NEW CANVAS CAPABILITY
Canvas, our open online learning management system, recently announced the immediate availability of a new annotation feature in its mobile application. This new functionality allows students to open, annotate, and submit an assignment directly within Canvas. Historically this has been accomplished through a third-party app, which can create an additional expense for our students. Providing one platform where all of these capabilities reside eliminates the need for students to buy additional software and reduces the need for paper, both cost saving actions. The mobile annotation feature allows instructors to spend less time demonstrating procedures for moving and transitioning digital assignments and more time teaching. Digitizing assignments inside Canvas also allows instructors to grade assignments using the Canvas SpeedGrader. Read more here.

ENGAGEMENT IN THE ELEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

Learning is about personal relationships. Deep learning doesn’t happen through reading or rote memorization online any more than in the physical world. It is the experiences and meaningful conversations (or maybe human interactions) within a course that enable students to critically reflect, and deepen their learning. All too often, online students feel isolated, which can decrease motivation and increase attrition. When learning occurs entirely through computer-mediated instruction, professors often overlook simple steps like asking participants to introduce themselves. Details like asking your students to create a video introduction to a class can have a powerful impact. Video-based introductions can help develop a community of learners more quickly than simply posting text on a discussion board. Students who are in courses with introductory videos have been shown to actively participate in online discussions very early in the course. And research shows that learners who are more engaged and have higher levels of interaction, have higher success rates. Read more here.

THE FEEDBACK IS FOR YOU
The classroom is a non-stop hub of feedback: test grades, assignment scores, paper comments, peer review, individual conferences, nonverbal cues, and more. Feedback is essential for student learning. Still, students’ ability to process and use feedback varies widely. We have some students who eagerly accept feedback or carefully apply rough draft comments, while many others dread or dismiss their professors’ notes or reject exam grades as “unfair.” Although feedback is integral to our classrooms and work spaces, we often forget to teach students how to manage it. Two Harvard law professors, Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen, argue that identifying different kinds of feedback is a good place to start. Continue reading here.

THAT FEEDBACK REALLY HURT
It took fewer than three semesters for Michael Howell to realize that he might need to change how he provided written feedback to his students. Dr. Howell, an associate professor at Appalachian State University, used sarcasm and wit in feedback to students during his early years as an instructor. Students complained that the feedback was negative and unhelpful. In one case, his feedback provoked a tearful response from one “grief-stricken” student. “Worst of all, most students were not performing any better on later assignments, despite being provided with copious, and what I considered helpful, feedback,” Howell writes. “Most of my feedback was simply being disregarded.”Howell shares his personal reflection in the introduction of a scholarly article published in the latest issue of the Journal on Excellence in College Teaching. Howell reviewed the literature and identified five essential principles of written feedback for college instructors to follow. Check out “The Feedback 5”.

QUICK ACTIVE LEARNING EXPERIENCE
Integrating active learning experiences into your class can be simple and allow you to gauge the learning that has occurred. Here is one example called "Student Response to a Demonstration (or Other Teacher-Centered Activity)." After a classroom or laboratory demonstration, the instructor asks students to write a paragraph that begins with the phrase “I was surprised that . . . , ” “I learned that . . . ,” or “I wonder about. . . .” This lead allows students to reflect on what they actually got out of the teacher’s presentation. It also helps students realize that the day’s activity was designed for more than just entertainment. To find more quick and easy ways to implement active learning opportunities in your class, take a look at the Active Learning Manual on the Teaching and Learning Faculty Development page under Modules on Canvas.

WRITING AS A GROUP
Are you interested in how to promote collaborative learning among university students via instructor-guided writing groups? Faustin Mutwarasibo has an interesting article based on her research. She writes, "In their responses, students acknowledged having improved their interpersonal and collaborative skills through writing groups. Students also indicated that, while discussing and interacting with their group members and with the support from their instructor, they improved their English, gained new ideas and perspectives, and learned better about text coherence." Some strategies are proposed on how an instructor can help make group work a relevant and effective learning tool in the full article.

HOW AM I DOING
It is about that time when we begin to give some sort of assessment, whether it is tests on the first 3-4 chapters, a writing essay, or some other formative assessment that is usually medium to high stakes. So I thought I would spend some time on this topic. First, I would like to urge you to strongly encourage your students to partner with a study-buddy or to create a study group for each of their classes. Research proves over and over again that these types of collaboration are significant. If they are looking for study space, send them to the Academic Learning Center first. They can also access tutors to help them in their review. You might even ask them what day and time they are meeting so that you can stop in and answer any questions they may have.

LET'S START A STUDY GROUP
Dr. Maryellen Weimer has written a nice synopsis about ways we can help students improve their study sessions. She writes, "How should I be studying for the exam? Students tend to be pretty generic in their thinking about study strategies. “I’ll go over my notes” and “I’ll reread what I’ve highlighted in the text.” If your students don’t have stellar study skills, a list of possible study strategies might be helpful in guiding this discussion in small groups or with the whole class. Recommend what research in cognitive psychology has shown promotes learning and test performance: studying for shorter periods across several days, testing knowledge with questions (those in the book, provided by the teacher, or made up on their own), working on different types of problems, reviewing with a study buddy, and reworking (not recopying) class notes." Continue reading her article here.

