Category Archives: Conferences

Avatar photo

SLATE 2019 Takeaways

Something I like to do for this blog is to post a review of any conferences I attend. My hope is that anyone who is struggling to find the right conference can look at my reviews as a guide to help find the “right fit” for them. 

This year I attended the SLATE conference in Naperville, IL. This was my second time attending and it had been several years since I last attended SLATE. The first time I went, the focus and content within the conference was very BlackBoard heavy. DePaul uses D2L, so the focus on BlackBoard really limited the sessions I could pick from.

I decided to give SLATE another chance this year to see if they broadened their learning management system (LMS) coverage. Sadly, for me, even though it wasn’t as Blackboard-centric, the only other LMS included was Canvas. I found myself with a limited amount of sessions to choose from, again, because the sessions were heavily based around LMS offerings that DePaul does not use. Despite the limited options, however, I did find some sessions that proved to have useful takeaways.

There also seemed to be a focus on new products, rather than new concepts, this year. Which I should preface with at this point, factoring the amount of conferences I have gone to and what I have already learned by working with my knowledgeable colleagues at DePaul, it’s getting harder to go to conferences and have those “eureka” moments. Continue reading →

Avatar photo

Preparing for the Future When the Virtual is so Real

PS4 gaming consoleLike any mom of teens, I am trying to pull my 13-year-old son away from his game console and get him to try something that I think would benefit him for his growth—something like reading!

“But books are history,” Grant claimed. “And this…” he tilted his head toward the screen with his hands still fixated on the bat-shaped controller, “is the future.”

But, Grant, you see, history is…

Continue reading →

Avatar photo

Takeaways from UBTech 2018

UBTech 2018This year for my conference choice I picked UBTech. The conference was held at The Mirage hotel in Las Vegas, baby, and it was during June so you can imagine how the weather was. But as everyone likes to say, “at least it’s dry heat!”

As the name suggests, UBTech is very tech heavy. If you are on a mission to find new technology for your classroom/school, this is the conference to go to. As I am an instructional designer, I did struggle to find topics more geared towards online learning but I still feel I came away with some useful knowledge!

Continue reading →

#GlobalLearning17: Five Reasons Why You Should Attend!

DePaul University and the SUNY COIL Center have teamed up to offer the first-ever Global Learning Conference: Transcending Boundaries Through COIL. This don’t-miss event will be held October 30-31, 2017 in Chicago.

The Global Learning Conference illustrates best practices and innovation in collaborative online international learning (COIL). COIL is an approach to fostering 21st century student competencies through the development of multicultural learning environments that link university or college classes in different countries using online technologies. The conference invites faculty and lecturers, instructional technologists and designers, international education and study abroad managers, and anyone interested in the internationalization of higher education to attend and share knowledge with their peers in this growing field.

Continue reading →

Virtual Exchanges: The Next Big Thing?

In these increasingly unique times, ubiquitous access to alternative facts via the media (both social and traditional) can influence the impressionable minds of our youth—especially those living in homogeneous communities. Now more than ever, it’s imperative that educational institutions expose students to authentic, real-world experiences with diverse people and perspectives around the world.

Study abroad programs have been and will continue to be an effective way for students to garner global perspective and experience cross-cultural collaborations with students overseas. Students are immersed in the culture, history, and heritage of their experience and ideally, take advantage of the opportunity to meet people from diverse backgrounds and viewpoints. Continue reading →

Avatar photo

“Please, do take it personal…”

A few weeks ago, I attended the Brightspace Fusion 2016 conference.  While the conference itself is hosted by the team that develops our LMS (Learning Management System), many of the sessions focused on strong use of technology in general, as well as tested strategies for engaging learners, whether online, hybrid, or in traditional classrooms (in other words, these ideas apply regardless of the LMS you may be using).  If I had to pick one theme that stood out to me most, it would be the idea of personalized learning and instruction.

I know what you may be thinking now—we’ve been hearing about this for years and it still doesn’t seem to be that common, and most people push back by saying they don’t have time for creating individualized items for every student in the class.  I couldn’t agree more; that’s why the point here isn’t necessarily making many individualized items for each and every student, but personalized to different styles of learning, or even to your personal style of teaching your subject.  From what I see, the point here is that much of the content for courses is ubiquitous now—anyone can search online for countless bits of information, textbooks, how-to guides, websites, or videos on a topic; because of this, the real art and strategy of teaching is not so much in what we present, but how we present it.  The personalization is as much about the instructor’s style as it is the learners’ styles—the questions we need to answer are “How knowledgeable and authentic is the instructor? How can an instructor use their personal experiences or examples to make the content more accessible?”

