Determining Success Teaching with Google Plus
I had a major period of doubt about whether or not Google Plus was working as a platform for the communication portion of my online class. Some of the students struggled with the platform. Some students hated logging on to two different platforms. (Three if you count their college email account which believe me, they [...]
Reservations in teaching with Google Plus
Six months ago I started using Google+ as a more transparent and effective way of managing the communication element of my online classroom. The potential benefits of the platform were clear. Most of the complications I perceived in those first few classes were resolved as the Google developers team made upgrades to the interface and [...]
Google Plus, Discussions, and Online Learning
Discussions in Google+ I don’t know about you, but I hate discussion boards. No. Seriously. I did a webinar about it once. I think there is this misguided mentality that to criticize online learning particularly while you are teaching online is a no-no. To be fair, I think that a general dismissal of online learning [...]
Week Zero: Why you should engage students before classes start.
You arrive at the mall with a long list of things to do. You’ve got 6 or 7 places you need to visit and a lot to get in each one. You may have been to this mall before but you’ve never been to any of the stores that you need to visit today. Each [...]
Preparing Your Class for GooglePlus
Monday marks the first day of the intersession course that will include Google Plus integration. The course lasts for three weeks and I teach it three times a year. It is a virtual course with three meetings. I’ve spent the last week creating the framework that will help students navigate this new place with a [...]
10 Things to think about before adding Google Plus in the classroom
1. Age Limit Currently Google+ has set the age limit at 18+. Though they state that this is a temporary situation and that the eventual age will be lowered to 13+. Whether that will happen when the site goes public or after has not been truly clarified. This causes a lot of potential problems. For [...]
Textbooks Unplugged: or Why you should tell your book rep: “No thanks.”
A few years ago I was approached by a very nice book rep who was excited about the ability of their textbook to create a lot of course content that would be automatically installed in my ANGEL class via a cartridge. It would allow students to access a great deal of supplemental content that was [...]
10 ways to use Google Plus in the classroom
Circles Obviously you are going to want to create a circle for your class and guide them through making a circle for the class as well. But as cool as that is, it doesn’t stop there. You can also make a circle for announcements and important links and drop any posts in that you know [...]
Online Learning: We’re doing it wrong.
Imagine that you are walking across a busy neighborhood. The four blocks or so that you cover in a given day are familiar to you, there is a sort of order to the day to day chaos. You turn down an alleyway and arrive at a very small door. You have business on the other [...]
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