GSA eLearning News

Coming in September:  Learning Technology Staff Development Sessions,  Canvas Rollover Workshops,  and Canvas Showcase In September the GSA Learning Technology team has sessions planned for staff to help introduce new systems (Keylinks Reading List, Collaborate Ultra Virtual Classroom) and other sessions to help improve your use of Canvas. Plus we've got Canvas rollover workshops and a visit from the Planet eStream trainers. Scheduled Sessions: Canvas Showcase: September 9th Intranet Training with Vivienne Vine: September 10th Planet EStream corporate trainer visits GSA: September 12th Other sessions to be scheduled September 2 - 13th: Reading List – Keylinks Training (the new reading list software - staff can now update their own lists throughout the year right inside your Canvas course) - Multiple dates September 2 - 13th Canvas Rollover Training - get your 19/20 course student-ready. - Multiple dates September 2 - 13th Collaborate v...

GSA Teaching Staff: Your 19/20 courses are now live! They should appear on your Canvas dashboard when you log in.  The 19/20 courses are now ready to be populated with your content. You will find that the new courses have a home page that includes instructional videos to guide you through the setting up process. All existing GSA staff enrolments on 18/19 courses should have been replicated in the 19/20 versions of the courses. This includes admins, teachers, support and observers on courses. External users - teachers, guest speakers, or external examiners - have not been added to the new courses. If any external user needs to access 19/20 courses they can be enrolled directly by the other teaching staff, by the programme administrative staff, or by contacting lthelp@gsa.ac.uk When you open your 19/20 course, you will notice that the home page is a page of instructions for you. You can also view all the videos on the  Using Canvas for Staff course . PLEASE NO...

First, a bit of news:  The Canvas teacher app  has been updated and greatly improved. Please install the latest version if you haven't already. The GSA Intranet has launched (and there was much rejoicing). This means that HR and Marketing forms and information are now found at intranet.gsa.ac.uk , rather than on the VLE. Please go to the Intranet from here on out. The Blackboard VLE is being phased out. The 2019 Degree Show is upon us. That means Summer! And New Canvas Courses... Before you head off for far flung locales, you may want to get your 2019/20 Canvas courses up and ready. Learning Technology have created a four - part video series that lasts 20 minutes in total, and a new 10-point checklist to tell you everything you need to know about rolling over your course and getting content imported and in place. You can view the videos in Canvas . Or, you can take a look at them in this blog post, below. You will also be able to view the videos...

So, are you ready to take your Canvas course to the next level and add some flair? You don't need to be a coder to make these changes. There are easy HTML 'hacks' that you can use to give your Canvas course a bit more style. Shadow Text Box A shadow text box like this one is a great way to add a little bit of visual emphasis. It's fairly easy to add the code  to your Canvas course using the HTML Editor. You can change the colours of the border and shadow by changing the background-color and solid line colour. Check out how to do it here on Canvas. Buttons Buttons are a way of creating interesting links within your course, rather than just using the standard hyperlink in blue text, or using a graphic.  Buttons can be linked to sections of your course, or you may have them link to external sites. Buttons can be red, blue, black, green, orange or grey. Here are instructions on how to add them to your course!   These are just two...

Collaborate Ultra How it can be used Glasgow School of Art has installed a Collaborate Ultra as our Virtual Classroom tool - instructors are already using this to deliver entirely online distance courses, and some are using it for tutorials and other informal communication with students. When 'turned on' (send a request to Learning Technology) within a Canvas course, remote sessions can be set up that enable screen recordings to be shared alongside voice calls to give the look and feel of an ordinary lecture/seminar. This is also more than a live tool, as it allows sessions to be saved as recordings, allowing students to revisit the content. An example of its use is during our Business and Technology Professional Practice module where students who are on placement can receive content delivery and ask questions whilst away from university about their final year assessments. How to get started When accessing your module sites on Canvas, at the bottom of the subheadings...

Most of us still use PowerPoint to make presentations, and with good reason: It is awesome, and continues to have new features with each Office update. GSA IT has been updating all computers on the network, and any staff computers (Mac or PC) who request it, with the latest versions of Office. It is easier than ever to create a narrated PowerPoint. You can even edit the narration slide-by-slide after you create it, so you don't have to re-record the whole thing if you want to make corrections.  Uploading this to Canvas will provide your students with a great learning resource. Recorded lectures or presentations, even if they are just short recaps, make your course more accessible and inclusive because they help students with all learning styles. Here's a video that explains how to create a narrated PowerPoint, save it as a video, and upload it to your GSA Canvas course. Lastly, take a look at the 1 Minute CPD video post below. If you haven't use...

Hi, This post is inspired by a recent 1 Minute CPD blogpost TAKEN FROM 1 MUNUTE CPD #5MinuteReflection 3: Open Education Resources (OERs) by @heydftba In the third instalment of our monthly #5minutereflection, we will look at Open Educational Resources (OERs). Open educational resources (OERs) are ' free and openly licensed educational materials that can be used for teaching, learning, research, and other purposes '. They can be in any format, and they can range from individual items to full courses. #1minuteCPD is an example of an OER. Open practice has guided the creation of this blog from the decision of which technologies to use to create the resource (WordPress, YouTube, Creative Commons images), how to manage the resource (Gmail, Google Drive) and to determine the contents of the resource (free and open technologies available to all). You can read more about this here . Why use OERs? The latest NMC Horizon Report (commissioned by Educause, which identifi...