Month: May 2012

I have spent hours looking at the videos on how to use Instructure Canvas. I am still waiting for the new textbook. Apparently it was not ordered by the salesperson and this has delayed the project a bit. I will be working most of the summer to get this imformation into the new system. I am looking forward to getting the book and to begin reading it.

I have been busy with the band and practicing for our gig that was perfomed on Saturday night. Inspite of all the practice there was a lot that could have been improved. Performing on stage is much like trying to get the design for the course worked on. There is always new improvements that will have to be made. Just putting the course online doesn’t guarantee everything will work the way it is suppose to work.

There are some really interesting ways to put the course up online. Charlene is interested in using the assignments method of teaching this class, rather than putting up modules. I have selcted a video that clearly tells the user of Canvas how to do just that.

Grading in Instructure Canvas is seems like a very easy task. I am including a video on how this can be done.

Finally, Charlene wants the activities of her students to be done collaboratively. Canvas lends itself to this type of activity.

Yesterday was Mother’s Day.  We spend a quiet day enjoying our yard. I planted some tomato plants and helped my husband clean up the yard and gardens. It was warm, in the eighties. I sat on the porch and watched the birds and busy insects do their spring dance around the plants and flowers, as the sweet scents pleasured my senses.

There was no flowers, no cards and no phone calls from my children or grandchildren. I had talked with my daughter earlier in the week. Guess the grandchildren are too busy with their lives. I have gotten use to this turn of events through the years. I suspect somehow, in some way this will all come back to them in one form or another. Some younger people, today, do not seem to respect their elders in the United States. This is sad. Most of them do grow older and begin to realize how much this means to them when they have children and grandchildren and they want to have this contact with them.

Today I have been watching videos on Canvas and each time I watch them I learn something new and exciting. I am getting a bit anxious about putting this course up online. There is so much to learn. I am not certain where to start. I find the whole process a challenge and just love the thought of it! I cannot wait to get started!

I met with Robin last week and will meet with Charlene this week. We are waiting for the textbooks to arrive. When they do, we will begin creating a syllabus. Canvas is so different.  I am not certain how to begin. I think it will be a process of figuring it out as we go. I really like the information I found so far. It is easy to figure out and the videos make everything really clear. They can be found on Youtube too.

One of the best tutorials so far can be seen at the following: https://howardcc.instructure.com/courses/32484. The beauty of watching these tutorials is it gives the designer a good look into the various ways you can set up your course and navigate in Canvas. I have seen quite a few of these and find this one particularily interesting. I am hoping that Bellevue College will have something similiar for their faculty to watch.

After meeting with Charlene, she seems to like using Turnitin. This application or tool can easily be used in Canvas: https://howardcc.instructure.com/courses/32484. If the instructor is using this tool for papers in the course it can help with some of the issues involved in cheating. I am including a canvas link to turnitin information, as well as Youtube videos.

I met with Charlene last week. I showed her what I was doing and learning in Canvas. Unfortunately, the videos did not work when I showed her the one I had put in Canvas.. Today, the videos came up and were really great! However, when I tried to update the syllabus, Canvas refused to load. Apparently their website is down for the moment.

On top of this,  I spent several hours trying to get documents attached to my email. I finally had to dump all my favorites  The temperature is about 69 degrees outside; and I have clothes to wash and weeds to pull (everyone got a letter telling us to clean up our yards for Mother’s Day). Right now none of that is happening. To make matters worse, I was called by my supervisor to work for a teammate, this morning. I did not go because I had so much to do. I lost money staying home fighting with a silly computer. Go figure!!

It seems it never rains but it pours. Since I cannot get to Instructure Canvas to get the information I need and to input what needs doing, I am going to watch YouTube video on how to operate Canvas. I have spent many hours now doing just that…watching videos. I am getting pretty frustrated. I have so many unknowns and am supposed to be producing course material at this point. That is not happening! Charlene gave me an instructors manual to go with the textbooks that never arrived because the sales rep forgot to order them. I am not certain when the book will come into Charlene’s department. One more frustration to work around. Do you suppose there are internet trolls that create all this havoc for fun?

I am trying to figure out if in five weeks I have accomplished anything. I meet with Robin on Thursday of this week and feel like I will not be able to show her what the system is capable of doing. I wish I had a few more hours in the day to get all this done. One positive in this situation is the fact that with a little luck eventually everything will work like it is supposed to do. Will I have the time to do what I was trying to get done today? Probably not!

So back to my tale of woe. I had band practice for the last three weeks in my lead’s garage. When I got home last night, I could not sleep. I was up until 3:30 AM. Right now this page is out of focus. While I am trying to work with a misbehaving computer and progs, I am trying to get my laundry done. I have a unmade bed, clothes all over the top of that unmade bed and have banished my poor husband to the front yard to start pulling weeds. Now, if looks could kill, I’d be toast. Okay not really, he went rather willingly. I think he isn’t really impressed with our computers at the moment either!

This all reminds me of why I asked to study under Charlene again. She has the classroom experience and some feel for what will work online. She seems to know instinctively. On the other hand, I think I am showing her how to use the technology to get a totally online class up-to-date with the tools available in Web 2.0. She seems pretty hesitant about using blogs and feedback forms. She has seen that the students in her class have a hard time with attaching documents to emails. I suppose a blog will be too difficult for them. However, grade school children are using these tools. Maybe grade school children are more advanced technological then college students…now there’s a thought!

Our next problem is trying to get a good group activity together for our online course. There are many different ideas and ways to do this. Maybe if Bellevue College offers training on Instructure, the instructors would get more insight on how to use open source materials and technology. I certainly could use course like this myself. I am getting a bit frustrated trying to learn the ins and outs of Canvas via only video tutorials. I need someone with more knowledge to “hand hold” me at this point. Did I really say that?

I am including a video on the future use of technology. Can you imagine have a bad day with these precious creations?