“Food” for Tech Help
Notice: Effective immediately; there has been a slight change to receiving assistance form Educational Media Technologies personnel. We ask that you donate a can or boxed item for every technical question we assist you with or idea we inspire you with. This new "can...
Time To Reflect on Competency-based Learning
At the November Faculty Friday Forum sponsored by NMC’s Center for Instructional Excellence, four questions about competency-based learning were posted. As I struggled to organize responses to this hot topic into a meaningful context, Mark DeLonge suggested Jimmy...
The Joy of Public Speaking
There's been a commercial on TV recently about glossophobia, or the fear of public speaking. It's an advertisement for a new Google tablet, which does seem pretty cool, but the message about overcoming speech anxiety is even cooler. Watch it now: Google Nexus 7...
How Much is Too Much?
I find myself struggling with the technology question, how much is too much. Or, more realistically, how much is the right amount. I am a stickler for working out a problem yourself, but there are some problems I like to assign that are too time consuming, or the...
Accessibility – Testing Accommodations
I am often stopped and asked a variety of questions regarding the students with disabilities (SWD) here at NMC. Many of those questions revolve around the approved accommodations. In the next several editions of this column I’ll share some of those in a Q & A...
Learning debt
Lately I've been studying Agile Programming. One idea new to me is the concept of "technology debt." The gist is this: if developers choose to release a version of software with fewer features or more bugs than planned and desired, they accumulate a debt that must be...
“Messy” Questions Often Elicit Critical Thinking
One strategy to elicit critical thinking is to omit important facts when presenting scenarios to students for classroom discussion. Often instructors take considerable care in class to articulate each important fact within a particular scenario that students will...
Searching for the Somatic (week 2)
My writings involve movement descriptions taken from my classroom. I am trying to bring the reader into a dance classroom to catch a glimpse of movement education. "Today we will start facing away from the mirror. Although the mirror serves as an important tool in...
It’s a Lesson…It’s a Study Guide…No, it’s a Moodle Quiz!
That’s right! Ever thought about using a quiz for a lesson? Or how about as a study guide? It’s easy, and it’s all in how you set it up. Instead of an assessment tool, re-purpose as an active learning activity where students can: Watch a video clip. Go to websites...
Thinking Inside The Box
Thinking Inside The Box By Brian Sweeney I spent two years in Germany with the U.S. Army, providing bomb disposal support to highly classified missions. I would get a call telling me to get to an airfield within usually 6 hours, without being told where I was going...