UP TechTalk Podcast

Getting students up to speed with hands on technical skills can be challenging, especially when students are coming to class with a wide variety of experience levels.  For engineering students, fundamentals like using a multimeter are basic skills needed to move on to bigger projects.  Dr. Shaz  Vijlee, Assistant Professor of Engineering, decided to make a series of videos for students, teaching them the core technical skills in a self-paced format that has enabled students to tackle new ground in a user-friendly format.

In true DIY spirit, Shaz built his own camera rig with PVC piping so that he could mount a camera above a work surface to show students how he connects an Arduino to a circuit board.  One video shows him setting up the circuit but also shows him coding on a screen so students can see what results the code produces.

They[students] really like to see that things actually do what they’re supposed to do…It’s really satisfying for students to think “I’m actually learning the skill to do something with this… so what can I do with it next”

In this podcast Shaz explains the process he goes through to produce videos and how students use them in his class.  Pick up some pointers on producing your own videos that can improve student learning in the classroom.

Continue the conversation at the Teaching & Learning Community Blog: https://sites.up.edu/tl

UP TechTalk is a bi-monthly podcast with cohosts Ben Kahn and Maria Erb of Academic Technology Services and Innovation at UP that explores the use of technology in the classroom, one conversation at a time.

Bootcamps are usually designed to get participants up and running quickly with a new skillset provided they’re willing to use plenty of elbow grease.  Imagine, if you will, a kinder, gentler bootcamp.  That’s what Dr. Lindsay Benes and Dr. Joanne Olsen had in mind when they teamed up with Instructional Design & Technology Specialist Ben Kahn (the co-host of this podcast) last summer to create a professional development opportunity for School of Nursing graduate faculty.  Using the new UP Boost online learning platform, faculty were treated to a two-week self-paced online course that covered best practices for communicating with students at distance, effective design for online courses, and strategies to use digital tools in Moodle effectively.   The result? Faculty got a taste of what it’s like to be an online student (which brought more than a few “a ha” moments to the surface) and they got a portfolio of efficient learning technologies to employ in their own classes.

“In the industry side of healthcare, [professionals] are using all of these different technologies so making sure our students come out with the skills they’re going to see in their employer is very important.” Joanne said.

Going beyond a standard workshop format where faculty learn about a new tool, try it out once but often forget how to use it shortly after the workshop is over, the bootcamp’s extended format offered a deeper learning experience.  The material covered in the course remains online for faculty to access at any time.  Topics are easy to find and all of the course resources are compiled in one area.

“The part of the bootcamp that really make it effective for me was that we had assignments to complete,” Lindsay said.  “Until I actually do something… that’s the time when I really learn how to do it.  That last piece is what really sealed it for me. “

The bootcamp addressed a need for standardization in the SON graduate courses taught in a hybrid format and it also enhanced teaching practices used by the graduate faculty.  In fact, Dr. Olsen expects to see some time recovery by using rubrics for grading, standardizing formats, and establishing “Moodle norms” in the SoN graduate school.

Continue the conversation at the Teaching & Learning Community Blog: https://sites.up.edu/tl

UP TechTalk is a bi-monthly podcast with cohosts Ben Kahn and Maria Erb of Academic Technology Services and Innovation at UP that explores the use of technology in the classroom, one conversation at a time.

Peter Pappas designs learning experiences that provoke reflection.  The UP School of Education adjunct instructor is known for pairing tech tools with creative assignments that lead to students having an external audience for their work, working as professionals do in a more public environment.

Utilizing the concepts of Project Based Learning, Pappas’s students have developed multi-touch books with iBooks Author on historical topics that have been downloaded 16,000 times from iTunes.  The blog Pappas uses for his course is public on the web and gets comments from beyond the classroom.  Students are startled to find out that someone besides a teacher cares about the work they do in class.

“Students really want to make a difference,” Pappas said.  This year, his students will be developing curriculum for the Oregon Jewish Museum And Center for Holocaust Education that can be used by middle and high school teachers when they bring students to the memorial in Washington Park.

