Desire2Blog

So far there are 125 responses to the informal poll about whether we should start the process now to review IMS platforms for the MnSCU system. Basically the question was should we start a process now that might result in replacing D2L at the end of the five-year contract or wait it out a while longer before starting the process. Of course the other possible outcome of starting a process now is that D2L again be selected as the best available IMS for the system in which case we would likely negotiate a new long-term deal. We are able to wait longer if desired since we have a series of five one-year contract extensions available that can turn the five-year contract into as much as a ten-year contract, or anywhere in between. Those contract extensions might also be valuable in delaying a new long-term contract which will almost certainly be at a higher annual cost than the current contract. The poll results are as follows: 79 out of 125, or 63% say we should wait longer before starting t...

This is about a 9 minute podcast where I review some of the open-ended written comments about D2L in the MnSCU I.T. survey for faculty. You might want to put on your headphones, unless it is okay to have some fun at work. Added in 2022: Apparently I didn't think this was good enough to be part of the Desire2Podcast series. Looking back from 16 years later, it's some of my finest work. (LOL)

We just received our campus results from the faculty I.T. survey. One thing I find interesting is how many of the faculty systemwide have never used WebCT. We hear so much about the old "WebCT days," and yet across the system, only 35% of those who have used ANY IMS have used WebCT. If we were to adopt WebCT across the system, it appears that there would be a very large need for faculty training. Click chart to enlarge.

During the first week of May I'll be moderating an online discussion for the University of Wisconsin Distance Education Certificate Program . This is a special topics course where the group explores a different topic for one week at beginning of each month. The Topics are: February: "Real" Ways to Promote Interaction for Effective Online Learning March: Learning on Demand: Using the PDA for Mobile Course Delivery April: Creating and Using Learning Objects with Open Source Tools May: e-Learning Quality Improvement Through Peer Review I'll post more about the course quality discussion later, but for now I'll just tell you that I'm excited to use Moodle during the week of the discussion forum. Moodle is the one of the open source IMS/CMS/LMS (take your pick) platforms that has seen a great deal of development over the past couple years. Nancy Rebholz of UW has given her permission for me to post this link to a 12 minute Camtasia video about Moodle . This was mad...

MnSCU folks only please! Take this instant poll. Should we start evaluating IMS platforms again, or should we just ride it out for a while longer? With the end of the D2L 5-year contract staring us in the face, should a full review process begin now for an RFP (request for proposals) leading to a new long-term contract with whichever IMS rises to the top during the process, or should we delay beginning such a process and take advantage of the series of 1-year extensions to the D2L contract until such time that the system is ready to engage in another full-blown RFP process? Begin RFP process now Delay RFP process for at least a couple of years powered by Vizu.com : See what the world thinks

On the recent satisfaction survey (Noel-Levitz PSOL) administered at 17 of the campuses within MnOnline, question 28 stated: "The online course delivery platform (Desire2Learn or D2L) is reliable." 2,818 students submitted the survey. Of the 30 comparable items on the survey, this was rated as the most important item with a score of 6.61 on a 7-point scale. On the satisfaction scale, it rated a score of 5.74, which results in a performance gap of .87 points (difference between importance and satisfaction, which could be viewed as the room for improvement). Overall, that is a pretty good satisfaction score, although clearly not as good as it could be based on the size of the gap. There are only three items on the survey that the students rated higher for satisfaction, which means that the students were more satisfied with D2L than with 26 of the other items on the survey.

