July 17, 2006
Impact 2006: Final Keynote: ePortfolios: Digital Stories of Deep Learning
The final keynote was provided by Dr. Helen Barrett of the University of Alaska in Anchorage. She had a very interesting take on what an ePortfolio is. Some people see it as a way to save assignments to demonstrate work. Others see it as a way for institutions to track accreditation. But Dr. Barrett sees ePorfolios as a way for people to tell stories about their life.
See her website at http://www.electronicportfolios.org/ for more information.
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Posted by kvl014 at 03:37 PM
Impact 2006: Friday Session 2: Decentralized Administration and Faculty Support
This session discusses the University of Western Ontario's experiences in decentralized administration of WebCT services.
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Posted by kvl014 at 01:40 PM
Impact 2006: Friday Session 1: How we Made Vista 4 Work - Administration and Migration
This session discusses how Northern Arizona University handled setting up their Vista 4 system.
For more, see http://www2.nau.edu/~d-elearn/conference/
Posted by kvl014 at 12:48 PM
July 13, 2006
Impact 2006: Thursday Session 6: Automating Adminstrative Processes
This session talked about systems University of Notre Dame put in place to automate some of their administrative tasks.
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Posted by kvl014 at 05:51 PM
Impact 2006: Thursday Session 5: Lessons Learned Migrating to CE 6
This was a panel discussion where members of the CE 6 Pilot project discuss their experiences migrating to CE6. Members include Brown University, CSU Chico, Southern Illinois, San Diego University, and Washington State University.
Continue reading "Impact 2006: Thursday Session 5: Lessons Learned Migrating to CE 6"
Posted by kvl014 at 05:31 PM
Impact 2006: Thursday Session 4: MS-Office 2007 and WebCT
The writeup for this talked about how to improve WebCT integration with the new MS-Office 2007. However, it really was just a demo of 2007, with very little mention of WebCT. Having said that, the demo was good.
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Posted by kvl014 at 05:20 PM
Impact 2006: Thursday Session 3: Blackboard Executive Listening Session
This was a session where Blackboard executives listen to the concerns and comments from conference attendies. Detailed notes will be published online after the conference.
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Posted by kvl014 at 04:59 PM
Impact 2006: Thursday Session 2: Capture the Classroom Experience with Apreso
This was a presentation about the Apreso product by Anystream. This is a system that allows you to easily record live lectures for playback. This allows students to review the course after the fact, study, etc. The system is designed to be extremely easy for instructors to use.
Continue reading "Impact 2006: Thursday Session 2: Capture the Classroom Experience with Apreso"
Posted by kvl014 at 04:11 PM
Impact 2006: Thursday Session 1: Implementing a WebCT Vista Disaster Recovery Environment
This session discusses Perdue University's disaster recovery strategy for WebCT Vista. They have developed a system that is supposed to protect them from complete loss of the building containig their WebCT servers.
Posted by kvl014 at 11:36 AM
July 12, 2006
Impact 2006: Wednesday Session 5: Scalable Reliable Vista Infrastructure
This is another session on setting up a system presented by North Carolina State University.
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Posted by kvl014 at 10:17 PM
Impact 2006: Wednesday Session 4: Tips for Managing WebCT 6
I thought this session was going to talk about operational tips for service managers and user support staff. However, it was aimed more at system administrators and DBAs who were planning for CE 6 implementation. Denise took courses like this last year in San Francisco.
Continue reading "Impact 2006: Wednesday Session 4: Tips for Managing WebCT 6"
Posted by kvl014 at 09:50 PM
Impact 2006: Wednesday Session 3: Empowering Vista with In House Tools and Technologies
This session discussed how Texas A and M University developed some in house tools to enhance and manage WebCT Vista.
Posted by kvl014 at 09:27 PM
Impact 2006: Wednesday Session 2: Application Pak 1
WebCT is now releasing major new functionality using Application Paks. This article discusses the cool new features available in Application Pak 1 for WebCT 6.
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Posted by kvl014 at 04:14 PM
Impact 2006: Wednesday Session 1: CE4 to 6 migration
Dallas University experiences in migrating.
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Posted by kvl014 at 12:17 PM
Impact 2006: Wednesday Morning Keynote
Dr. David Wienberger: "Rethinking Knowledge".
This is a quick summary of the key points. More details to follow as I get time to enter them.
