Category: Online Education News You Can Use

Faculty Support for In-Person Instruction

Hello Faculty,

After almost two long years, many of us will be returning to campus in some capacity starting the week of February 22nd. There are some fantastic resources available in this email to help faculty prepare for in-person instruction for next week. In addition, PDP + C3 are working together to provide:

  • Drop-In Zoom support for Faculty who are returning to campus
  • In-person tours and C3 meet ups

Resources for Returning to Campus

Start here to learn about returning to campus.

  • Teaching in Person: Lessons from Fall 2021 – Watch the Zoom Recording
    Taya Lazootin, Lynne Miller, Jim Sullivan, curry mitchell, dara, Robert Perry provide helpful classroom tips.
  • Return to Campus Instruction – Information for Faculty – Watch the Zoom Recording (start around 15 min mark)
    Jonathan Fohrman, Nick Mortaloni, Al Taccone, Wendy Stewart, Freddy Ramirez provide procedural information about returning to campus.
  • Return to Campus website for Employees

Faculty Support Drop-In over Zoom

First time on campus? Or, even your first time on campus in two years?

C3 Meet Up

Did you know the C3 Teaching + Learning Center is available 24/7 to all faculty?
In addition, you can stop by the C3 space February 22nd, 23rd, or 24th anytime between 11am-1pm. Lauren will be there with snacks and a masked smile 😊 I hope you’ll stop by and get a chance to connect with other faculty in person, even for a moment.

Wishing you a great return to campus!

Lauren McFall, Denise Stephenson, Lynne Miller, and dara

Feb 2022 MiraCosta Faculty Online Support 💥now with weekly challenges!

February is already here! Still polishing your class design and online teaching skills? There are so many great opportunities and resources!

First I want to highlight something 💥 brand spanking new 💥 . Our MiraCosta Online Mentor faculty and instructional designer are putting together a series of weekly challenges to be held throughout this spring!

  • Each challenge will enable you to make a small but important improvement to your classes
  • Each challenge is designed to require no more than 3 hours of your time
  • You are welcome to participate as much or little as you like
  • The challenges will be based in our new MiraCosta Teaching Collaborative space in Canvas (feel free to take a peek!)
  • The first challenge will start on Feb. 7 – look for more info coming soon!

Beyond that, I invite you to check out our TIC home page which includes essential information for any MiraCosta faculty member teaching using online technologies. It now includes:

Finally, a reminder that Student Online Academic Readiness workshops are continuing this week and next – please share the schedule and signup form with your students if you’d like to encourage them to attend a one hour workshop where they will get tips on Zoom, Canvas, time management, online library resources, and all the amazing forms of support that MiraCosta provides to them online.

– Jim

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

C3-2-1 Newsletter – Spring 2022 Week 1!

Welcome Back Faculty,

I am the Interim Coordinator of our C3 Teaching and Learning Center

I hope this first week back is as productive, stress-free, and enjoyable as possible during a time of continued upheaval. I want to start by thanking Denise Stephenson, Debby Adler, the PDP Committee, and the amazing FLEX week presenters for bringing us such relevant and exciting topics. I know many of you are in the middle of teaching (or even reworking) your courses for the mostly online start to our semester. As isolated as some of us may be feeling, know that you are not alone. My hope is to find creative ways to connect with you and to help you connect more with one another.

These weekly newsletters feature 3 resources related to teaching and learning, 2 online tips and tricks, and 1 question for reflection.

C321 Newsletter. Resources, Tips & Tricks, and Reflection

(3) Resources

  1. Watch the FLEX Week Keynote with Fabiola Torres or consult the Becoming Equity Champions resource she created for MiraCosta. If you’re feeling motivated, consider taking more courses with Fabiola and her peers through @ONE’s Equitable Online Teaching series.
  2. You’re teaching online, and you want to run an idea by someone. Connect with a MiraCosta Online Mentor. And, our Instructional Designer Nadia Khan is offering drop in times this week, too (or schedule a consultation with Nadia year round)! These options are all free, easy, and super helpful!
  3. With the many changes, it can be hard to keep up. It’s difficult to fully imagine just how much this is impacting our students. Here are some quick resources that you may want to have handy to share with students:
    Spring Return to Campus information for Students
    Student Support Guide 2022
    Student Online Academic Readiness workshops
    CARE Emergency Grants and Technology Requests

(2) Tips & Tricks

  1. Are you struggling to connect with your online students? Try Pronto – this quick Canvas/Pronto video will you get started.
  2. Turn videos into interactive experiences using Studio. Learn to use Studio Quizzes and Annotations.

(1) Question

  1. How are you connecting with your students and colleagues? How would you like to better connect?

Looking for archived resources, tips/tricks, and questions?

Revisit the past editions of the C3-2-1 Newsletter.

Want to share? 

If you have some resources, tips/tricks, and questions to share, please contribute to the newsletter using this C3-2-1 Form.

With recognition and respect,

Lauren McFall
Interim Joyful Teacher in Residence/
Coordinator of the C3 Teaching and Learning Center
Web Services + Emerging Technology Librarian

Instructional Design Drop-in Sessions 1/24-1/28, 2022

Dear colleagues,

Kudos to all of you for all the work you’ve done in preparation for the start of term next week. I wish you all the best as you welcome your students next week.

I am an instructional designer at the college, and I’ll be hosting drop-in instructional design sessions next week to support faculty with course and instructional design.

