THIS IS NOT THE CURRENT EDITION OF THE OAT UPDATE
Browse all OAT Updates
New Announcements
Reminders
Browse all OAT Updates
New Announcements
Hypothes.is + JSTOR
OAT recently enabled the direct JSTOR connection inside Hypothes.is. Now, when creating a social annotation activity, instructors can chose to link directly to the stable URL of any article in JSTOR. This step eliminates the need to figure out how to download and host the PDF yourself - just keep the article in JSTOR and let Hypothes.is do the rest!
Step 1: Find the article in JSTOR and copy the "Stable URL"
Locate your article as usual. Open the article and locate the "Stable URL" shown on the lower left side of the page (indicated). Copy the URL (ctrl-C).
Step 2: Choose JSTOR in the Hypothes.is settings
Next, create a new Hypothes.is activity in Canvas (whether as an ungraded item in a module or as an assignment) and select JSTOR as the source for the document your students will be annotating.
Step 3: Insert Stable URL
Finally, paste the Stable URL you acquired in Step 1 into the box and click the "proceed" arrow to the right. This will generate a preview of the article, and from there you can continue with the rest of the assignment configuration.
Have questions about this or anything else related to Hypothes.is? Contact Glenn Pillsbury for help.
Return to top
Canvas: Create Non-Academic Course Shells
Instructors in Canvas now have the ability to create their own non-academic course shells for conducting university business. These shells typically are for departments or programs that need to use some of the features of Canvas to organize and share materials. While students can be added as users to these shells, the shells are not to be used for any kind of academic work by students by replacing or attempting to augment existing official course shells. Students cannot create shells.
To create a non-academic Canvas shell, open your Dashboard and click the button on the right to "Start a new course". Type a name for the course and it will be ready instantly. There is no need for any additional configuration or approval before it can be used. These shells are not actively monitored by OAT.
If you have questions about this new feature, please contact oatsupport@csustan.edu.
Return to top
Reminders
Oct. 5 Hypothes.is Workshop Recording
On Oct. 5 OAT hosted an introductory workshop on using Hypothes.is for a variety of digital annotation activities in Canvas. The presentation also featured a discussion by Jey Strangfeld (Sociology), Staci Scheiwiller (Art), and Kellie Cotter (Psychology) about the ways they're using the tool and students' responses to it.
Learn more about Hypothesis
Return to top
Canvas: Removing Previous Instructors from Rosters
Has your teaching assignment changed? If you are no longer listed as the instructor or a course or section in PeopleSoft, please contact oatsupport@csustan.edu and ask to be removed from the Canvas roster for the prior course. Currently, changes to the instructor-of-record field in PeopleSoft are not automatically reflected in Canvas so that any previously assigned instructors are removed from the course roster (only added). Remaining on the previous roster when courses begin means you'll receive notifications about the course, and students may also be confused about whom to contact.
Removing you from a previous course is very easy to do, but it must be requested first!
OAT and OIT have begun working on a solution to automate these removals, but there is no ETA for delivery at this time.
Return to top
Zoom Software Update Required
Zoom is requiring all users to update their desktop/laptop meeting software to the latest version by November 5, 2022. Users who have not updated at that point will not be able to join or start a meeting. This policy is being enforced by Zoom, not Stan State.
How to Update Zoom
Updating is simple and painless. Here are the steps to update Zoom:
- Launch the Zoom app on your computer
- Click your profile picture in the upper right to open the setting menu
- Click "Check for Updates"
- Follow the remaining prompts to download and install the latest version
Return to top
Ed Tech Tool Spotlight: VoiceThread
An ed tech fixture on campus since 2012, VoiceThread has helped make online classes more engaging and humanized. Part discussion board, part presentation tool, VoiceThread enables students and instructors to display media files and talk about them. In Spring 2022, users spent almost 75,000 hours with the tool and recorded almost 49,000 comments!
Read more about VoiceThread at Stan State.
What is a VoiceThread?
A VoiceThread is a collection of slides (akin to a PowerPoint file), with each slide holding some kind of content, such as an image, or a series of pages from a PDF file, or a video file. Interaction comes in the form of voice and video comments that users record in the margins of each slide of the VoiceThread. While recording, users can also annotate/doodle on the slide to emphasize what they're talking about.
How can VoiceThread be used in a course?
Here are some common ways instructors have incorporated VoiceThread into their pedagogy.
From simpler to more complex:
- Course icebreaker activity: Students introduce themselves to the class using voice or video.
- Syllabus overview: Instructor records a page-by-page overview of the course syllabus. Students are encouraged to ask questions via the commenting tool.
- Weekly lecture: Instructor designs a VoiceThread with slides and other media as part of course lecture. Students are encouraged to ask questions on any slide via the commenting tool.
- Class discussion: Instructor offers 3-4 discussion prompts in a VoiceThread (one slide for each prompt). Students record posts and replies on the slide of their choosing.
- Feedback on student submissions: Instructor assigns students to create a VoiceThread and upload a writing assignment file as the slide content. Instructor records voice comments and annotates each slide/page.
- Individual presentation gallery: In fully online courses, instructor assigns students to design and deliver a culminating presentation using VoiceThread. Final slide contains a discussion prompt related to the topic created by the student. All students then peruse the 'gallery' of class presentations and respond to the prompt slides.
- Group presentations: Student groups collaborate on the creation of a common VoiceThread. The link to the group VoiceThread is submitted into a Canvas assignment and also shared in a standard Canvas discussion forum. All students then peruse the links and watch the presentations.
Can VoiceThreads be graded in Canvas?
