Technology & Instruction for UNEX

In this lesson, we will see how to set up categories in the Moodle grade book and use the categories to generate a weighted final grade. In most cases, this is an easier method than creating a custom formula for the final grade. Access the Grade Book Once you have added the graded activities to your class, login and click on the Grades link in the Settings block. Grade book The grade book's default view, Grader report , will list each graded item, with one column for each item and one row for each student. We will be organizing the items into categories and adding a total number of points to each category based on a 100 point scale. For each category, we will use the average score, assuming that all items in the category carry equal weight towards the final grade. Locate the Grader report menu in the upper left. Change to Full View Click on the Grader report menu and choose Full view . Full view Full view displays the graded items ...

Textbooks can be incredibly expensive. The 20 Million Minds Foundation is doing something about it. Cover the Cost Contest -  The 20 Million Minds Foundation: With skyrocketing textbook costs creating a major barrier to higher education affordability, we want to give students a chance to share how this affects their lives. To do so, we're asking students to submit a 30 second video or 250 word essay describing how they cover the cost of textbooks. Three winners will receive a book scholarship worth $2500. http://bit.ly/coverthecost

Restricting access to course activities and resources isn't something I use in my own classes and I'm not a big fan of overdoing it with this feature, but there are times when it comes in handy. This lesson covers how to set up access restrictions for everything in one week in a Moodle class. Edit the Weekly Summary Turn editing on and click the edit icon under the dates for the week you wish to restrict. This gives you access to the weekly Summary. Set up the restrictions There are a number of options that can be set to restrict access. The simplest approach is to have the week become visible to students at a specific date and time. To do this, click the Enable button next to Allow access from , and choose a date and time. For many students, it may be more convenient if the material is available a few days before the week officially starts, so in this example, I have set it up so the week of August 20-26 will become visible on August 17th. You can a...

On the Internet, Nobody Knows You're the 'Wrong' Professor , by Stacy Patton, describes the experience of Karen McArthur, who discovered that an online class she developed on art appreciation without additional compensation, had been given to two others who then taught using her materials, course design, etc. It is an interesting and disturbing story and one that I think will become even more common as online learning expands. The growing use of adjuncts and the commoditization of teaching and learning in higher education, along with the push to put more classes online and the ease with which one course can be copied into another one all contribute to the problem. I had the experience of teaching an online class developed by someone else only one time and I found it odd to use another person's materials and hear their voice on recordings in the class. It's obviously less work, but for me, it wasn't something I would want to do again. Almost all of our ins...

We have two free classes for instructors available for registration for the Fall quarter. Instructors who will be teaching online or hybrid classes during the Winter or Spring quarters are required to complete Teaching Online with Moodle (online or hybrid format) or demonstrate equivalent experience prior to teaching their first class. 142MSCC02  - Teaching Online with Moodle - starts  October 1 , 2014  – Hybrid, 4 weeks; Meetings at UCR Extension on Oct 1 and 8, 4:30 – 6 PM This class covers the basics of teaching online and using Moodle along with new features of Moodle 2.4 and Adobe Connect. Participants learn about the online environment as they participate in the class and complete assignments. Development of a detailed course syllabus is the final project. Emphasis is on the unique features of online teaching and learning, and the transition from face-to-face to online. 142MSCC01 ...

A recent podcast/documentary by American RadioWorks, “The Science of Smart,” explores how research on learning can be applied to instruction and improve outcomes for students. Segment two, “Learning to love tests” and segment three, “Variation is the key to deeper learning” present concepts that can work well with adult learners. The podcast can be found at the American RadioWorks website: http://www.americanradioworks.org/documentaries/the-science-of-smart/ I also enjoyed the first segment on dual language immersion programs and the new findings that students in such programs actually do better, not worse, than students who are receiving instruction in one language. Years ago, I planned to enroll my sons in the local elementary school's bilingual magnet program. As it turned out, the program was primarily a magnet for students who spoke Spanish rather than English. Such students did not do well on standardized tests given in English, so that particular elementar...

Short article with good ideas about professional development from Edudemic