At a time when we’re revisiting questions about history and people’s perspective on history, I think it will be somewhat cathartic for my students to feel they could make a statement and speak on behalf of people who perhaps can’t speak for themselves.

In this podcast, Pappas talks about project based learning and some of the other ideas that have helped to shape his current style of education.  Listen to this intriguing discussion about student engagement and more.

Continue the conversation at the Teaching & Learning Community Blog: https://sites.up.edu/tl

UP TechTalk is a bi-monthly podcast with cohosts Ben Kahn and Maria Erb of Academic Technology Services that explores the use of technology in the classroom, one conversation at a time. Visit the UP TechTalk archives for a plethora of excellent content from our UP faculty guests. Get a sneak peak at the future with our UP Tech Talk special 5 part series The Future of Learning.

Dr. Bonnie Stachowiak is the Director of Teaching Excellence and Digital Pedagogy at Vanguard University in Anaheim, CA.  She hosts the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast and regularly covers cutting-edge topics in teaching and technology on her show.  She gave a recent presentation at the Lily Conference in Anaheim on increasing learner agency in the classroom and graciously joined us via Skype to share some tips on incorporating new assignment types into the classroom.

“Generally a test doesn’t make us curious,” she said.  “That kind of experience of ‘flow’ is not something I’ve ever experienced coming out of a test […] so can we blend in a few more assessments that might be more subjective?  We have tools to make them more measurable in some ways.”

In working with faculty, Dr. Stachowiak starts with research-based teaching methods as a starting point and builds on techniques proven to support student learning.

“What I like about digital pedagogy is that it centers around teaching, ” she said. “This idea that we can have our teaching be at the core and that our teaching can be enhanced by technology.”    Join us for this engaging and informative discussion.

Note to Listeners: I totally misprounced Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s name but won’t make that mistake again.  Here’s a phonetic pronunciation:  Me-high Cheek-ment-see-high.

Continue the conversation at the Teaching & Learning Community Blog: https://sites.up.edu/tl

UP TechTalk is a bi-monthly podcast with cohosts Ben Kahn and Maria Erb of Academic Technology Services that explores the use of technology in the classroom, one conversation at a time. Visit the UP TechTalk archives for a plethora of excellent content from our UP faculty guests. Get a sneak peak at the future with our UP Tech Talk special 5 part series The Future of Learning.

Professor Lars Larson is a self-described “Facebook Refusenik” and “a social media illiterate”. He doesn’t have a cell phone and he talks about the Joy Of Missing Out rather than the Fear Of Missing Out.

But he is fascinated by technology.

“It’s an illusion to think we’re missing out,” the English literature scholar said. “When we pay attention to only what comes across on silicon technology we’re ignoring a lot of the thoughts and stories that people who are dead had.  Older technology has preserved that.  I would hope people would fear missing out on things that Chaucer said and Shakespeare said.”

Professor Larson helps students to see current technology as a point on a very broad spectrum that contains many things from flutes made of bird bones to iPhones.   The classroom itself is one of the best technologies to enhance learning, Professor Larson believes, because it blocks out ambient noise and various distractions allowing students to focus on the challenges of critical thinking.

“I try not to be a low-tech elitist,” he says in this podcast. “I try to look at things in the big broad evolutionary spectrum.  I’m fascinated by technology even if I don’t participate in all of them.  None of us really do.”  Don’t miss this riveting discussion!

Professor Larson’s recent UPCrossroads conversation The Professional Amateur as Scholarly Teacher is available in its entirety.  He also provided the audience with an insightful list of questions worthy of perennial reflection.

Continue the conversation at the Teaching & Learning Community Blog: https://sites.up.edu/tl

UP TechTalk is a bi-monthly podcast with cohosts Ben Kahn and Maria Erb of Academic Technology Services that explores the use of technology in the classroom, one conversation at a time.  Visit the UP TechTalk archives for a plethora of excellent content from our UP faculty guests.  Get a sneak peak at the future with our UP Tech Talk special 5 part series The Future of Learning