1. Create games/quizzes/activities to make learning fun for your students is easy with a number of software programs available to educators.
a. For MCC faculty, the handiest gaming software to use is StudyMate. You can log on to Softsense Downloads to download your copy (we have a district site license) of StudyMate. Follow the directions on screen to complete the download process. To see the types of games you can quickly create using StudyMate, go to these sites:
- Example No Answer GamesThe CTL offers workshops on creating online games using StudyMate if you are interested. Other tools you can use to create online games include:
b. Powerpoint Games - this site, developed for educators, provides templates for you or your students to create a variety of interactive educational games, such as Jeopardy, Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Twenty Questions, or Hollywood Squares.
c. Flash Learning Games - even more terrific software options!
d. PrimoPDF - free software to convert any documents created on a Windows computer to a PDF file. It works just like Acrobat to create PDF files that will look the same no matter what hardware and software your student is using to view the file.
2. A WebQuest is an inquiry-oriented activity in which most or all of the information used by learners is drawn from the Web. WebQuests are designed to use learners' time well, to focus on using information rather than looking for it, and to support learners' thinking at the levels of analysis, synthesis and evaluation. Many faculty are enthusiastic about using WebQuests to facilitate learning. San Diego State University has created a site that describes how this technique works and provides examples of WebQuests other faculty have created as well as a WebQuest template. Learn more about this strategy at The WebQuest Page.
3. Are you worried about plagiarism in your class? These sites may be helpful:
a. Turn it in.com is an online site that will check for a work's originality. They charge something like 50 cents per student to check all their work for a semester.b. UCLA has a website for calibrated peer reviews.
c. This resource provides suggestions on how to reduce plagiarism.
5. A company called Xanedu will customize a course for you by putting together journal articles or other resources you want for your students. Check it out at Xanedu.com .
6. Your students may find it fun to use this creative online Visual Thesaurus to understand some of the terms in your discipline.
7. James Jacobs has an outstanding list of links to help you create the web pages you want. His site includes directions for making your site searchable by Google. Check it out at James Q. Jacobs Resources.
8. SoftChalk software is an extremely user-friendly way to develop attractive, well-organized web content. To see an example of a lesson created in SoftChalk, go to SoftChalk Example. The district has a license for SoftChalk that faculty can download to their own computers (home or office). MCC faculty can download SoftChalk by clicking on this link. Directions for using SoftChalk can be found at this link http://ctl.mc.maricopa.edu/_resources/helpdocs/how_to/index.html (click on "Web Pages" heading and select appropriate link for How to Use SoftChalk Lesson Builder.
9. If you are teaching math, check out Interactivate: Lessons at http://www.shodor.org/interactivate/lessons/ With the kind support of the National Science Foundation, the Shodor Education Foundation continues to provide a wide set of resources designed to assist educators with the formidable task of teaching young people about math and science. Since 1994, they have been responsible for the Interactivate website, which is designed to create, collect, and disseminate Java-based courseware for exploration in science and mathematics. On this part of the website, visitors can consider some of the 90 items they have created so far. The subjects covered include geometry, algebra, probability, and discrete functions. Within each activity, visitors can read more about the intended audience for each one, and also learn about the prerequisites and objectives for each lesson.
10. Alisha Cooper created a very video on Creating a Grading Toolbar in Microsoft Word. If your students will be submitting papers online for grading, you'll find her suggestions very helpful.
11. Scrapblog.com can create slide shows complete with transitions. This free software can embed links to UTube videos (embedded videos don't work consistently within Breeze). To read more about Scrapblog, see Jeff's posting on the CTL wiki at http://ctl.mc.maricopa.edu/blogcast/?p=123
12. Jing software lets you quickly and easily make a mini-video of what you are doing on the computer (screen captures complete with cursor movements). Each Jing file can't be more than 5 minutes in length and you can't edit out your mistakes (but you can start over). This is a great tool for showing your students exactly what they need to do in your course (like submitting an assignment, posting a discussion etc.) . Find out more about Jing and/or download it at http://www.jingproject.com/
13. A website that provides tutorials for a multitude of software programs (both PC and Macintosh) is http://movies.atomiclearning.com/highed/tutorials/
14. Would you like to create a cartoon caricature of yourself? You
could use this graphic as the icon for the folder that contains
information about you in your online course, include it when you post a
message to the discussion board, add it to emails you send, or use it
any time you want to add a little interest to a document. Use the free
tools available at http://www.weeworld.com
to customize your image. You select the hair style/color, eye color,
clothes, shoes, background, etc. Here is Peg Johnson's weemee : 
Once you've created your weemee, directions for saving it as a jpg file that you can upload anywhere you want are available at http://forums.weeworld.com/forums/p/7747/53797.aspx#53797
15. Project Management Software is available at these sites (identified by Shelley Rodrigo):
zoho: http://www.zoho.com/
goplan: http://goplan.org/
backpackit: http://www.backpackit.com/
CollectiveX: http://www.collectivex.com/
Keep&Share: http://www.keepandshare.com /index.php
16. Browser Applications - Your browsercan be customized, especially if you use Mozilla Firefox (http://www.mozilla.com/en-US /firefox/), which is open source. Some of Shelley Rodrigo's favorites:
Google toolbar: http://toolbar.google.com/
adding search engines to your firefox search in the upper right hand corner of the toolbar: https://addons.mozilla.org/en -US/firefox/browse/type:4/cat :all?sort=namebetter gmail: https://addons.mozilla.org/en -US/firefox/addon/6076
delicious toolbar: https://addons.mozilla.org/en -US/firefox/addon/3615
zotero (research guide): http://www.zotero.org/ http://www.zotero.org/diigo toolbar: http://www.diigo.com/tools
snapper: https://addons.mozilla.org/en -US/firefox/addon/2703
search for others: https://addons.mozilla.org/en -US/firefox/
17. Personal Portals -Shelley Rodrigo is a big fan of these three personal start pages:
iGoogle: http://www.google.com/ig
Pageflakes: http://www.pageflakes.com/
Netvibes: http://www.netvibes.com/
18. Mobile Applications can be very handy for your students who may be accessing their online courses on computers other than their own. If they are working in a public library, they are not able to download specific software you'd like them to have. The solution can be mobile applications - software they can carry around on a thumb drive and run on any computer.Check out portable apps for the thumb drive at http://portableapps.com/
19. Comics & timelines can be useful educational tools. Alan Levine covers the issue at http://cogdogroo.wikispaces .com/StoryTools.
