WebLearn and Turnitin Courses Trinity Term 2017

Posted on April 20, 2017 by Jill Fresen

IT Services offers a variety of taught courses to support the use of WebLearn and the plagiarism awareness software Turnitin. Course books for the formal courses (3-hour sessions) can be downloaded for self study. Places are limited and bookings are required. All courses are free of charge.

Click on the links provided for further information and to book a place.

WebLearn 3-hour courses:

Byte-sized lunch time sessions:

These focus on particular tools with plenty of time for questions and discussion

Plagiarism awareness courses (Turnitin):

User Group meeting:

Posted in WebLearn | Leave a comment

Activity Browser: We have lift-off!

Posted on April 3, 2017 by Adam Marshall

We are excited to announce that the SHOAL project’s Activity Browser has been launched!  You can find Activity Browser here: https://weblearn.ox.ac.uk/activity-browser.   You can also access it from the left-hand menu of WebLearn’s Gateway home page, or from the Support page of the Digital Education website www.digitaleducation.ox.ac.uk.

If you’re curious about digital teaching tools, want to engage students in different ways both in and beyond the lecture theatre or tutorial, or want to satisfy student digital expectations, Activity Browser is for you!  It’s a searchable showcase of inspirational digital learning activities created within the university.  You can explore activities created by Oxford innovators, and see what digital tools they have chosen to tackle particular teaching challenges.  Each example includes suggestions for how to adopt and adapt the ideas and tools for your own teaching, whether for face-to-face learning in tutorials, classes or labs, or for online study, revision or assessment.

The SHOAL project was a proof-of-concept focussing on STEM subjects, but we’re aware of the innovative online teaching taking place in other subjects and we’re keen to add those resources to the collection.  We are currently looking into the easiest way for you to contribute your own online learning activities, and to grow the range of digital tools and applications in our showcase.  We will update the ‘Contribute’ page of Activity Browser in the next phase of the project.

The Browser interface will be improved when WebLearn is upgraded in Trinity.  We welcome feedback on this early version; please email shoal@maillist.ox.ac.uk.

 

 

Posted in Sakai, SHOAL Project, WebLearn | Tagged | Leave a comment

Using LaTeX in WebLearn

Posted on March 29, 2017 by Adam Marshall

Mathematical (LaTeX) Notation is a special mark-up language designed to present mathematical notation in electronic documents. The upgrade to WebLearn 11 now means that LaTeX can be used to format equations as mathematical notation on most pages.

Once LaTeX has been enabled on a site and in a tool, one can easily add mathematical notion by enclosing equations and the like between two sets of $$.

This will produce the following output

 

 

Features:

  • identical output for all browsers and platforms
  • no images or special browser plugins required
  • accessible, with screen-reader compatibility
  • scalable font for different text sizes and zoom levels

LaTeX needs activating on each site via Site Info > Edit Site Information,

then enabling for individual tools via Site Info > Manage Tools (remembering to press ‘Save‘ at the bottom of the screen).

Posted in Sakai, WebLearn | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Problems with Turnitin this morning (Monday 27 March)

Posted on March 27, 2017 by Adam Marshall

Turnitin was erroneously returning error messages (“invalid file type”) this morning (27/3/2017) between 9am & 11am. This will have caused problems for submissions made through WebLearn’s assignment tool.

WebLearn respects error messages from Turnitin so would not try to resubmit any submissions made during this period. It will mark them with an error warning (orange triangle) in WebLearn.

If you have outstanding Turnitin reports from this period then please get in touch and we can resubmit for you.

Posted in WebLearn | Leave a comment

WebLearn and Turnitin User Group Meetings Hilary Term 2017

Posted on March 15, 2017 by Fawei Geng

WebLearn User Group Meeting 21 March 2017, 14:00

Tuesday 21 March 2017, 14:00 – 16:00, followed by tea and cakes
IT Services, 13 Banbury Road

The meeting will feature two reports on the completed WebLearn Improved Student Experience (WISE) project, as well as information about how Replay Lecture Capture works with WebLearn, and planned WebLearn upgrades.

Booking is required to secure your place: WebLearn User Group booking.

Agenda:

  • Elaine Aitken (Programme Manager, Academic IT Services):Education IT projects and summary of the findings of the Digital Education Strategy (DES) consultation
  • Liz Masterman (Project Lead) and Ana Matak Siviour (Business Analyst): Update on the VLE Review
  • The WISE team (Academic IT): Reports on lessons learned during the WISE project
  • Fawei Geng and Jill Fresen (Academic IT): Replay Lecture Capture: how does it work with WebLearn?
  • Adam Marshall: WebLearn updates, including special WebLearn sites for anonymous submissions

Join the WebLearn User Group site in WebLearn: https://weblearn.ox.ac.uk/info/wlug for regular updates and access to audio recordings of previous presentations.

Any questions or comments?  Contact webearn@it.ox.ac.uk.