Continue reading →

Avatar photo

How to Give a Kahoot!

This year I decided to attend the OLC (Online Learning Consortium) Innovate conference in New Orleans. The conference was a great experience in part for getting to hear from others in the same field on what their doing to improve online learning and I also had the opportunity to immerse myself in the culture, music, and food of New Orleans; the chance ended up being very fulfilling.

Of the sessions I attended, two in particular really stuck with me. One session, as the title “Don’t Put Your Phone Away” suggests, demonstrated how instructors can incorporate students’ phones into their classrooms. One tool in particular that really intrigued me was Kahoot!. Kahoot! is free tool that allows you to create fun learning games made up of multiple choice questions. You can add images, videos, and diagrams to your questions to enhance them. Kahoot!s are meant for an in-class setting as they are not embeddable in web content. You’ll also want to make sure you are using a classroom that has a projector, as the answer choices will only appear on the screen with a corresponding symbol. This symbol is what students see on their devices. Once they see these symbols, they must select the symbol that corresponds with the answer they want to select.

Continue reading →

Avatar photo

Tipping the Balance Towards Scalability

I attended the Council on Global Affairs’ International Women’s Day Global Health Symposium. The focus of the day was on the health of the next generation for women and girls locally, nationally, and internationally. The keynote panel focused on new initiatives and challenges with implementation. Rebecca Winthrop, the Director for the Center of Universal Learning at the Brookings Institute, talked about the science of scalability and her project, Millions Learning, which “…explores specifically not just how to improve learning, but how to do so in a way that can be efficiently and effectively implemented at a large scale.” Her comments really resonated with me. Specifically, she emphasized that successfully scaling up means releasing the idea of having a “gold plated” model that can be replicated with fidelity. That model is too complex and requires finesse specific to a particular author. When scaling up, sustainability is the goal. To achieve this, the cookie cutter model will not work. Rather, it is best to identify the core “ingredients” and aim to replicate those and then allow the user to adapt to their particular context. This creates a partnership that allows the program to maintain its essential attributes, but allows the user to “make it into their own” and have some ownership. Continue reading →

Courses without Borders: Global Engagement with Students Abroad

DePaul University’s Global Learning Experience (GLE) is a relatively new initiative that was established to provide students with opportunities to engage in collaborative projects, mediated by technology, with students abroad. GLE exposes students, some who have never traveled out of the country or considered studying abroad, with an opportunity to journey to another country via their GLE course without leaving the state.

GLE activities and projects are designed by faculty partners (typically one professor at DePaul and a professor(s) at an institution abroad) and range from concepts such as the creation of interactive, collaborative virtual tours to innovative 3D design projects. Students have a chance to work with their peers around the globe and learn cultural similarities and differences that impact (or don’t impact) collaboration and development.

Some of the residual benefits for students include building an international network of peers and working on teams globally. It’s no secret that companies, educational institutions, government agencies, etc. are eager to find talented graduates with diverse experiences. The University of Southern California Annenberg developed an infographic which suggests that “today’s global economy demands a more unique and effective working environment. Virtual teams consist of employees who are the best people for their jobs, but who are not geographically close to a company’s headquarters”. (USC Annenberg, School of Communication & Journalism). In GLE courses, students are exposed to a virtual team experience and are better equipped for the globalized workforce.

Continue reading →

Avatar photo

The Best Video Conference Tool for People Who Hate Video Conference Tools

For years, faculty have asked me to recommend a tool that would make it easy for them to conduct online video conferences with students. Every time I tried to answer this question, I felt like one of those announcers selling an experimental drug with dangerous side effects. “Do not use Connexium™ if your students are unable to install Java 10.2.9.3 on their computers. Do not operate on low-bandwidth connections or enable video sharing with more than two participants while using Connexium. Connexium is not a virtual whiteboard replacement and cannot be used to record meetings. Ask your instructional designer if Connexium is right for you.”

That all changed when I started using Zoom. Zoom provides the key features most faculty ask for with almost none of the unpleasant side effects that come with other tools I’ve tried. Here are a few examples.

  • Minimal setup and installation – So far, we’ve found that students can join a meeting even if they’re in one of our computer labs or using a computer that doesn’t allow them to install desktop software. (Some of our students connect from locked-down computers at their workplaces, so this is an important feature.)
  • Up to 50 participants per meeting – This is true even for free accounts. For larger meetings, it’s $54.99/month to upgrade to a limit of 100 participants.
  • Android and iOS mobile apps – In my experience, these apps work very well and include the most important features available in the desktop version of Zoom.
  • Screen sharing and remote control – All participants can share their screens and hosts can even take control of a participant’s machine if needed.

Continue reading →