Author: Jim Julius

MiraCosta Online Ed Updates: Mid-Semester edition

Good stuff here for all faculty – not just those teaching online. Please read on!

Canvas Conference online tomorrow (10/26)

Ready for some new ideas on effective uses of Canvas? The Can-Innovate online conference is designed by and for the CCC system. You can register and attend independently, or you can pop in to the new C3 Teaching & Learning Center space in the OC Hub (OC 1252 & 1253) to catch as many sessions as you like throughout the day (tomorrow, Friday 10/26). There’s also an open Canvas course with slides and other resources for every session. This is, of course, Flex-eligible!

Spring Class Schedule is available!

That means three things:

  1. Classes assigned to you in SURF are available for you to begin developing in Canvas.
  2. If any of your spring classes are Zero Textbook Cost (ZTC) or Low Textbook Cost (<$40), you should designate them as such in SURF.
  3. If you are teaching online or hybrid spring classes, you can provide more information about them for students in the Online Course Schedule. . Please note: if you have done this in the past by copying text from Word or other sources, you may have introduced HTML that causes your course description to be inaccessible. Please type directly or copy in plain text only.

Want to learn more about Open Ed Resources & Zero Textbook Cost materials?

Check out the MiraCosta OER/ZTC website, starting with a curated set of texts and Canvas shells useful for many GE classes.
Consider registering for and attending a regional OER/ZTC summit on Nov. 9, 8 am – 2 pm, at Grossmont College.

Video Management System coming – interested?

The MiraCosta Online Educators committee is preparing to select a video management system to pilot this spring at MiraCosta. This will enable faculty and students to easily record, manage, and share videos within Canvas. Faculty will be able to get detailed information about student viewing of videos, discussions can be tied to different points in videos, and quiz questions can be inserted within videos. Please let me know if you might want to be part of our evaluation process.

Fall Student Orientations to Online Learning complete

Nearly 240 students attended a Student Orientation to Online Learning session this fall, and nearly 2700 have attended since 2014. If you want to give extra credit to your students for attending, you can run a report in SURF to see which ones participated. 

Jim Julius, Ed.D.
Faculty Director, Online Education

Academic Integrity and Canvas Exams

Though cheating is certainly not unique to the online environment, many instructors have  reasonable concerns about opportunities for students to cheat online. These concerns may include:

  • inappropriate access to resources when completing an online assessment
  • copying answers or text found online
  • sharing answers with other students
  • contracting with a third party to complete online classwork

There are many approaches to decreasing the likelihood or ability for students to cheat in the online environment.

Course Redesign ideas:

  • Consider including more formative assessments and activities, and making high-stakes objective assessment a smaller portion of the overall course grade.
  • Get to know your students to help them be more personally invested and to help you recognize individual student voices.
  • Integrate and encourage student use of institutional support resources such as tutoring as part of the learning process.
  • Design assignments that enable/require students to include unique, personally meaningful perspectives and details.
  • Consider combining or replacing objective tests with other methods of assessment, such as projects, collaborative work, writing assignments, and personal reflections.
  • Consider designing tests as open note/open resource so that you do not get caught in an “arms race” with students.
  • Multiple choice and essay questions requiring application of skills and knowledge rather than simple factual recall are harder to cheat on.
  • Consider requiring students to turn in drafts of projects and written work (for feedback from instructor and/or peers) well in advance of a final due date.
  • Include a variety of student-to-student interactions and group activities. For group work, ensure that assessment practices don’t allow non-contributing students to receive the same grade as other group members.
  • Alter assignments and tests from semester to semester.

Proctoring: For objective assessments critical to the learning outcomes for an online course, consider using the MiraCosta Proctoring Center. For students at a distance, the Proctoring Center can help to establish proctoring in other locations. [Note: during spring 2021, the Proctoring Center will have limited availability. Consider using Zoom to proctor objective online assessments yourself.]

Code of Conduct and Instructor Leadership: Discuss with students the reasons why academic integrity is important. Emphasize the benefits (and pleasures!) of truly engaging with course material and learning, rather than focusing on grades. Have students sign or even jointly develop a statement summarizing the expectations and requirements for academic honesty. You might also refer to MiraCosta’s

  • Standards of Student Conduct, AP 5500
    Students must refrain from engaging in … Cheating, plagiarizing, or engaging in other academic dishonesty
  • Academic Integrity policy, BP 5505
    MiraCosta College highly values academic integrity. At the core, this means an honest representation of one’s own work. MiraCosta College also promotes the approach that education is best accomplished as a cooperative, collaborative enterprise in which students are encouraged to work with and learn from each other. The line between academic integrity and collaborative education is not always easy to define and may vary from one discipline to the next and from one instructor to the next. Many aspects of cheating and plagiarism are universally recognized, while others are subject to debate. This policy provides some broad, general guidelines and allows instructors to be more restrictive according to their preferences and practices. Examples of academic dishonesty include but are not limited to:
    A. Cheating: Copying from another student or using unauthorized aids or persons during an examination.
    B. Plagiarizing: Copying someone else’s work or ideas and misrepresenting them as one’s own.
    C. Falsification: Making up fictitious information and presenting it as factual or altering records for the purpose of misrepresentation.
    D. Facilitation: Helping another student to cheat, plagiarize, or falsify.