Turnitin User Group Meeting 23 March 2017, 14:00

Thursday 23 March 2017, 14:00 – 16:00, followed by refreshmentsTurnitin Logo
IT Services, 13 Banbury Road

Booking is required for catering purposes – book now to secure your place:Turnitin User Group booking

Agenda:

  • Jamie Whitehead (TurnitinUK account manager, Turnitin): Overview of Turnitin Feedback Studio and Grademark
  • Amanda Tattersall (Exams and Assessment): Overview of the new anonymous online submissions process
  • Adam Marshall (WebLearn service manager): Configuration of WebLearn sites for anonymous online submissions

Join the Turnitin User Group site in WebLearn – it offers a collection of resources and will add you to the group e-mail list: https://weblearn.ox.ac.uk/info/plag/tiiug. Audio recordings of previous meetings are also available on this site.

Any questions or comments? Contact turnitin@it.ox.ac.uk.

Posted in WebLearn | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Adding ‘awesome’ icons to web page in WebLearn

Posted on March 8, 2017 by Adam Marshall

As I’m sure you’ve noticed, most pages in WebLearn 11 use a new icon set: Font Awesome icons. You may well recognise these icons from other websites or phone ‘Apps’. Unlike the previous (‘Silk’) icons these are not images, they are, as the name would suggest, a font. This makes them scalable and colourable (if that’s a word).

Font Awesome icons are open source and can be customised in many ways — size, colour, drop shadow, and anything that can be done with the power of CSS. They can even be made to spin around if that’s one of your hobbies.

Using Font Awesome icons on your pages

To add a Font Awesome Icon to a WebLearn page, open the HTML editor and locate the Font Awesome ‘flag’ icon at the end of the middle row (when using WebLearn on a desktop machine).

You can then select a suitable icon, either search by name or browse by using the scroll bars.

Basic customisation can be effected whilst using the picker but you can use any CSS directives via the “Source” view of the HTML WYSIWYG editor.

That’s all there is too it. Don’t go too crazy with the spinning though!

Links

Posted in Sakai, WebLearn | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Innovative uses of the Lessons tool – free webinar 15 March 2017

Posted on March 3, 2017 by Jill Fresen

The Sakai community has announced an online panel discussion on Wednesday 15 March 2017, about innovative uses of the Lessons tool in Sakai (WebLearn). Oxford University has been using the tool for two years and promoted its use during the WISE project; our team contributed many improvements to the tool to the central Sakai code base.

Join the free online discussion to hear how practitioners at various institutions are using the Lessons tool:

Date: Wednesday 15 March 2017
Time: 15:00 GMT
Big Blue Button link: <http://apereo.blindsidenetworks.net/apereo/
Password: apereo
Join Room 2

The Lessons tool provides an easy way for tutors or other site maintainers to design and implement a structured pathway of learning materials, activities and interaction in a WebLearn site. (See video: Overview of the Lessons tool).

Oxford’s own Dr Lucy Tallents won a Teaching with Sakai (TWISA) award in 2015 for her work in implementing the Lessons tool on a distance course delivered to conservationists and environmentalists in developing countries.

If you have any questions, please contact weblearn@it.ox.ac.uk

Posted in WebLearn | Leave a comment

Lecture capture and WebLearn

Posted on March 3, 2017 by Jill Fresen

The Lecture Capture service (called Replay) is now available across the University, after a two-year pilot of the commercial software (called Panopto). This July 2016 blog post provides more information: Replay is now a service.

What are the costs to departments?

The service is free of charge to departments at the point of use. This means that the Panopto software can be installed on any number of computers in any numbers of rooms, or on any personal laptops. The only restriction is that the annual licence fee (paid by IT Services to Panopto) depends on the number of hours recorded and viewed. Therefore access to making and viewing recorded lectures is restricted via membership of a suitable WebLearn site.

What is the difference between recorded lectures and podcasts?

The University’s podcast service has been in place since 2008. It now offers a large collection of audio and video recordings of lectures and other events or series. The majority of recordings are available to the public or as open educational resources. Recorded lectures using Replay, on the other hand, are intended for Oxford students and are restricted via membership of (or visitor access to) a WebLearn site. There are numerous pedagogical benefits for students in being able to listen during the live lecture and view the recording later for consolidation of their knowledge and revision. Usually audio and slides are sufficient, which makes the system comfortable and unobtrusive for presenters (video can be added, but this increases the complexity and cost of equipment).

Can I make my recordings public?

If you wish to make your recorded lectures public, the Replay recordings can be downloaded from the Panopto site as .mp4 files, which can then be made available via the Podcasting service.

What is required in WebLearn?

WebLearn is used as the gateway into Replay, enabling staff and students to use their Oxford single signon accounts. A suitable WebLearn site needs to be created before any recordings can be made. The site maintainer provides student access to the site and uses Site Info > Manage Tools to add the Replay tool. This is an LTI (learning tools interoperability) tool that enables authentication and the link to Panopto. The Panopto software (‘app’) needs to be downloaded (once) onto the presenter’s computer – via the same LTI tool (usually called ‘Recorded Lectures’) in the WebLearn site. The lecturer uses the WebLearn site to initiate recordings, which are automatically uploaded and stored in a corresponding Panopto folder. Students view the recordings by clicking on the ‘Recorded Lectures’ tool in the site.

