Hi everyone! Hope you are enjoying the nice Northern Michigan weather that has finally arrived. It has been very fun to see the interesting teaching and learning happenings continue since our boot camp ended as well as to hear from a few of the fully online participants that they are ready for a round of feedback. Mark and I both enjoy most of all learning from all of you along the way.
Some of you may have used our Teaching@NMC.edu website as a resource, and remember the 4x4x16 blog writing event we hosted in the fall. This idea came from Yavapai Community College, started by their instructional designer Todd Conaway. Our colleges have kept in contact, and today he sent us an email that some of their blog participants have now written posts for the ITC Newsletter, (similar to Faculty Focus) targeting online teaching and learning.
Another resource that I recently found is a project management software, Teamwork.com. (I know, I know, but it has cool features for course development...) It has a 30 day free trial, and is very simple to use. You can type in milestones and tasks, etc... much like most project development software programs. The cool feature I found though is in the timer feature. You can choose to use it, and it will start, pause, and stop as well as assign the times to the tasks you choose. You don't need to stay on the website as it runs in a small widget at the bottom of the screen. That means you can not only track your own time, but you can test your learning opportunities to see how long they might take students.
Good luck, and let us hear from you with your findings!
Tracy and Mark