Information on another timeline tool, Circavi, can be found at http://www.circavie.com/
20. Helping students analyze whether they are suited to online learning at the beginning of the course is very useful. Miami University's questionnaire gives students some questions to reflect upon, and guidance as to whether their answers to these questions suggests they will like online learning. See this questionnaire at http://www.units.muohio.edu/cool/self_assessment.html
PODCASTING
Podcasts can add a lot of interest to your class. You can have an audio podcast saved as an mp3 file that students can download to their computer, iPod or other MP3 player. If you have access to a Smart board, you can capture what you write on the board and have students view that as they listen to your discussion. Check out suggestions on how to use podcasts as well as examples of exemplary educational podcasts at Jeffrey Daniel Frey's blog: http://jdfrey.wordpress.com/podcasting-in-education/
Alisha Cooper at South Mountain Community College is the Queen of Podcasting in the district. You can find her excellent tips on podcasting at http://drcoop.pbwiki.com/CoopsWorld
You can even create podcasts by recording audio files on your cellphone and using free Gabcast software. Check it out at http://www.gabcast.com/ . Shelley Rodrigo recommends these other cell phone applications sites as well:
Jott: http://jott.com/default.aspx
GrandCentral: http://www.grandcentral.com/
Utterz: http://www.utterz.com/
Radar: http://radar.net/
DukaBuzz: http://labs.jaduka.com/dukabuzz
DukaLink: http://labs.jaduka.com/dukalink /
Loopnote: http://loopnote.com/
MCC's iTunesU page: /http://itunes.mc.maricopa.edu/http://itunes.mc.maricopa.edu/
RSS FEEDS
Once you've created podcasts, you may want to give your students RSS feeds to the podcasts. Then they receive your files without having to go out and get them (kind of like receiving a magazine subscription in the mail instead of having to go to the library to read the magazine). Shelley Rodrigo's suggested links for learning more about RSS feeds:
- intro video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0klgLsSxGsU
- the funny video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEmss2lg-ug
- Google Reader best place to start: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0klgLsSxGsU
ARTICLES OF INTEREST TO ONLINE FACULTY
Critics of testing through the computer often argue that it’s difficult to tell if students are doing their own work. It’s also unclear to some professors whether using the technology is worth their while. A new study makes the argument that giving electronic tests can actually reduce cheating and save faculty time. Click on this link to read more... http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/08/29/e_test
Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education: These principles are important for both face-to-face classes and online classes. Check it out at http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachtip/7princip.htm
A technical reportfrom a University of Houston Department of Health and
Human Performance researcher finds that students in a hybrid class that
incorporated instructional technology with in-class lectures scored a
letter grade higher
on average than their counterparts who took the same class in a more traditional format.To read the complete article, go to
http://www.campustechnology.com/articles/60481/http://www.campustechnology.com/articles/60481/
Want your online degree accredited? All eight regional accrediting
commissions identified what they identify as BEST PRACTICES FOR
ELECRONICALLY OFFERED DEGEE AND CERTIFICATE PROGRAMS to guide you.
The document is available at http://wcet.info/resources/accreditation/Accrediting%20-%20Best%20Practices.pdf
There are some great articles in the free Merlot online distance education journal. It's available at http://jolt.merlot.org/ A recent article provided excellent suggestions for creating community in your online class. I especially liked their suggestions for having students introduce themselves to one another. One suggestion is to ask students to list four sentences about themselves, three of which are lies and one of which is true. The rest of the class guesses which of the statements is true. You can check out the entire article at http://jolt.merlot.org/vol4no1/mcelrath0308.htm .