WCU's Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence

April 2017

Greetings,

The end of the Spring 2017 term is growing closer, and it's time to start planning for the next semester.  One great way to get better prepared is to attend the NEW and IMPROVED Summer Institute for Teaching and Learning (SITL) at NCCAT on May 16, 17 and 18.  On the 16th, the CFC will host a day-long Quality Matters workshop focused specifically on aligning your courses and programs with peer-reviewed standards of quality. Quality Matters is specifically tailored for online courses, but the methods and standards of the program are applicable to improving all areas of instruction. On the 17th and 18th, the CFC staff, together with faculty facilitators, will be presenting eight mini sessions over these two days on faculty-requested topics that have been proven to improve student learning and engagement. For more information on SITL or to register, please check out the article below.  We hope to see you at SITL 2017!

Martha Diede, PhD
Director, Coulter Faculty Commons

P.S.: Please excuse our mess - the CFC is currently experiencing renovations and have temporarily relocated to HL156 and HL166.  If you get a chance, stop by and visit with us!

Upcoming Events:

May 16, 17, & 18, 2017 (9am - 4pm each day)

It's time to mark your calendar and register for the New and Improved Summer Institute for Teaching and Learning (SITL) which will be held at NCCAT this year!  We have redesigned this seminar to give faculty more of what they want and need to be successful in the classroom.  The theme for this year's SITL is "Take Your Teaching to the Next Level."  There will be an all day Quality Matters workshop, followed by two days with four distinct and exciting mini sessions each day.  Each session is geared towards helping faculty to improve, enhance, and innovate their teaching techniques.  Lunch, snacks, and drinks will also be provided each day.  Remember, if you want to Step Up your teaching, please join us for SITL 2017!  For more information check out the CFC's Web Page or our Faculty Resources Web Page.  The SITL Agenda is also available here. 

To register for one or all sessions, please click here.

Topics to be covered:

In addition to the specific sessions listed below, we will be offering General Course Improvement with 1-on-1 assistance all day on Day 2 and Day 3 for any Blackboard, Panopto, Collaborate, Course Design, Pedagogy, or any other area that faculty would like assistance with.

Day One (May 16, 2017) Applying the Quality Matters Rubric to Your Online Course: This will be a day-long workshop where you will learn about some best practices of course design based on Quality Matters guidelines.

Day Two (May 17, 2017) Mini Sessions will be: Student Learning Outcomes, Online Teaching, Research-Based Teaching Practices, and Teaching with Technology

Day Three (May 18, 2017) Mini Sessions will be: Student Learning Outcomes - Assessments, Universal Design (UDL), Applying Research-Based Teaching Practices, and Writing for Research

We Want to Help Share Your Innovative Work

Please continue to think of the CFC as one of your continuing resources as you constantly work to improve your practice.  We are often asked to make recommendations about technologies, innovative classroom practices, methods of student engagement, and modifications in course structure.  We are also often asked about how faculty members use innovative practices at Western, and we are charged with helping faculty and programs to scale effective practices when possible.   If you are doing innovative work in the classroom and want to share your methods more broadly, we would love to help multiply your efforts.   

Let us know more about what you are doing at any time by using the "Let Us Help You Multiply Your Innovation" link below.

Blackboard Collaborate Workshops

Are you teaching online this summer or in the fall?  Come learn more about how to setup and use Blackboard Collaborate, WCU's synchronous software for real-time class meetings and/or presentations. These workshops will cover the technical requirements of using Blackboard Collaborate, along with how to add Blackboard Collaborate to your courses, how to setup sessions, how to share documents or screens, and how to record your sessions.  The workshops will be held on Wednesday, April 12, 2017, from 10:00am – 11:00am, in Hunter Library - Room 186 and Thursday, April 20, 2017, from 1:00pm – 2:00pm, in Hunter Library - Room 245.  To register, please click here.

Important Information for Faculty:

Pilot Classroom Design Feedback Survey

As WCU explores Active Learning/BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) classrooms, like Forsyth 313, the Coulter Faculty Commons is gathering feedback to gain a better understanding of what faculty think about these pilot classrooms.  We need your input to guide the design of future WCU classrooms.  By completing this survey, you will help WCU to move forward with classroom designs that successfully integrate innovative technology, which in turn will help to promote group learning and allow students to become more engaged, invested, and enthusiastic active learners. 

If you have visited or used Forsyth 313 since it was redesigned in January 2017, please take a moment to complete this survey by clicking here.

Blackboard Process Upgrade

The LMS Team at the CFC is planning a minor upgrade to the processing between Banner and Blackboard on Wednesday, May 25, 2017. There is no downtime expected and we hope to shorten the time between updates during the day to Blackboard to every hour instead of every two hours. We are also working as part of the upgrade to include users “preferred” name rather than their formal names in our Blackboard Environment. Please be looking for these changes starting during the summer term.

More Resources:

Blackboard Online Help
As the Learning Management System utilized here at WCU, Blackboard enhances the quality of online and face-to-face instruction and is used to monitor, document, and manage online and classroom events and assignments.  The LMS Team at the CFC has put together a handy list of resources for Blackboard, tailored to meet the needs of the WCU Community.

Blackboard Supported OS and Browsers
We all know that technology is changing more rapidly than most of us can keep up. With that said, the link above shows the operating systems and browsers that are currently supported in our version of Blackboard here at WCU. As always, please make sure you have stable Internet connection and that your computer is free of malware.

Highlighted Learning Videos on WCU's Panopto Features Page
We've customized the first entry landing page on the Panopto home page.  We'll be putting up-to-date focused videos in this space and changing them monthly, so make sure to take a look and to suggest more content.  To view the videos, please click the link above and log into Panopto.

Provost's List of Faculty Resources
There is a considerable amount of helpful information on this web page provided by the Office of the Provost. Information concerning faculty awards and recognition, support and development, to forums, gender equity, and policy and procedures is available on this site.

CFC Resources Online
The CFC works to keep our main web page updated.  We'd love to have you click in for a visit.  We also have a Faculty Resources Blog where we post additional resources and announcements as we get them.

IT Training Opportunities
The Division of  IT continues to provide training opportunities on Microsoft products for faculty and staff.

CFC Suggestion Box
We would greatly appreciate any feedback you could give us about how we can improve or add to our services.  We regularly monitor this suggestion box, located on our main web page, and try to respond to suggestions as quickly as possible. We thank you for taking the time to provide us with your constructive and formative feedback!