Is additional training required for WebLearn site maintainers?

No additional training is required.

What Replay training is provided by IT Services?

The IT Learning Centre offers a series of short courses on the use of Replay, ranging from a getting started workshop to more advanced sessions.

More information

Posted in WebLearn | Leave a comment

Collaborative authoring of materials

Posted on March 2, 2017 by Adam Marshall

The 2017 version of the annual NMC Horizon Report was launched during the
final session of this years ELI conference. One of the key themes is “Collaborative Learning Approaches” (see Page 5 of NMC Horizon Report Preview, 2017 Higher Education Edition). This is defined as:

Collaborative learning, which refers to students or educators working together in peer-to-peer or group activities, is based on the perspective that learning is a social construct. The approach involves activities generally focused around four principles: placing the learner at the center, emphasizing interaction, working in groups, and developing solutions to real challenges.

It is not well known that all Oxford University staff and students already have access to a collaborative authoring environment known as *Unity. *Unity is a multi-tenant instance of the Apereo Open Academic Environment (OAE), staff and students can sign-in to OAE with the regular Oxford Single Sign-On credentials.

All UK HEIs plus a huge number of worldwide educational institutions (20,000 in total) also have access to OAE and it is possible to create ad-hoc groups containing just Oxford University staff or students or including members from any of the other participating institutions.

These groups can work together on documents, build up libraries of materials and hyperlinks, have on-line discussions or create networks of colleagues, peers or contacts at other institutions.

You can login by visiting https://ox.oaeproject.org/ or there’s a handy link in the ‘Quick Links’ drop down on every single WebLearn page. OAE works equally well on desktop or mobile.

If you wish to add collaborative exercises as part of a course then we recommend that you add a ‘Web Content’ tool (Site Info > Manage Tools) and set the URL to https://ox.oaeproject.org/. We recommend that you should ask your students to complete their profile upon first login.

We would be very interested in hearing from anybody who intends to try out collaborative authoring in OAE in their teaching.

Posted in Apereo OAE (formerly Sakai OAE / 3), e-learning, WebLearn | Tagged | Leave a comment

Learning Management Systems – what comes next? A presentation about the Next Generation Digital Learning Environment (NGDLE) by Dr Charles Severance, Mon 27 Feb at 12.30

Posted on February 23, 2017 by Adam Marshall

We are thrilled to announce that Dr Charles Severance from the University of Michigan will be giving a short talk about the “Next Generation Digital Learning Environment” (NGDLE) in IT Services, Banbury Rd on Monday 27th February at 12.30.

This is a version of the talk that he first aired at the Educause Learning Initiative (ELI) conference last week.

A NGDLE was proposed by Malcolm Brown in 2015 [1] and is seen as an evolution of the “monolithic VLE”. It is built upon open learning tools interoperability standards and it envisages a small central ‘hub’ (host) supplemented by an “App Store” of plug-in tools.

Charles has led the development of an open source framework (Tsugi [2] which is a project hosted by the Apereo Foundation [3]) to support this vision.

Recording of the talk: http://podcasts.ox.ac.uk/embed/de6221f0d019e4062ce9

Here’s how Charles describes his talk.

“This presentation will give an overview of the Tsugi project and applications of the Tsugi software in building a distributed approach to teaching and learning tools and content. It is not sufficient to simply make a bunch of small web-hosted things and claim we have “implemented” the NGDLE. We must be able to coherently search, find, re-construct and re-combine those “small pieces” in a way that allows teaching and learning to happen. To do this, each of the learning application and content providers must master detailed interoperability standards to allow us “mash up” and bring those distributed and disparate elements back together. While there has been much said about the ultimate shape and structure of the NGDLE, and there are many current and emerging interoperability standards, there is little effort to build and train providers with usable technology that will empower thousands or hundreds of thousands of people to create and share applications and content that will populate the new learning ecosystem.

In effect, we need to build the educational equivalent of the Apple App Store. Except that it needs to be open and extensible and not depend on a single vendor intent on maximizing shareholder value. This presentation will show how the Tsugi project is doing research into how this works in actual practice. Tsugi is a 100% open source production-ready application and content hosting system that is simple enough to use to allow interoperable and pluggable learning applications or learning content to be built, hosted, deployed and shared by individuals or various-sized organizations.”

Charles is a Clinical Associate Professor and teaches in the School of Information at the University of Michigan. He is the Chair of the Sakai Project Management Committee (PMC). Previously he was the Executive Director of the Sakai Foundation and the Chief Architect of the Sakai Project and worked with the IMS Global Learning Consortium promoting and developing standards for teaching and learning technology.

Full bio: http://www.dr-chuck.com/dr-chuck/resume/bio.htm

Posted in e-learning, Sakai | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment