Blogs have become common tools for communicating and collaborating online. While setting up a blog takes only a matter of minutes, effectively incorporating blogs into online teaching requires purposeful planning and structuring of activities to leverage the power that blogging brings to the learning environment. This presentation I gave at the 2009 SLATE Conference shared the experiences of incorporating instructor and student blogs into an online course as well as practical recommendations for those considering utilizing blogs in online learning. Sample instructor and student blogs as well as activities designed specifically for blogs were reviewed.

In addition to recording the session using a FlipVideo camera and sharing via Vimeo as well as a podcast in iTunes, I also experimented with live streaming the session using Twitcam. My colleague, Stephanie Richter, moderated the live stream / Twitter comments. The interactive online handout contains all the links, screen shots, and examples that I shared and/or referenced. Enjoy!

Cite this presentation as:

Rhode, J. F., & Richter, S. L. (2009, Oct. 16). Blogger beware: Teaching with blogs best practices. Presented at the 2009 SLATE Conference, Chicago, IL

I’m leading the following hands-on workshops at the 2009 Faculty Summer Institute at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Follow @fsi and #fsi09 on Twitter.

Rhode, J. F. (2009, May 19). Getting started creating web pages with Google Sites. Presented at Faculty Summer Institute on Teaching Technologies, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. | handout | links |

Rhode, J. F. (2009, May 19). Quick and simple creation of educational tutorials. Presented at Faculty Summer Institute on Teaching Technologies, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. | handout | links |

Rhode, J. F. (2009, May 20). Mastering micro-blogging. Presented at Faculty Summer Institute on Teaching Technologies, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. | handout | links |

Rhode, J. F. (2009, May 20). Web 2.0 gizmos and gadgets. Presented at Faculty Summer Institute on Teaching Technologies, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. | handout | links |

Several weeks back I came across Prezi beta that claims to allow,

…anyone who can sketch an idea on a napkin to create and perform stunning non-linear presentations with relations, zooming into details, and adjusting to the time left without the need to skip slides.

Have you ever been in a presentation that dragged on and on?  Or perhaps are you looking for an alternative approach to presenting information in a concise and memorable way?  Then you need to give Pecha Kucha a try!

Pecha Kucha is a presentation format (usually creative) in which information can be easily and informally shown. This presentation style started back in 2003 in Tokyo, Japan, by Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham. Originally, this presentation form was created for young designers to meet, network, and show off their work.

The idea behind Pecha Kucha is to present information in a concise way. Each presenter is allowed to show 20 images, with 20 seconds per slide. The goal of the presentation is to keep interest high and information flowing. Pecha Kucha has sprung interest all around the world and currently occurs in over 157 cities.

Since there are no restrictions to the type of information presented in a Pecha Kucha style presentation this formula can be used in all types of learning formats. As several of my students have pointed out, there are numerous applications for how this type of abbreviated, engaging presentation format in any number of contexts.

Here’s a sample pecha kucha presentation to get a taste of what the impact is like…death to bullet points!

I’m giving a presentation at the 2008 Sloan-C International Symposium on Emerging Technology Applications for Online Learning on the topic of socially constructed self-paced learning environments. In particular, I discuss the implementation of CMUOnet, an instance of the Elgg open source social application engine, for fostering organic, informal interaction among participants in an online self-paced professional development certificate program.

The slides for the presentation are available here along with the links I reference.  If I am successful in recording the audio for my presentation, I’ll eventually add there here as well as on my edtech podcast.

My department at NIU has been working on a new endeavor we are calling “Quick Tips for Effective Instruction” in which we are putting together short multimedia presentations (5-8 minutes) to introduce faculty to different resources and methods for teaching and learning.  The presentations are made available in a variety for formats, for viewing either online, as a podcast, or even via YouTube.  

Here’s an example of the low-res version of one of the presentations available on YouTube:

For links to other formats of the presentation, such as hi-res online and the text transcript, click here.

The Northern Today, NIU’s weekly online newsletter, recently did a feature article on the project. To read the full story, click here.

This past week I gave a presentation at the 2007 SLATE Conference on the topic of Web 2.0 tools and integration with learning management systems.  Below is the citation for my talk along with links for the handout and audio recording of the session.

Citation:

Rhode, J. F. (2007, Oct. 5). Web 2.0 gizmos and gadgets: Moving beyond the walls of Blackboard. Presented at the 2007 SLATE Conference, Chicago, IL. | handout | links | recorded audio [mp3] | podcast [xml] | podcast [iTunes] |

I put together this presentation as part of a larger initiative to train NIU faculty on the use of a new podcasting building block in Blackboard.

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For the highest quality version of this tutorial, view the flash version. Also, this presentation is posted in .mov, .m4b (enhanced podcast), and on YouTube.

I put together this talk to explain in layman’s terms the technological framework and rationale for social bookmarking. This was my first attempt at creating a QuickTime video from an enhanced podcast episode.

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The enhanced podcast episode [.m4b] that this video was created from can be downloaded here or simply by subscribing to my enhanced podcast in iTunes.

The slides for this talk can be viewed here.