Continue reading "Impact 2006: Wednesday Morning Keynote"
Posted by kvl014 at 11:56 AM
July 11, 2006
Impact 2006: Tuesday night: Vendor Displays
The last event on Tuesday night was the opening of the vendor displays. Here's some of the things I found.
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Posted by kvl014 at 06:49 PM
Impact 2006: Tuesday Evening Keynote - Blackboard 2.0
The first keynote discussed the new "Blackboard 2.0" combined Blackboard and WebCT company. Where it is going, new initiatives, etc.
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Posted by kvl014 at 06:24 PM
Impact 2006: Workshop 2: WebCT E-Portfolio (Tuesday Afternoon)
The Tuesday Afternoon session delt with the new E-Portfolio option for WebCT 6.
E-portfolios allow users to store information for sharing with other individuals (other students, class, instructor, employers, etc.). This information exists outside of course space, so stay around after a course is finished. However, you can copy content from WebCT courses (discussions, assignments, etc.)
This can be made available to people outside the WebCT system. The user can control which users can see what information. (Employeers can see different information from friends).
Continue reading "Impact 2006: Workshop 2: WebCT E-Portfolio (Tuesday Afternoon)"
Posted by kvl014 at 01:25 PM
Impact 2006: Workshop 1: SCORM (Tuesday Morning)
The Tuesday morning session delt with the ability for WebCT 6 to import SCORM modules.
This session discusses how to use SCORM to develop content that can integrate with WebCT. Things like use flash applications that report grades back to the WebCT gradebook.
Continue reading "Impact 2006: Workshop 1: SCORM (Tuesday Morning)"
Posted by kvl014 at 01:04 PM
June 22, 2006
Some cool things from Tennessee Tech U
Bob Clougherty from Tennesee Tech U presented some cool sites they use with their students
secondlife.com
ActiveWorlds.com
and OpenCroquet
Continue reading "Some cool things from Tennessee Tech U"
Posted by tbb153 at 09:23 AM | TrackBack (0)
August 31, 2005
Conference Presentations Online
The conference PowerPoints and papers are now available from WebCT at WebCT's conference presentations site.
Posted by kvl014 at 02:48 PM
July 25, 2005
Denise's notes on Hardware Requirements
As a result of the User Group conference that I attended Jul 18-22, 2005. Here is some more detailed specs on the servers and operating systems required/recommended for the Installation for Webct 6.0
Continue reading "Denise's notes on Hardware Requirements"
Posted by kvl014 at 11:57 AM
Conference Summary
In this blog entry Kevin summarizes the major points from the conference and how they apply to the University of Saskatchewan WebCT installation.
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Posted by kvl014 at 09:37 AM
July 22, 2005
Friday 's Sessions
This installment talks about the last two sessions on Friday.
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Posted by kvl014 at 10:41 AM
July 21, 2005
Thursday Evening
Supper, a science centre, and drinks in the lounge.
Continue reading "Thursday Evening"
Posted by kvl014 at 10:16 PM
Deter Plagiarism and Enhance Learning with Turnitin
This session talks about the "Turnitin" product for detecting plagiarism, and how it is used with WebCT. They provided a PowerPoint presentation which I have in my conference docs and may be available on the WebCT site later.
Continue reading "Deter Plagiarism and Enhance Learning with Turnitin"
Posted by kvl014 at 06:30 PM
Innovative Additions to WebCT's Digital Content Offerings - Beyond ePaks
This session listed how WebCT's strategies have changed from older "ePaks" to post content, to newer richer content that is better integrated with WebCT. It was basically a marketing parade of current and future integration partners, such as Merlot, SafariU, etc. It didn't get into the technical details of how these are built, but that was listed in other sessions.
Continue reading "Innovative Additions to WebCT's Digital Content Offerings - Beyond ePaks"
Posted by kvl014 at 05:51 PM
Creating and Using a Learning Object - Start to Finish (Kent State University)
A learning object is any grouping of materials that is structured in a meaningful way and is tied to an educational objective (Johnson, 2003). This session was a demonstration of a SCORM learning object for WWII history developed in Flash.
Continue reading "Creating and Using a Learning Object - Start to Finish (Kent State University)"
Posted by kvl014 at 05:47 PM
How to Cheat Online
This session outlines the different ways students can cheat online, and ways instructors and course designers can minimize these problems.
