Workshop update and quick course improvements
As the semester winds down, life just gets downright crazy, doesn’t it? I was amazed to see that it’s been a couple of weeks since I last posted! My peer review colleagues and I have been busy getting the May 24-25 workshop planned. As of today, we have 30 people registered. Please reserve your spotsoon, if you’re considering attending! http://www.lsc.edu/online/faculty/ It looks to be a top-notchcouple of days(with great food and a beautiful inn/conference center, too!). We’ll discuss, in great detail, how LSCdeveloped its online course peer review process and participants will walk through an online course while conducting their own review. Other hot topics include assessment and best practices in the online classroom.
We’ve conducted a total of 15 peer reviews this academic year at LSC! Some of the most frequent recommendations to instructors that also happen to be quick fixes are:
- Remove any linksfrom the navigation bar that are not used. Students will likely click on every link to see what’s there. To remove D2L navigation bar links, click on the E button in the upper lefthand corner of the homepage and you’ll find your way…
- Never permanently delete anythingof importance from the news area. Create a “Homepage News Archived” forum in the discussion area and post it there for students to refer back to, if needed.
- Use sans serif typeface such as Tahoma or Verdana instead of Times New Roman for all online documents. It’s less stressful on the eyes (but I’ll be darned if I can figure out how to change the font of this blog)!
- Include an “Ask the Instructor/Ask the Class” forum on the discussion board for student questions. Generally, if one student has a question about something, others do, too. You’ll find that students answer each others’ questions in the forum, too. An added bonus!
- When organizing the content area of the course, place all important course information documents (syllabus, printable course calendar, course overview, etc.) at the very top where students will easily find them.
More next week…
Posted: May 3rd, 2007 under Peer Review.
Comments: 2
Comments
Comment from Webmaster Karl
Time: May 12, 2007, 4:10 pm
Keep up the great work, its looking good.
little tip for “but I’ll be darned if I can figure out how to change the font of this blog”, check the
http://blog.lsc.edu/onlinepeerreview/wp-content/themes/wp-magapress/style.css
the style.css file will show you all the colors and fonts etc etc so you can chenge all in there.
hope this helps keep up the hard work.
Comment from Susan Brashaw
Time: May 12, 2007, 6:11 pm
Thank you!
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