Updates

Hi Everyone!

I am training three new guest lecturers: Zoe, Kathleen, and Theresa. I am excited to add them to our team! With three extra guest lecturers, we should hit 200 classrooms spring semester compared to our 115 last semester! (Not that numbers matter, but it still feels cool to say it). Please drop in Writ 999 under "conferences" and then "guest lecture training" and say hi to them! Please offer them any advice you might have under the thread titled: "Our Mission." They are really thrilled to start!

Also, I haven't asked for your feedback on the Excl classrooms lately. I did get some information from Alicia. Alicia said the visit went really well, but mentioned that students were submitting very long essays (over 25 pages). She also said she was able to give some really great advice and it was received well and with appreciation. Overall, how do you think the semester went? I believe we will be helping the Excl classes all of the spring semester as well. I will be checking in with the director of that program shortly to collect the names of professors who wish to have us with them. You will most likely be seeing Excl classes added to the schedule in the next couple of weeks.

Speaking of the schedule, you will also see it start filling up, especially in January. Please let me know how many guest lectures you are comfortable with each week. If I can schedule you each 3-4 workshops during the busy times, we would really be spreading our knowledge around and helping a lot of students. I understand it can get really busy at times, so please do let me know what you are comfortable with or how many hours you can fit in.

I believe I have rostered you out of all classes from the past, but if you still see any classes hanging out, it might be Webpsycho's fault. So, let me know if you have one loitering and I will do what I can to get rid of it! :)

Let me know if you have any questions or just drop a line and say hi :)

 Warmly,
Michelle

Hi GL Team!

How was your holiday weekend? Mine was relaxing. I didn't end up going to Arizona because there was an ice storm that prevented us from driving to the airport two hours away. We had a lot of family Wii bowling and racquetball tournaments and I read a really good Jodi Picoult book.

We have four GL's scheduled so far for December. I just rostered you in for them.  Let's talk with David today in our meeting about what sort of projects we could work on while it's slow in December and January. We usually have GL's trickling in still throughout this time, but not as many.

I will begin harvesting professor email addresses for the spring semester and David and I will send out invites that will spark interest for the spring GL schedule. This will keep me busy while things are slow and prepare for a very busy spring.

With that said, are you all liking the new scheduling system? Is it working out for you to check in with the Google calendar and Google Master schedule? How about this blog? Would you rather me email you? I'd love to hear from you all on what works for you and what doesn't. Each time I schedule a new GL in the google calendar, there is the option to "invite" you to it. This just means you would receive an email notice about the GL that was just scheduled. Let me know if you would like me to do that each time I schedule one, because it is an option. I just wasn't sure if you wanted your inbox cluttered with these when you can simply go in and look at the calendar. On the flipside, I don't want you to feel surprised either. Most of the time, when a GL is scheduled without the two week notice, I email you anyway.

Let me know your thoughts! :-).

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and now the Xmas madness begins. Today is Cyber Monday! Free shipping at Barnes and Noble and just about everywhere else!

See you at the meeting in a few....

Warmly,
Michelle

Hi GL Team

Hi!

How's it going? This is just a quick note to let you know that we may have three new workshops scheduled beginning Monday, November 29th from Frances Fister-Stoga. She requested them for three different classes and I'm waiting for her confirmation. So, look for those on the schedule soon.

Does anyone need out of any classes? If so, let me know :)

Also, if you are scheduled a lecture that runs through Thanksgiving, please feel free to take the day off of the lecture and spend it with your family. You can answer students on Friday if you are not out shopping like all the other crazy people that get up at three in the morning to find deals.

I also heard that Alicia's new book is out in print and kindle. I am excited to read it. Here is the link:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Year-She-Fell-ebook/dp/B004CFBMR4/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1290182410&sr=8-11

News in Wisconsin: Hunting starts. I am not thrilled about this, but will thankfully be gone during most of the shooting sprees and orange apparel in the woods. Also, a man in Wisconsin shot his TV because he was mad about Bristol Palin on DWTS. Have I mentioned how much I love this state? (said with sarcasm)

I am going to Arizona for Thanksgiving, but will have my laptop with. :)

Have a good day!
Michelle

November Classes Rostered

Hi All!

I hope you had a Happy Halloween.

You are now rostered into all November classes. Please continue to let me know what classes you are done with and I will remove you. This has been working out great.

See you all in our meeting @ 12:30!
Michelle

EXCL solution

I got rostered into 2 Excl classes, and one of the profs and I were trying to figure out how the students can post their narratives privately (some apparently had some sensitive material in there they didn't care to share with the class). We talked about them emailing to me, but I wasn't really comfortable with that as I thought some might end up thinking I was their private writing advisor and email me next semester for help!

We were also aware of the university's concerns, that there should be some oversight of instruction. Not that I'd do anything inappropriate, but better to make that clear by having a non-private communication with students. And finally, I think the professor understandably wanted to see whwhat I was doing so she could warn me off if I steered a student the wrong way. ("This would be so cool done in verse!") And we agreed it would be good if we could do it IN the classroom rather than having the student have to attempt something maybe unfamiliar like Google Notes.

We stumbled on a solution-- still in experiment-- using the classroom Study Groups (which the prof can set up). Each student gets a study group, and the members are the student, the advisor, and the professor.
Still working out kinks (Conference or collaborative docs? Conference works better so far, but the students upload a file, so it doesn't make that much difference). Also, I told Richard Daumit (my other section) that we were trying this, and he wanted to try it, and set up study groups with the student's name. (This made it much easier to match the paper with the study group it came from.)

