April 1, 2015
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on Ed Tech Team Vancouver Summit, featuring Google for Education
Conference website: https://bc.gafesummit.com/2015/ Venue: Mulgrave School (holy cow – what an incredible learning environment!) As you enter the school, on the left is a large reception desk and on the right is a 5-foot in-wall gas fireplace with couches surrounding … Continue reading
December 23, 2014
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on Extra credit assignments in Blackboard
What’s the best way to handle an extra credit assignment in Blackboard’s Grade Center? There are a couple of ways you can do this. These suggestions assume you are not weighting grades: Option 1: For the extra credit assignment set … Continue reading
December 12, 2014
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on Make it Stick
I recently completed three short papers based on Make it Stick (2013) by Brown, Roedinger, and McDaniel for a class I’m taking and thought I would share my work. I enjoyed the book and it confirmed many of the techniques … Continue reading
November 4, 2014
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on Lessons learned from Hangout on Air Presentation
Getting ready for a presentation delivered using Google Hangouts and recorded and viewed on Youtube takes some prep time. Presenting with two others on Oct 16 in an eCampus Teaching Tips Live session, was a great experience and I learned … Continue reading
July 17, 2014
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on The Whale and the Supercomputer
by Charles Wohlforth I read this book with a group of friends who have formed a reading group. Together we’ve read a variety of books but to date, the books about Alaska, the Yukon or the Arctic and its people … Continue reading
July 14, 2014
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on Writing, drawing, or other creative prompts
Send a tweet of “i” or “inventory” to @YouAreCarrying and receive back a random list of items. Use this list as a writing prompt for creative writing, such as an adventure story or for poetry. According to https://www.gamezebo.com/2014/07/04/carrying-minimalist-text-adventure-twitter/, the twitter … Continue reading
June 12, 2014
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on Fulfilling writing requirements in an online environment
One advantage that most asynchronous online courses have over face-to-face courses is that historically, there are more requirements asking students to submit multiple writing assignments. Both informal writing that can be captured through an online discussion, and formal writing, as … Continue reading
March 27, 2014
by Heidi Olson
4 Comments
UAF’s Blackboard was recently updated to Service Pack 13 (SP13). There are several new features that have been added for increased functionality, as well as solutions to some issues with the previous version. Some features that were added include: Achievements … Continue reading
March 26, 2014
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on Storytelling in Earth Sciences
I was intrigued by the title of this article and thought it might give some suggestions for how science teachers might engage more students through storytelling practice. I think it has become clear that whatever discipline you are passionate about, … Continue reading
February 7, 2014
by Heidi Olson
Comments Off on Thoughts on New Horizon Higher Ed 2014 Report
The New Media Consortium Horizon Report 2014 Higher Education Edition was recently released. This is always a good read and I appreciate the depth from which their research reaches. There are several pages of information on the process for conducting … Continue reading