You might include a question on exams that has students agree to the code of conduct and/or that has students indicate that they have completed the exam on their own without using prohibited resources.

Making Canvas Exams More Secure

When conducting tests through Canvas, the following methods can further reduce the risk of cheating. Note that as of fall 2020, Canvas has two different tools for conducting tests – Quizzes (the original) and New Quizzes. New Quizzes is still being developed; at this time it has both advantages and limitations (view a comparison and/or a New Quizzes FAQ) compared to the original Quizzes tool, but it is expected to eventually fully replace the original Quizzes. Canvas guides for both Quizzes and New Quizzes are given for each item below as applicable.

  • Availability Window – Restrict the availability of the test to a specific date/time range. Quizzes | New Quizzes
  • Time Limits – Limit the time a student can spend on a test once they start it. Quizzes | New Quizzes
  • Disallow Multiple Attempts – Multiple attempts is a great option for a “mastery” quiz where you want students to retake it until they achieve a certain level of proficiency; this isn’t typical of a summative, high-stakes assessment. Quizzes | New Quizzes
  • Delay Per-Question Feedback (Quizzes only) – Providing students feedback on each question can help them learn; delaying the availability of this feedback until after the test availability window is over can help ensure the integrity of the exam. Quizzes [As of spring 2020, if feedback is built into a New Quizzes assessment, it is provided to students immediately and cannot be delayed.]
  • Answer Randomization – Answers to multiple choice questions can be randomized/shuffled so they are presented differently for different students. (Note: In Quizzes this is one setting for the entire quiz; in New Quizzes this is a per-question setting.) Quizzes | New Quizzes
  • Present Questions One at a Time – This can make it more difficult for students to “collaborate” if questions are also randomized. An additional option can prevent students from going back to previous questions, which can further strengthen the integrity of the exam, but can also frustrate students who legitimately realize they made a mistake on a previous question and wish to correct it. Quizzes | New Quizzes
  • Shuffle Questions (New Quizzes only) – This will present the quiz questions to students in random order. New Quizzes
  • Question Randomization with a Question Group/Item Bank – Drawing questions randomly from a pool (or pools) can make it even more difficult for students to productively share questions during an exam. Keep in mind that if your pool contains more questions than the number of questions you are drawing from the pool to go into the exam, you need to be careful about maintaining consistency of the questions within the pool (both in terms of outcomes measured and difficulty of the questions). Quizzes | New Quizzes
  • Calculated (Formula) Questions – Formula questions can include a range of values for one term/variable. Thus, the same question will have unique answers across different quizzes, but the question can still be auto-graded. Quizzes | New Quizzes
  • Require Presentation of ID – if you are not using a physical proctoring center, but you would like students to demonstrate that the person taking the test is the person enrolled in your class, one suggestion is to have students record a brief video holding a picture ID next to their face. If you use Proctorio, this step can automatically be included when enabling video proctoring; if you don’t, you could add an Essay question that directs students to access their webcam through the Rich Content Editor and record this. Of course, this requires students to have a webcam (and still wouldn’t prevent the student from doing this, then having someone else complete the rest of the exam). Quizzes | New Quizzes
  • Restrict Computer Activity During Exam – Technology such as Proctorio enables faculty to require that student’s computer and browser are “locked down” during an exam, preventing students from opening other browser windows or applications, taking screen captures, etc. This requires specific technology on the student computer. Note that Proctorio works only with Canvas Quizzes, not New Quizzes.

Online Ed Info for ALL MiraCosta faculty

Happy fall, everyone. Please see below for important online education-related updates and information for all MiraCosta faculty.

Canvas Updates

Lots of new features are available in Canvas, which is now the sole course management system at MiraCosta. These include a more streamlined way to use Turnitin, an updated Gradebook, a brand-new Quiz feature, a new integrated accessibility checking/correction tool, and more. Read more.

If you are still getting familiar with Canvas, remember to check out all the great Canvas resources we provide, and at this time especially our Start of Semester Canvas Checklist.