Anyway, the study group option seemed to solve a lot of problems, and it's working pretty well so far.

Alicia

Staff Meetings Starting Next Week

Hi All!

Monday @ 12:30 is our new staff meeting time. We will start this next week.

I hope you all have a great day!

Michelle

Happy Friday!

Hello All!

How's it going?

I rostered all November 1st courses for you. Thank you to all that keep sending me updates on what classes to take you out of. I appreciate that. I will wait to remove you until I hear from you.

We have a new link for meetings and on Monday (posted on the top of this page), David, Dan, and I discussed meeting times. I think we were thinking about having staff meetings for all of us on Monday afternoons. I'm not sure what time yet or when these will start--Dan will let us know. Stay tuned on that! :)

One of the things we will need to discuss is the upcoming change in semester length that will begin pilots in the spring and eventually will be the norm. For those that don't know, semesters are changing to 8 weeks. We will need to discuss what this means for us. I have many ideas I have shared with Dan and David about our roles and changes we will  need to make to adjust to this. Nothing is set in stone yet and I will keep you all posted! Just know that we will continue to make a difference in classrooms! :)

Looking ahead, we will also likely have some projects to work on once the semester ends. I will keep you posted on this in case you want to maintain your hours over the break. David is our mastermind on fun projects! He will also keep us updated.

I hope you all have a good weekend!
Michelle

Anyone having trouble w/ Webtycho today?

Hi All!

I got 8 loads of laundry done today waiting for WT to work. I tried all three computers, too. Maybe it's my wireless acting up. I think whatever it is, it needs to go on a timeout in the naughty chair for a bit.

Anyway, I don't have much to touch upon tomorrow morning, but will be there if you want to say hi at 9:00. I do need to check and be sure you can all see my posts here and are able to access the Google Docs master schedule w/ no problems.

Tomorrow I will be rostering out a bit more....if you have specific ones you are absolutely done with, don't hesitate to shoot me an email and let me know. (Kevin and Anna Henderson: thank you for doing that! It helps and then I don't end up rostering you out of a class that you weren't done in because of an extension).

I can't believe how fast October is going. I have been working slowly on some new video presentations. I should have a big debut coming up soon for you to see before anyone else sees it! Stay tuned!

As always, thank you all for your continuous hard work in all of the classrooms and students you help each day. We are so lucky to have such a great team of advisors!

Best,
Michelle

Exciting Development

Hi All!

As you may know, I invited Wendy McDonough into my EDCP 100 workshop with Enid Bank so she could observe. After talking with her yesterday, she inspired me to try using audio advice with each student using Screenflow (which shows the WT screen while I am talking in a video). I am finding the process a new challenge, but very fun..... I am noticing that once I learn the kinks, it seems easier to give the advice than just simply typing. I am really hoping to hear some feedback from students on this. I hope they appreciate the gesture. I also have the option to include my webcam in these recordings, but haven't tried that yet (today is a no makeup day). 


If you have time, drop in there and take a look! (I can roster you in). I'm there until Sunday. 


Michelle

Monday Meeting Cancelled

Hi All:

I have a meeting with Wendy McDonough during the time we would have our meeting tomorrow and I know David will not be there either.....

Happy guesting and I will talk to you all soon!

Thank you Alicia for taking a guest lecture last minute. I hope the rest of you are doing well. Feel free to comment on this blog!

Best,
Michelle

Rostering....

I'm back from my furlough! Aren't you all excited?! :) Today my agenda includes taking you out of more classes and rostering you into some more. After today, you should be all rostered in for the remainder of October.

 Let me know if you have any questions on the master schedule in Google Docs. It's updating as I add lectures and I consider it quite amazing. Now my Gmail is like a one stop shop for everything! I wish Webtycho was like that!

Let me know if you need me!

Michelle
mbowman@umuc.edu
715-271-0418

Hi All,

I would love to add the horrible picture of myself I just took with the webcam I had installed to "see" you all this morning, but I'm not sure how to. Please let me know.

Thanks,
Dan

Team Notes

Hi Team:

From now on, I will post all team notes here. Feel free to post anything you want to share in this blog as well. I have invited you all to be administrators to this blog, which means you can add videos or blogs or change your picture, ect.

At the top of this page, you will notice two links. One is a Google doc version of the master schedule. I believe that every time I make a change to it, you will be able to see it right away (I still have to enable the "share" feature with all of you). This will eliminate me sending you the attachment by email every week. The other link is to our Monday meetings. 

Please bookmark this page and check it frequently. I will most likely turn on the feature that will alert you each time I post a message or team notes. 

I will also be adding a link to the top that will share every assignment we work with at UMUC. This will be a document within Google docs and will be visible to you at all times as well.

I hope you like this idea and it makes your life just a little bit easier. 

John: Would you like me to embed the database calendar as well? Feel free to or let me know and I can add it. 

I am open to any ideas anyone has for this blog and ways for us all to communicate in one place. I do know that we should have record of all our UMUC communications and there might be rules pertaining to this that I don't know about.

We need a picture of Dan! Dan: add a picture above David or send me one to me and I will add it. :)

Have a great weekend!

Michelle

Blog

You know, even when I can't write another word, I can always write a blog post. I think the blog is my medium.

I wish the novel were my medium. Or the sonnet. But no, it's the blog post. You know, no one in a hundred years is going to re-read my blog post as we do a Frost poem, or War and Peace.

But I like the casual language it allows. Have to be careful not to let that get into my other writing! Already I'm worried that my guest lecture posts are a bit too... discursive. Not to mention long
Alicia