on your PC and log into your Google account and then run Splashtop on the iPad and log into the same Google account.  Once you have done this, you can ‘see’ the PC from the iPad and take control.  I was able to run Photoshop, enable VPN, and do anything else my PC can do, but from my iPad – well worth the five bucks!

Another thing that I want to do but have haven’t had success with yet, is to have my iPad view go directly to an overhead projector wirelessly.  I have an iPad to VGA projector cable but to add wireless it looks like I will need to spend $100 on an Apple TV receiver and probably another $50 on an HDMI to VGA adapter for it if I want to use the airplay setup in classrooms with older equipment.

Screenshot from iPad remotely launching Photoshop.

Tegrity Summer 2012 Update

On April 18^th, following the opening general session of their Users Conference in Seattle, Tegrity shared details on changes coming with the summer, 2012 Update (Tegrity does to major updates every year).

According to Tegrity, 44.8% of students report using tablets or phones to view recordings - This summer emphasis will be on improving iPad and android experience - including the ability for faculty and students to make Tegrity recordings with audio, from their Apple iPhone, iPad or Android smartphone!.  Currently students can make their own Tegrity recordings if the instructor has given them permission on a class-by-class basis. Student recording functionality is identical to what faculty can now do: Tegrity will record the student’s computer screen, their voice, and optionally a webcam video. Recordings are stored in each individual class on a separate student recording tab.  Allowing recording from phones and tablets will dramatically improve opportunities for students and faculty members alike.

Kindle fire support coming.  The fire retails for $200 and has a 7” color screen and is projected by some to be an up and coming competitor to Apple’s iPad.

Other summer 2012 improvements include the ability to play from direct links on iOS, the ability to generate alternate formats when recording on a Mac as well as the ability to switch between multiple instructional video sources.

Also coming is multi-screen support for PC, and streamlined upload processing for proctoring recordings (now works in background).

Faculty Panel on Novel Uses of Tegrity, Shoreline CC

Novel Uses of Tegrity to Augment Fully-Online and Face-to-Face Classrooms

On Wednesday, April 11, Ann Garnsey-Harter of Shoreline Community College facilitated a panel discussion of Shoreline faculty members who discussed how they use Tegrity Lecture Capture.  The session was made available to remote participants via Blackboard Collaborate. 

Here is the session description:
Shoreline Community College faculty use Tegrity in innovative ways outside of traditional lecture capture. A panel of SCC faculty (Emma Agosta, Dennis Chang, Dan King, and Kira Wennstrom) will demonstrate how they use Tegrity in fully-online science laboratories, for introductions / tutorials to the online class environment, for remote proctoring, and to “flip the classroom” even in a face-to-face course.  Facilitator: Ann Garnsey-Harter, eLearning.

This session was recorded.

To view the recording, click the link below:

View the Blackboard Collaborate recording