These were a few of the takeaways for me from the D2L session in Chicago. All of these are features for version 8.x, which means we have no idea when we might actually see them in production. Internal email function: the first glance at this tool looked pretty good. It appears to be a combination of a true email client and an internal IMS tool, such as the internal "email" in WebCT, which of course wasn't really email, but it was a private communication device. From what I could see, it looks like real email in that you can send and receive messages to and from the world outside D2L. It also functions as internal email by placing class messages into a separate folder for each class. My biggest question is how well it will integrate with the various email clients in use at different campuses...or more to the point; will it integrate nicely with our employee GroupWise and student NetMail systems? D2L is extending the Journal tool into a blogging tool. They didn't provid...

dahlba Originally uploaded by Barry D . Too bad we wasted time and money (not alot, thankfully) when we created a group of about ten coordinated icons prior to the switch to D2L. I really like the icons (these are fuzzy, not sure why) but we haven't really gotten much use out of them. I think we were so used to icons from our WebCT days that we weren't sure whether people could live without them. Looks like everyone has survived the past two years without icons plastered all over the place. Also, the actual icons don't have those little picture frames around them, I was just playing around with a photo edting program.

D2L_MyHome Originally uploaded by Barry D . We have started to use Dennis O'Hara's photos in our picture gallery within D2L. Dennis has fantastic photos of lighthouses, the North Shore and the South Shore, ice storms, the Northern Lights, beautiful fall colors, and all things about the Northland. Dennis has also given his permission for his photos to be posted as part of the 4th graders Wikiville project about Superior, WI. Go to www.northernimages.com to see more of his fabulous work.

While attending the Higher Learning Commission annual meetings in Chicago I sat in on the Desire2Learn forum session. I would estimate that there were at least 50 people in the room, maybe more like 75. I usually avoid these sessions for various reasons, but I decided to go since a couple of MnSCU friends were going and I also just thought that it had been long enough since I last heard what they have to say. D2L always has skilled presenters for sessions of this type. None of the others are quite as skilled as CEO John Baker himself, but the sales manager for this session was also pretty good. I'll post later about some of the new features that we can expect (someday), but for now just let me say how hard it is for me to sit through demonstrations like that. I am a bit of an instant gratification kind-o-guy. It pains me to see some really cool features that they have built. The pain comes from the fact that we don't access to those new features and it's not even clear when...

The question about what constitutes online attendance provoked some great answers, but also moved into the question that has been bugging me for a long time....if we establish standards (policy) for student attendance, shouldn't we also have "set" standards for faculty participation? Regarding the question of what types of activities constitute attendance in online courses: “Each class I have taken has also required at least weekly postings and/or dropbox assignments. I agree with XXXX, though, that participation in online discussions heavily depends on instructor interaction. Most of my instructors are wonderful about responding and keeping discussion going. However, I have a couple of classes where the instructor seems to be "absent" most days. It becomes apparent within the course itself that students are frustrated and confused, and that could certainly lead to non-attendance problems.” “I think online attendance policy should at the very least be ...

One of the discussion topics for the student advisory group centered on various issues related to the school policy on assigning a "F" for non-attendance. In particular we looked at the questions about (1) how long (the policy says 20 days) should the non-attendance be allowed, and (2) what is considered to be "attendance" in an online course (next post, above). Regarding the 20 days of inactivity to assign the FN grade: “Wow! Twenty days is a long time for a student to be away from the class entirely. While I appreciate the freedom and flexibility, this may be too flexible.” “I also agree that 20 days is an incredibly long period of time not to participate in a class. If one stays away from a class for that period of time, is there any hope of catching up? I'd have a nervous breakdown! I was gone for one day over spring break and was unable to log-in, and I felt absolutely out of the loop even for that one day. What was the criteria for the 20 d...

There are about a dozen online students participating in a short-term advisory committee with me inside D2L. Over the next month we are holding online discussions about 3 or 4 different questions each week. Their input during week one has been tremendous. Here are a couple of examples of their posts: Regarding end-of-term evaluations, one suggestion is: “Perhaps be as basic as possible. The first question is 'Are you satisfied overall with the class, material and instructor'. If not, then please look below and mark the areas of problems (with a list of areas similar to what the normal survey contains). If there are areas you feel were above your expectations, please mark those below also.” Regarding the online tutoring service provided to LSC students: “I think discussion between fellow students is one of the most often used sources for help in a class, as well as direct questions to the instructor. I have never been in a situation where that assistance was not adequa...