Online Academic Support Resources for ALL Students

As you finalize your syllabi and course resources, please make your students aware of online tutoring, online writing center, and the 24×7 online ask-a-librarian service. These services are open to all MiraCosta students in any class!

Preferred Name Change Form for Students

Students who prefer to be known by a different name from their legal/formal name on record may change their name via SURF – instructions are here. Preferred name is used in Canvas, on class rosters and student ID cards, and to borrow items from the college library. Students may also stop by Admissions and Records to submit a paper Preferred Name Change form.

Designating Zero- and Low-Textbook-Cost Classes

If you are teaching a ZTC or LTC class this fall, please ensure it is designated as such in SURF – see directions to do so.

You can view more details about ZTC and LTC designations, as approved by the Academic Senate.

For faculty teaching at least one online/hybrid class this fall:

Fall Student Orientations to Online Learning

I will offer many online learning orientation sessions this fall. Please share the schedule with your online/hybrid students and encourage their attendance. Read more, including how to get a report from SURF on which of your students attend.

Online Class Schedule – UPDATE and beware HTML

For all those teaching an online or hybrid course this fall, please make sure your class description is up to date on the separate Online Class Schedule page. Students use this page to learn how to get started with your class, and you can provide other important information to help students prepare for success. See detailed instructions if needed. Please note: if you have done this in the past by copying text from Word or other sources, you may have introduced HTML that causes your course description to be inaccessible. Please type directly or copy in plain text only by copying from NotePad on a PC or TextEdit on a Mac.

CCC DE Faculty Survey

The California Community College Chancellor’s Office conducts annual surveys of faculty and students involved in Distance Education. Be on the lookout this month for a survey if you taught a DE class in the spring, and please take the time to complete it – your input is invaluable!

Come on and Zoom-a-Zoom-a-Zoom-a-Zoom!

You might have to be of a certain age to get that headline. Anyway, Zoom is a great tool for live online interaction that has now replaced the old CCC Confer (Blackboard Collaborate) in the CCC system. Learn more about Zoom.

NetTutor Online Tutoring Service

In addition to eTutoring, an online tutoring option for MiraCosta distance education classes is NetTutor. Unlike eTutoring, NetTutor provides extensive coverage up to 24×7 of just about any academic subject, and is available via a link embedded within Canvas. The link would take students directly to the subject-specific tutoring area with no additional login required. Also with NetTutor, each instructor may specify “Rules of Engagement” that inform tutors about the approach and resources you would like them to use when working with your students. Contact me if you’re interested in NetTutor for your fall class(es).

Distance Education Requirements and Guidelines

Please review the MiraCosta online class quality guidelines. The document has two parts – (I) Essential elements for all distance education classes as already required in department and college policies (especially AP 4105 and the Syllabus Checklist), and (II) Good practices featuring principles and examples commonly recommended for consideration in online education.

Captioning Support

Videos included in your online course materials should be captioned. 3CMediaSolutions is a video storage and streaming system for California Community College faculty that provides free professional captioning as an option when you upload your media to the site. It’s a great way to manage your media and to get everything captioned. You can also work with Robert Erichsen of DSPS to submit media for captioning through a special grant-funded program. Please contact him to learn more: rerichsen@miracosta.edu

Jim Julius, Ed.D.
Faculty Director, Online Education
miracosta.edu/online | tic.miracosta.edu
OC 1254, MS 11A
1 Barnard Drive | Oceanside, CA 92056
(760) 795-6745

@jjulius | Linkedin

 

Countdown to Canvas: 6 weeks to go

Please be sure you have extracted everything you need from Blackboard and Moodle, since access to those systems ends on June 30. See Considerations in Leaving Blackboard and Moodle for more details; for quick guidance on downloading class gradebooks and archives, see directions to do so for Blackboard or for Moodle.

Further, please consider carefully:

  • Are there old courses that you haven’t taught for some time, but you don’t want to leave behind? Don’t forget those!
  • Are there old courses that someone else in your department taught, but that person has since left MiraCosta, and your department has permission to reuse course content? If so, contact Karen Turpin (kturpin@miracosta.edu) for assistance in bringing such content over to Canvas.

Finally, if you are still getting up to speed on Canvas, keep in mind:

  1. The plethora of great locally-developed and selected Canvas resources available to you.
  2. The 24-7 instructor hotline for Canvas support – it remains available throughout the summer: 1-833-345-2890 and is your best option for quick “how do I do this in Canvas” or “why isn’t Canvas doing what I think it should do” types of questions.
  3. The TIC will be closed for its transformation into the brand-new Teaching & Learning Center during the first part of the summer, but Karen and I are working and available to you throughout the summer – feel free to contact either of us with questions that go beyond what the Canvas hotline can provide.

 

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