Archive of Inclusive Learning: Lightbulb Moments

Here is the archive of Inclusive Learning: Lightbulb Moments, a Hangout on Air from The Center. In this Hangout, +Deborah Lemon and I share and reflect on our own growth and development as online educators and discuss how the integration of social tools into our online learning environment has fostered community-oriented learning that nourishes our students' learning differences and creates personal, relevant learning. Deborah showcases her online Spanish class which is taught in Facebook and I share my online ice breaker designed in VoiceThread and examine how the option to express oneself in voice or text is impacting my students' learning. What are your two takeaways? I'd love to hear them! #CCCLEARN

    Thanks for sharing with me today, Deborah! I always learn so much from you. 

Inclusive Learning: Lightbulb Moments from 2 Online Instructors

Inclusive Learning: Lightbulb Moments from 2 Online Faculty

Thursday, April 3rd

4:00-5:00pm Pacific

LIVE - Google+ Hangout on Air!

Click for Google Event

View on YouTube --> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJkREZ-eYqo&feature=share

Join The Center's Community for follow-up discussions --> tiny.cc/TheCenter 

Follow The Center on Twitter --> @Center_Ed

Join me, Michelle Pacansky-Brock, and +Deborah Lemon  as we engage in a reflective conversation about their growth and development as online educators. Deborah and I will share how we have come to value the rich, community-oriented learning environment in our online classes that supports our students' learning differences and encourages them to make relevant connections with the curriculum. We will share tips and strategies, show examples of our own VoiceThread and Facebook learning activities, and take questions from the live audience.

• The Q&A feature will be enabled during the live Hangout on Air to allow viewers with a Google+ account to submit questions through a web browser.
• The Hangout on Air will also be archived and and shared with a Creative Commons license on The Center Hangout Archive playlist at: http://tiny.cc/CenterArchives

This Hangout on Air will feature:

• Michelle Pacansky-Brock - Community Coordinator of The Center; Associate Faculty, Mt. San Jacinto College; Instructional Technologist, CSU Channel Islands, Author of Best Practices for Teaching with Emerging Technologies and How to Humanize Your Online Class with VoiceThread
• +Deborah Lemon  - Professor at Ohlone College, Instructor of Building Online Community with Social Media at @ONE

All Center events are brought to you by @ONE.

How to Doodle in VoiceThread Mobile & Why it Matters

VT Mobile. Bridge image by Glam.

I'm currently teaching my Building Online Social Media class and I'm seeing a big increase in the number of faculty using iPads.  In the class, faculty are introduced to a number of tools, one of them being VoiceThread.  VoiceThread provides users with the option to access content created with the tool via a regular web browser or through a free mobile app (to accommodate the flash "gap" experienced by iPhone and iPad users -- although an Android app is in development too).  For users who are blind or have cognitive disorders that are supported by a more linear flow of content, VoiceThread Universal provides yet another alternative to the content (note: a VoiceThread must first be "Shared" with a user directly before it is available to him/her through VoiceThread Universal but that's the only necessary step).

For those of you who read my blog, you are familiar with the fact that I am a passionate advocate for emerging technologies that support non-traditional learners.  I get very excited when I envision a future of inclusive learning environments in which all of our students can learn together in community and feel good about what they bring to the table, rather than feeling poorly for about how they don't measure up to the status quo.  You can read more about my views on this topic in my new book, Best Practices for Teaching with Emerging Technologies.  I believe mobile learning and emerging technologies in general are pathways to mainstreaming the adoption of Universal Design for Learning.

In my current class, I have a few students who had some hiccups understanding how to locate the Doodle function in the VoiceThread mobile app.  Rather than sharing those instructions just with them, I thought I'd post them here so everyone could learn from them. 

Why is Doodling on a Mobile Device important to educators?  

Using the raw gesture of the human hand to control the actions on a mobile device is proving to open a world of new dazzling cognitive leaps for individuals with particular learning differences.  Beyond that, however, giving students the option to Doodle on slide while they are responding to a discussion prompt or having them demonstrate how to work through the rest of a problem set are ways to engage the psychomotor cognitive domain in an online learning environment that nearly always left dormant.  

What is the Doodle feature?

The Doodle feature gives users the ability to draw on a slide while leaving a voice or video comment on an iPhone or iPad (if you are using VoiceThread on a full web browser, the Doodle feature also works with text commenting). 

Step 1:

Click the "Plus Sign" to comment.

Step 2:

Select the microphone or webcam icon to leave a voice or video comment.  The Doodle feature is not included with text commenting on VoiceThread mobile.

Step 3:

The red flashing light indicates that you are now recording!  Click on the white dot to the right to activate the Doodle feature.

Step 4:

A vertical palette of colors will expand.  Tap a color in the palette to select it.

Step 5:

Doodle away with your finger! The marks will begin to fade after a few seconds.

Step 5:

Click Save.

For More Help

For more help with VoiceThread mobile, please explore the great resources in the VoiceThread Mobile Support Site.

How Are You Using It?

Are you using VoiceThread mobile with your students?  If so, drop us a comment here and let us know how!

VoiceThread SmartTeacher Badge Program

After four years of transforming my online and face-to-face teaching through the use of VoiceThread (and other fabulous tools), I am now officially working for VoiceThread as a (paid) consultant.  I share that to be transparent but also because I'm really excited! 

Since I resigned from my most recent full-time academic position nearly two years ago, I've been in search of my next step.  I can't say I've found it yet but it feels really great to be working for a company that has brought so much value into my own teaching and fostered such dynamic, inclusive learning environments for so many of my students who commonly feel marginalized in traditional "lecture-based" classes (or online classes that are the virtual equivalent of a lecture class).

Over the coming months, I'll be fleshing out my role with VoiceThread but I have been tasked with developing training and support for higher ed clients about the effective integration of VoiceThread in support of pedagogy.  How cool is that?

Last week, I felt like the planets were aligned when the new HASTAC Digital Media & Learning Competition was announced.  This is fourth competition released in this series and it's focus is on "Badges for Lifelong Learning."  In an instant, I had a vision of how VoiceThread could develop a training program designed around digital badges that also fosters the ongoing development and sharing of open educational resources.

With the support of Steve Muth and Ben Papell, the VoiceThread co-founders, I began to write.  And today I entered our submission into the DML Competition.  It's titled the "VoiceThread SmartTeacher Badge Program" and you can read the full submission overview here (and leave a comment or "like" it while you are there!). 

Essentially, it's an open training program built around the concept of "SmartTeaching" which integrates the use of VoiceThread into a learning environment using the principles of Universal Design for Learning and brain research.  The program trains educators to teach with VoiceThread while simultaneously developing a growing repository of VoiceThread samples, shared with a CC license in support of open educational resources. 

And three cheers for Pat James, Dean of Technology and Distance Learning at Mt. San Jacinto College, who immediately supported the concept and got institutional support to participate in a pilot.  All this is contingent, however, upon the grant's approval.  So wish us luck!

Then leave me a comment and let me know what you think.  If you like the concept, please share it with your networks!