POST-ASSESSMENT IS CRUCIAL
We know why we are giving assessment tests, papers and the like but are you sure your students truly understand the purpose? Any type of graded material that provides good feedback will allow the student to understand just what they have or have not learned. It can be an indication that they have learned the material well enough to move on or they may need to return to some of the resources to better understand the material. Pointing that out to them is vitally important. Lolita Paff has a good post on her blog about other types of assessment follow-up that can be beneficial for your students.

Do you have a no-tech policy in your class? Do you encourage the use of cell phones, tablets, and laptops during your class? There are arguments for both and more faculty seem to be taking sides. Dr. Laura Tropp has an interesting post on her blog about this topic and writes, "It seems that people tend to be divided into two camps: those that have given up (or are adapting to the new technology environment, which sounds better) and let their students use the screens, and those that enact strict rules and policing policies to prevent students from using screens while in the classroom. I have found myself sitting in both camps in the past. This summer, however, I am noticing that those in the former camp are thinking about reverting to a no-technology policy because they think it is interfering with students’ ability to focus and reflect. Clay Shirky, a Professor at NYU who specializes in emerging media technologies, wrote an interesting piece last fall about his new policy to ban all screens in his classes. He even made an intriguing analogy comparing technology in a classroom to second-hand smoke. However, many faculty have responded that banning technology does not work but only creates a deceptive culture in which students slyly sneak their technology use in class." Read the entire post here.

Are you spending part of your summer on a course redesign project or maybe you are focusing your attention on creating a master syllabus. Both of the projects, one small and the other very labor intensive, are worthwhile and lead to many benefits for you and your students. Dr. Vicki Caruana has a nice article in the Faculty Focus online newsletter about how a course map can help you remained focueds on the important outcomes. She writes, "Course mapping, as a step in the curriculum mapping process (Jacobs, 2004), offers faculty new pathways to meet shared outcomes. The five principles of curriculum design (Fink, 2003) inform the development of learning experiences that are structured in such a way that they scaffold student thinking and progressively move them toward the desired course outcomes. A course should: (1) challenge students to higher level learning; (2) use active forms of learning; (3) give frequent and immediate feedback to students on the quality of their learning; (4) use a structured sequence of different learning activities; and (5) have a fair system for assessing and grading students." Read the entire article here.

There is nothing so dispiriting for teacher or for student as a discussion section in which questions fall flat, conversation drifts aimlessly, and a small number of predictable voices predominate. That is the opening sentence of Dr. James Dawes article concerning class discussions. He offers a list of ten strategies to help you bring out the best in your students. Read the entire article here.

LEARNING MADE EASIER
IDEA provides some great tips on how you can help your students learn fundamental principles, generalizations, or theories. How can students show they “comprehend” a principle, generalization or theory? Bloom describes three ways. First, they can restate the principle, generalization or theory in their own words, which Bloom calls translation.  When asked what is Newton’s third law of motion, the student might answer, “It’s when two things hit each other, they push each other equally in opposite directions.” Bloom states that translation can take one of three forms: translation into the student’s own words, as we’ve just seen; translation into symbolic form e.g., from verbal to graphical form (inserting arrows into a picture to depict the forces operating on the chair in the example above); translation from one verbal form to another, e.g., metaphor, analogy. Read more here.

DOES LEARNING STOP
Most of us can describe what good teaching looks like and many of us accept the premise that learning occurs when student accept the new knowledge and are able to apply it to different contexts. But when does learning end or does it have to? That is the basis of Dr. Maryellen Weimer's latest blog post. She writes, "With courses ending so definitively, it’s easy to think that whatever impact you or the course might have on students is over. But learning doesn’t always end when the course does. Some insights and understandings are iterative and cumulative. Students arrive at them after repeated exposure, as the evidence mounts and their skills and experiences deepen. Other intellectual development happens when students are finally ready to learn.Read more here.

HOW MUCH FEEDBACK IS ENOUGH
Are you sure that the feedback you are providing to your students is really helping them? It is a question that nags at us. We want to provide enough feedback to help our students from repeating the same mistakes. We also want them to learn from what they did right and wrong. But we are always concerned about giving feedback that demotivates our students. Dr. Matt Gomes and doctoral student Noel Turner offer their own take on this dilemma. They suggest that we have students identify a specific outcome or assessment criterion they are concerned with, and respond only to that concern. When Dr. Gomes uses this strategy, the question becomes “What does this student need to do in order to perform better along specific project goals or assessment criteria? What do they need to do to become a more reflective writer (project goal) or to organize their claims effectively (criterion)? This strategy has the added benefit of prodding him to specifically elaborate on his understanding of outcomes or assessment criteria." Read more here.