#auc09 The fun and power of using Macros in ANGEL for Web 2.0 content to embed in courses and share with others is Very Impressive. Looking forward to sharing.

Day One at #auc09 is Done

Just wanted to give a report on the topics covered as the SBU team spread out to cover the topics of interest. From the Plenary, Ray Henderson's report card and demo on version 7.4 was worth enduring the rest for. Google content, rubric enhancements, Institutional Directory, and some really nice additions for the Gradebook, were all very impressive and exciting.

For the sessions that covered the rest of the day, we found out details about such things as:

• Evergreen Training
• Upgrading to 7.4 details
• Integrating Google Docs
• iTunesU and ANGEL integration
• A Second Life dropbox which is integrated into ANGEL
• How to provide student identification verification
• Promoting Higher Quality Online Discussion and Interaction
• Use of Rubrics in version 7.4

Tomorrow's sessions will carry us into mid-afternoon, and then the journey home.

In a hands-on session at #auc09 about Second Life. Looking forward to hearing about the ANGEL Learning dropbox for Second Life, a great aide to use for class!

Very excited by the ANGEL 7.4 report and demonstration. As great as 7.3 is, these latest features are Fantastic! Looking forward to install and use of 7.4!

We've Arrived at ANGEL User Conference 2009

And by we, I mean Peggy Walden, Scott McNeal, and myself.  The trip went very smoothly, Chicago downtown traffic was a bit brutal, but Google Maps led us right to the hotel entrance.  After settling into our rooms, we gathered our conference materials, attended the welcoming reception, then met to make plans for Thursday morning and settle on the sessions we are going to attend.

For more information on the conference, please visit:

http://www.angellearning.com/auc/ 

And to follow the chatter about AUC09 on Twitter, try:

http://twitter.com/nealcross 

or

http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23auc09 

I plan to blog at least at the end of each day, and might even try some blog posts via SMS from my phone.  Now, time to check on e-mails and such!

Some ANGEL first steps

OK, it's May 2009, and your Summer and/or Fall 2009 courses are now on:

http://angel.sbuniv.edu

Instead of Blackboard. You login, but you are not seeing any courses? You just need to change the settings on your Courses Nugget:

1. Hold your mouse cursor over the Courses nugget, then click the pencil icon that appears in the colored bar with the word "Courses" in it.
2. Change the "Show Disabled" setting from No to Yes.
3. Checking the other options helps keep your courses organized by Semesters and Categories.
4. Click the Save button, and now your Courses nugget shows all those courses.

If you are using your course, and you are now ready to let your students see the course, you'll need to change the status from Disabled to Enabled:

1. Go into the course, and then the Manage tab (far right across the top).
2. In the Course Settings nugget, click the General Course Settings link.
3. Click the Access tab, then change the "Member Access" setting from "Editors Only" to "All Members".
4. Click Save.

Now, if you go back to the ANGEL Home, you'll see in the Courses nugget that the course is no longer Disabled.

If you have any questions or comments about ANGEL at SBU, please send an e-mail to:

angel AT sbuniv DOT edu

TLT Conference and other foods for thoughts

Two weeks from now, I'll be travelling to attend Purdue's Teaching and Learning with Technology conference.  Not only do all the presentation topics sound great, but the first morning keynote is by Sarah "Intellagirl" Robbins.  I was fortunate to meet her in Second Life (two years ago, at least?), and have viewed a few of her presentations virtually since then.  The slides from a March 2009 symposium presentation she gave is certainly some good food for thought:

The Seven Deadly Sins Of Technology In Higher

View more presentations from Sarah Robbins.

I plan to use some manner of blog and Twitter combination to cover the journey and conference, which happens to (of course) embrace the use of tools like Ning and Twitter:

Twitter:
Follow @TLTConference on http://twitter.com/. Be sure to use the hashtag #tlt09, can look for the hashtag via http://search.twitter.com.

Ning:
Join the conference social network http://tltconference.ning.com.

A blurb about Twitter

I've been using Twitter.com for almost a year now, and have more than once thought that watching the Tweets from those I follow is like getting a peek into what humanity is thinking about at anyone time.

My Tweet

And I recently viewed this Rocketboom.com video, "The Twitter Global Mind" that does a nice job of exploring and explaining that idea:



Not using Twitter.com yourself yet? Might want to consider it.

More Sir Ken Robinson

Thanks to one of the many folks I follow on Twitter.com, earlier today I was able to listen live to most of an interview with Sir Ken Robinson, whom I've posted about before on his Ted talk. The program link is here:

KUOW 94.9 Public Radio

And here is the recorded Podcast file

Another January 2009 Faculty Workshop Presentation

Ed Walton gave a presentation about Library Tips and Tricks, and afterwards asked for me to share it via my blog. So, I've used this as an opportunity to use two different methods; Slideshare.net and Google Docs.

Library Tips & Tricks - Faculty Workshop Spring 2009

View more presentations or upload your own. (tags: resources library)

January 2009 Faculty Workshops

I am presenting two topics during the workshops:

Instructional Design with ANGEL = a look at the pedagogical why and how for what you can do with your ANGEL course, for supporting your face to face class, or a hybrid class, or even a fully online.

http://prezi.com/4627/

Reports and Automation in ANGEL = Wish you had a graduate assistant for your classes? Wanting to save your self some time and effort? Wish you could provide a more interactive course? We'll take a look at how you can check on things in your class with Reports, and how that same information can work for you by making Agents do the work automatically.

http://prezi.com/4643/

And these are my second and third Prezi.com presentations.