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