Read an interview with Sarah Rose Cavanagh, keynote speaker at the 2024 Teaching and Technology Summit. Researcher and author Sarah Rose Cavanagh opened the Ball State March 21-22 Teaching and Technology Summit with “Hope in a Time of Monsters: Supporting Student and Faculty Mental Health with Compassionate Challenge.” In the following post, Cheri Madewell, director of […]

Read a breakdown of one AI syllabus policy to help you consider how to craft your own AI policy. If you have (or are considering adding) an AI policy on your syllabus, this post is for you.  I’m going to share my AI syllabus policy and break down how I wrote that policy. I am […]

Supplement your office hours with in-person or virtual appointments that students can book straight through Canvas using Appointment Groups. Have you ever bemoaned the fact that students don’t come to your office hours? In this post, you’ll learn about a Canvas feature that can help you increase the amount of one-on-one time you get with […]

Discover a discussion board strategy that organically encourages students to move beyond simple agreement to critical thinking and synthesis. Coming into this semester with little online teaching experience, I knew I wanted to use a weekly discussion system that would be 1) at least a little different from the post and two responses that I […]

If you’re frustrated by the restrictions that learning objectives place on your course, read this meditation on how objectives can open possibility, rather than closing it down. Teaching is an act of navigating constraints and agency – and, incidentally, helping students navigate the same. Perhaps you must use a particular textbook, but what chapters you […]

Multitasking is a constant challenge in higher education, but our Canvas Course Templates offer one concrete way to help mitigate some of that. In the lead-up to each semester, one of the most time-consuming tasks on an instructor’s plate is creating their course site on Canvas. Often, it involves creating new material (if it’s a […]

Identify easy ways to incorporate Transparent Assignment Design in your course. Thinking back on my first online courses I developed in Blackboard over a decade ago, the assignment instructions and other context that I provided were fairly minimal. I didn’t recognize that my learners needed more. I was primarily focused on the content. As a […]

Updates to Mediasite make it easier to record videos, audio, and screencasts to provide media-rich content for your student and then embed the content Canvas. Two updates to Mediasite have provided an easier recording process and upgraded features in Canvas. The first update is Mediasite Capture, a browser-based recorder that will make recording videos, audio, […]

Create media-rich quizzes that are more engaging using the new Stimulus question type. Pop Quiz: Which Quiz Looks More Engaging, A or B?  As seen in the examples above, adding media (images, photos, videos, audio files, diagrams, or charts) to a quiz question in Canvas can help you clarify concepts, provide context to questions, and engage […]

Learn how I leverage our institution’s learning management software as a crucial and effective resource for in-person teaching and learning. Bear with me as I take you on a little stroll down memory lane. How many of you remember the days when organizing and printing lengthy, spiral bound packets was the best (and perhaps only) […]