WOOL Blog: Ram-ping Up Your Instructional Technology

As part of The Winthrop Online Teaching Certification (WOTC), the Winthrop Office of Online Learning (WOOL) administers training through two levels which are taught in two online training courses: WOTC 101: Online Course Design and Development Basic, and WOTC 102: Online Course Facilitation and Management. WOTC 101: Online Course Design and Development Basics is the first of two courses offered in the Winthrop Online Teaching Certification. This course introduces participants to the theories behind online learning. Participants will learn the basics of how to design and develop an online course using the Blackboard learning management system. WOTC 102: Online Course Facilitation and Management is the second of two courses offered in the Winthrop Online Teaching Certification. This course teaches the technical and procedural skills integral to facilitating and managing an online course. Participants will master skills learned in the WOTC 101 course in order to design and delive...

The following is a guest post by Dr. Marshall Jones. Dr. Jones is Professor and Senior Director of Learning Technologies and Graduate Studies in the Richard W. Riley College of Education at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, SC USA. Dr. Jones teaches graduate courses in Learning Design and Technology and undergraduate courses in technology integration. His research interests and consulting experience include project evaluation, instructional design, mobile learning, elearning, the design and development of constructivist learning environments, emerging technologies, learning analytics and new media.  For me, one of the most difficult things about teaching online is all of the typing that has to be done. Discussion boards, emails, feedback on assignments, EVERYTHING has to be typed. And even if you're a very fast typist and accurate typist (I’m neither), it will take you a long time. Recently, I've been using voice typing in Google Docs as a way to cut down on typing time. Voi...

If you have been an Office Mix user at any point in the last few years, you should have received the email down below. Microsoft has begun to move the core features of Office Mix Preview into an upcoming version of Powerpont and, in the process, will be discontinuing support for the Office Mix website. Depending on the nature in which you have used Office Mix, you may or may not need to take some additional steps to migrate your Mix content to a new platform. If you only used Office Mix to record audio and video in Powerpoint, simply make sure you know where you have your presentations saved. Presentations saved as regular Powerpoint presentations (.pptx) will not be affected. If you uploaded your presentation to the Office Mix website or used embedded quiz questions , please contact us here in the Office of Online Learning at  instructionaldesign@mailbox.winthrop.edu . We can assist in migrating your content to an appropriate platform to preserve this functionality.

You have probably spent plenty of time in the Blackboard Grade Center. Sometimes, the Grade Center can feel a bit overwhelming and difficult to navigate. One way to make navigating the Grade Center easier is to color code your cells. Setting up color coordinated cells can help you easily identify high grades, low grades, and patterns in student work. In this entry, we will show you how to set up color codes in your Grade Center. In the Grade Center, navigate to the manage tab and select "Grading Color Codes." Color coding is disabled by default, so make sure to check the box at the top of the page to enable the display of colors. You will find two sets of options for customizing Grading Color Codes Grading Status allows you to alter the background color for empty cells. This applies to cells in Needs Grading, In Progress, or Exempt status. In the example below, the chosen background colors emphasize the colors used in each status icon. Here is wh...

I. Test Exceptions Overview You may need to add test exceptions for students who need to take an online test at a different time, need extended time, or have other extenuating circumstances. The following can be created as test exceptions: Number of attempts Timer Availability Force completion Depending on your testing policy, students who have experienced technical issues during the testing session may be provided with another attempt to re-take the test. However, as long as Force Completion  was not checked for a test and the student did not run out of time, then he/she would be able to return to the test and complete it with the remaining time. For this reason, consider using a timer with or without auto-submit instead of the Force Completion setting. II. How to Add Test Exceptions To add test exceptions, you will need to access your deployed test in your Blackboard course and select Edit Test Options . Scroll to the Test Availability Exceptions sectio...

The Winthrop Office of Online Learning (WOOL) is hosting WOOL Week 2018 on March 19-23. In order to join us in this celebration, be sure to read your WOOL Week email in the Winthrop Daily Digest. You'll find a fact about our office and services or Blackboard and a trivia question. Submit an answer to the question by 5pm each day by emailing instructionaldesign@winthrop.edu . One of the correct respondents will be selected for a daily giveaway that will help facilitate your use of technology. On Friday March 23 at 1:30 p.m, we'll celebrate WOOL Week with the Office of Online Learning in 308 Tillman. We will select for one last giveaway to enhance your teaching or daily work experience from all of the week's trivia respondents.

In this post, you will find an overview of the one of the most useful pieces of software available in the Blackboard toolkit: Respondus Lockdown Browser. Respondus Lockdown Browser is a web browser just like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, or Microsoft Edge, but with a few extra features designed for assessments in the modern classroom. Respondus Lockdown Browser works with Blackboard to make exams more secure. When using the Respondus Browser to take an exam, students are unable to open other computer programs, windows or tabs in the browser, and copy, paste, or print. This makes Respondus Lockdown Browser ideal for proctored environments, such as a computer lab or classroom, where students take the exam together and at a common time. For fully online courses where you may never meet your students, Respondus offers an additional layer of security to help ensure academic integrity: Respondus Monitor. In addition to the features of Respondus Browser, Monitor enables a student...