Drop-in if you have a question related to online teaching, or if you just want to bounce off an idea or two about course design.

Instructional Design Drop-In Sessions:

Monday, Jan 24 –11:00 a.m. –1:00 p.m.
Tuesday, Jan 25 – 1:00 p.m. –3:00 p.m.
Wednesday, Jan 26 – 10:00 a.m. –12:00 noon
Thursday, Jan 27 –11a.m. —1:00 p.m.
Friday, Jan 28 –9:00 a.m. –11:00 a.m.

Zoom link for all drop-in sessions:
https://miracosta-edu.zoom.us/j/96513923710?pwd=Nkt3YjJIdzRQQUVjNkxRcjRQdHpyZz09

Have a restful weekend,

Nadia Khan 
Instructional Designer
My Pronouns: she, her, hers
https://calendly.com/nkhan-mcc/30min

Spring 2022 Online Teaching @ MiraCosta

Quick reminders for all faculty of important online-focused resources to help you prepare to help your students succeed this spring!

Support for You

  • Open faculty support hours during Flex Week have been added to the Flex week schedule: Wednesday night 7-9 pm, Thursday 9-11 am, and Friday 1:30-3:30 pm. Drop in for 1-1 support from online teaching expert guides with any question you might have as you prep for spring! There are still many fantastic online-focused Flex workshops coming up, too.
  • Our Canvas start-of-term checklist can help you prepare your classes.
  • The MiraCosta Online Class Quality Guidelines provides MiraCosta requirements and recommended practices for online instructors.
  • Ongoing faculty support – You can request an appointment from MiraCosta Peer Mentor Facutly and/or from our Instructional Designer anytime. Just click a link to get started. 
  • Tech Support – Canvas options include 24×7 phone and chat support. Just click the Tech Support button at lower left in Canvas! Zoom tech support for faculty is available through the MiraCosta employee help desk.
  • MiraCosta technologies supporting online teaching and learning – please see the last section of this email for an overview, with links to learn more.

Support for Your Students – Please help your students to be aware of and make use of these important services and resources!

  • Student Online Academic Readiness – In collaboration with the library, I’ll be offering about 20 workshops during the spring – see all dates and times on the TASC site and in Canvas announcements. These workshops (formerly known as Student Orientation to Online Learning) help to familiarize students with the resources MiraCosta provides online to support them, as well as to adopt habits and attitudes of successful online students. Encourage your students to attend and, if you like, find out which of your students participated in order to incentivize their attendance.
  • Online Student Support Access Points – the Student Support Hubin Canvas, accessed via the Student Support button on the left in Canvas gives quick access to online support from the library, STEM & MLC, online tutoring, writing center, counseling, career center, open computer lab staff, student help desk, health services, CARE team, and more! The Help Hut on the MiraCosta website is also a quick way for students to connect with all kinds of support services including A&R and Financial Aid. The Student Support Guide is a PDF providing an overview of all MiraCosta services.
  • Tech Support – Also at lower left in Canvas is a button for students to quickly access Tech Support options, including 24×7 phone and chat support from Canvas, and our local MiraCosta student help desk.
  • Technology Needs? – Be sure to share the CARE form for students to fill out if they need a laptop and/or hotspot to succeed this spring.

And please remember, in support of students: Class Availability in Canvas – Faculty teaching distance education (online and hybrid) classes are expected to make their classes available by mid-day on the Monday of the week in which they begin. To learn more, please see MiraCosta Distance Education Class Authentication Compliance, Start-of-Term Availability Procedures, and Recommendations.

MiraCosta’s Online Education Tools

Click the link immediately after each bullet for a detailed MiraCosta-specific overview of each item below. This is not intended as a comprehensive review of all technologies for online teaching supported by the college, but rather a quick look at the essentials available to all faculty. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have questions about these or other resources.

  • Canvas – the #1 tool for faculty and students
  • Zoom – Many of you are again using Zoom, at least to start this spring. Please make sure you’re using a pro Zoom account through MiraCosta.
  • Canvas Studio – This great tool enables faculty and students to create videos while inside Canvas. Faculty can create interactive discussion or quiz activities based on video.
  • Pronto is an incredible mobile-friendly and Canvas-integrated messaging platform that’s ready to use in every course.
  • NEW Perusall is a social annotation tool available within Canvas that makes it easy for students to comment/discuss right on a text, document, or image.
  • NEW Lab Archives Electronic Notebook is an online notebook especially useful for translating lab manuals and student notes/work into the online environment.
  • Pope Tech  helps faculty detect and correct accessibility issues within Canvas. See also Tips for Creating Accessible Course Content.
  • Ally automatically converts content you share through Canvas into multiple formats for students, allowing for listening rather than reading and better access to content on mobile devices.
  • PlayPosit – This video interaction tool offers more complexity and options than Studio. Studio is a great place to start, but if you’re looking for more question types to add to your videos, PlayPosit is a great option. 
  • Turnitin – Many faculty use Turnitin to help students learn to properly cite sources and avoid plagiarism, as well as to assist with grading and peer review processes for written work.
  • Productivity Software, Hardware, and other resources for working from home – this AIS website includes a number of links to helpful resources for being fully equipped when teaching from your home.

Best wishes for a strong start to spring!

– Jim

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

1 … 6 7 8 9 10 … 38