Yes! VoiceThread is an External Tool that can be connected to a Canvas assignment. Once initiated in Canvas, there are three assignment types that VoiceThread offers.
- Watching: students must watch a VoiceThread and all comments. This is automatically graded upon completion.
- Commenting: students must make a minimum number of comments in a VoiceThread. These are manually reviewed by the instructor and assigned a grade.
- Creating: students upload materials to build their own VoiceThread. Optionally, these VTs can be shared in a gallery viewable by the whole class. These are manually reviewed and assigned a grade.
Contact Glenn Pillsbury to learn more about Voicethread!
Return to top
2022-23 Faculty Ambassadors for Canvas
This year, OAT is again sponsoring the FAC program, which makes experienced Canvas instructors available to each college, as a supplement to OAT staff. Instructors may find it more helpful to work with other instructors in their general discipline on questions related to Canvas, and are encouraged to contact these individuals.
2022-23 Ambassadors
Return to top
Canvas How-To Tricks
Here are two cool Canvas grade book tricks that will impress your friends and frenemies alike!
1. Incorporate "choose your own adventure" assignment pathways into a course grade
With this trick, you can offer students a choice of possible activities to complete, as a way to generate the overall grade for a category of assignments in a course. Do this when you want students to choose their own pathway to demonstrating course learning objectives. Offering students choices in how they complete course activities allows them to focus on activities that resonate most strongly with their own interests and learning style. This makes them more engaged in the activity, which tends to result in better performance.
- On the Assignments homepage of the course, create assignment groups for the various activities in the course (instructions).
- The assignment groups here should correspond to the groups/categories and independent activities that are identified in the syllabus as contributing to the overall course grade.
- Be sure to create an assignment group to hold all of the student choice activities.
- Create an additional group that will hold the final grade for the student choice assignments. This is a separate group from the one that holds the activities themselves.
- Enable weighted assignment groups in the course and specify percentages for each group (instructions).
- Specify 0% for the assignment group containing the student choice activities. This will allow you to grade the activities without the scores directly affecting the final course grade.
- For the weight of the additional assignment group created in Step 2, enter the percentage given in the syllabus for the student choice activities. It is this group/weight that will contribute to the final course grade.
- Open a new assignment called "Pathways Final Grade" (or named something else meaningful to your class) and configure the following settings:
- Points: the max points you will be allowing for the student choice activities. In other words, how many points are the student choice activities going to count for?
- Assignment Group: from the drop-down menu, place this assignment in the weighted additional assignment group created in Step 2, not in the 0% assignment group.
- Submission Type: set this to "No Submission" since your students will not be interacting with this particular assignment directly.
- Leave the due date and all other settings at their defaults. There is no need for a due date for this assignment placeholder.
- Create the rest of the course activities as normal, including the student choice activities. Place them into the appropriate assignment groups in the settings. The student choice activities should each have points associated with them and be placed into the 0% assignment group. Due dates are optional.
- You can move or reorder assignments at any time from the Assignments home page (instructions). Nothing is ever 'set in stone'.
- Calculate the final grades for the student choice activities:
- As part of normal grading, review and assess the student choice activities using SpeedGrader. Not every student will have a grade for every choice activity.
- Open the Grades page of the course.
- Among the student choice activities, manually add up the scores for each column that a student has completed. Use a calculator to ensure accuracy.
- Click the cell of the Pathways Final Grade column for the student and type the total points they earned. Press Enter to save the number.
- Repeat these steps for every student.
That's all there is to it!
2. Award bonus percentage points
While it's easy to create activities that are worth extra credit points, what if you want to directly increase students' overall grade percentage? The trick is to use weighted assignment groups that total more than 100%.
- On the Assignments homepage of the course, create assignment groups for the various activities in the course (instructions).
- The assignment groups should correspond to the groups/categories and independent activities that are identified in the syllabus as contributing to the overall course grade.
- Create an assignment group for each activity that will be worth bonus percentage points -OR- create a single assignment group for all of the bonus activities.
- Enable weighted assignment groups in the course and specify percentages for each group (instructions).
- The bonus groups should be weighted at the desired percentage (1%, 2%, etc.). You do not indicate these percentages to be 'bonus' groups.
- If using a single group for all of the bonus activities, set the weight of this group to the total bonus percentage of all the activities.
- The total of all the weights in the course should be greater than 100%.
- Create new assignments or activities in the bonus group(s).
- The activities must be worth 1 point or more.
- Place the assignment(s) into the appropriate bonus assignment group.
- Recommendation: If you are planning to award whole bonus points only (1%, 2%, etc.), choose "Complete/Incomplete" in the Display Grade As setting. This will prevent fractional bonus percentages from being awarded during grading. A mark of "Complete" will automatically award full points on the assignment and may be easier for the student to understand.
- All other assignment settings are at your discretion based on the needs of the activity.
- Grade the bonus activities as normal, using SpeedGrader or directly entering scores in the Grades page. Canvas will automatically use the bonus groups as part of the student's final grade calculation.
That's all there is to it!
Return to top
Accessibile PDFs
Supercharge accessibility scores for your Canvas courses!
Now that the Fall semester is rapidly approaching, now is the perfect time to have our Document Remediation team make your PDF files accessible.
- Were your PDFs created by scanning printed pages?
- Is the image quality of your PDFs less than ideal? (e.g., skewed pages, handwritten notes)
- Is the PDF your only copy of the content?
If your answer is yes to any of the above questions, the PDFs are a perfect fit to submit to our Document Remediation team.
- Submit a document remediation work order: Select "Accessibility Work Request" in the Request Type drop-down menu, and "Make my document accessible for me" in the Service Type section
Return to top