David Wiley of Utah State University says "If your students can cheat on you, then you deserve it!"
Continue reading "How to Cheat Online"
Posted by kvl014 at 03:26 PM
WebCT CE 6 Impact on the Learner
This session is a discussion of the features added to WebCT 6 to assist course designers in enhancing the learning experience of the students, specifically in the area of facilitating student group interaction.
Continue reading "WebCT CE 6 Impact on the Learner"
Posted by kvl014 at 12:18 PM
Simplifying Content Distribution with The Vista Learning Object Manager
This session discusses the learning object manager that comes standard with Vista 4, and as an optional component in Campus Edition 6.
Continue reading "Simplifying Content Distribution with The Vista Learning Object Manager"
Posted by kvl014 at 11:02 AM
Thursday Keynote Talk
Today's keynote was by Jack M. Wilson, President University of Massachusetts. It was titled "The Never Ending Education: How Universities must and can meet the educational needs of students and alumni for life."
Continue reading "Thursday Keynote Talk"
Posted by kvl014 at 10:44 AM
July 20, 2005
You can't fight City Hall, but you can eat there!
Kevin talks about the dinner they had at San Francisco City Hall.
Continue reading "You can't fight City Hall, but you can eat there!"
Posted by kvl014 at 11:02 PM
A Tale of Three Universities
This session discusses the WebCT vista experience for Perdue, university of Alberta, and Georgia University. It discusses their vista implemementations, how they got to where they are, issues they are currently having, where they are going, and words of wisdom for others intending to move to Vista.
Continue reading "A Tale of Three Universities"
Posted by kvl014 at 06:46 PM
CE6 Partner Program Panel
This session was a panel discussion of participants in the WebCT CE beta program. It was primarily to test installation and upgrade procedures for the product. There is some useful information for people planning to migrate to WebCT 6 from WebCT 4.1.
Continue reading "CE6 Partner Program Panel"
Posted by kvl014 at 05:49 PM
Thomson iLrn powerlink
This entry is a summary of how textbook and online content manufacturer "Thomson" has created a powerlink to Single Signon students from WebCT courses to their iLrn system. Student grades from assignments on the iLrn site can then be sent back to WebCT.
This is mainly of interest to Instructional Designers who may wish to include content from Thomson textbooks into their courses. The powerlink technology is of interest to system administrators.
Continue reading "Thomson iLrn powerlink"
Posted by kvl014 at 02:49 PM
WebCT Powerlinks SDK
This session talks about the WebCT Powerlinks SDK module which allows us to expand the WebCT toolset with our own customizations. For example, integrate with libraries, the Computer Science system, etc.
Continue reading "WebCT Powerlinks SDK"
Posted by kvl014 at 12:17 PM
Interoperability with Open Source Community
A summary of WebCT's feature presentation on how WebCT can be extended with open source and commercial tools using the IMS Tools Interoperability standard. This gives the advantages of open source tool development but allows that to work within a well-established commercial framework.
Continue reading "Interoperability with Open Source Community"
Posted by kvl014 at 11:01 AM
Conference Themes
In this installment Kevin talks about some of the common themes developing at the WebCT conference about the new WebCT 6 and Vista 4.
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Posted by kvl014 at 10:47 AM
July 18, 2005
Something for Tyson
Monday evening, after the first day of workshops, Kevin and Denise go wandering San Francisco, buying clothes and checking out all the hot spots, like the Apple store!
Continue reading "Something for Tyson"
Posted by kvl014 at 09:00 PM
July 17, 2005
Lobster Head Kevin
Kevin discusses his first full day in San Francisco. Sights seen, places visited, head's burned ...
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Posted by kvl014 at 02:00 PM
July 16, 2005
The Flight to San Francisco
Read about Kevin's adventures on the way to S.F.
Continue reading "The Flight to San Francisco"
Posted by kvl014 at 06:51 PM
July 15, 2005
Packing Done
Finished packing. Managed to fit a week's worth of clothes two jackets, my laptop, PDA, MP3 player, two digital cameras, and sandles into two carry-on cases.
Continue reading "Packing Done"
Posted by kvl014 at 10:12 PM
My Hotel
I'll be staying at the San Francisco Marriott. 55 Fourth Street, San Francisco, CA 94103. (415) 896-1600.
Posted by kvl014 at 09:41 PM
