Faculty and students can now access SCOLA multicultural learning resources directly from the SCOLA Web site at http://www.scola.org/. Previous to December 2008, portions of these resources were downloaded and made available via a Penn State Web site at http://ets.tlt.psu.edu/scola/.
SCOLA is a nonprofit educational organization that distributes news broadcasts and multicultural resources in a variety of languages supplemented with instructional materials. By taking broadcast programs from around the world and adding transcripts, translations, vocabulary lists, images, and quizzes, SCOLA provides a complete package of materials for use in the classroom or by individual students. SCOLA materials are ideal as a language textbook supplement and suitable for use by an individual or a class to extend vocabulary, grammar, reading, and listening comprehension, as well as cultural awareness.
Beginning December 19, any Penn State community member who has an active Access Account user ID and password can use the resources available at the SCOLA Web site. To obtain the ID and password to access the Penn State account at the SCOLA site, individuals should go to http://ets.tlt.psu.edu/scola/ and follow the directions on the screen.
The Web site at http://ets.tlt.psu.edu/scola/, administered by Information Technology Services, will continue to provide information on how to use SCOLA resources and add them to an ANGEL course.
In addition to the resources available on the Web, a 24/7 SCOLA television broadcast is available to the Penn State community on channel 29 of the Penn State network. For more information on SCOLA, e-mail L-SCOLA@lists.psu.edu.
]]>To optimize the performance of ANGEL during fall finals week, the Import Wizard and Export Wizard tools will be turned off from 4:00 a.m. Saturday, Dec. 13 until 6:00 a.m. Saturday, Dec. 20. In the event that ANGEL does begin to experience performance problems, ITS staff will take additional measures to temporarily remove access to nonessential features from the ANGEL My Profile page to alleviate load. See below for a list of these nonessential features.
If ANGEL becomes inaccessible, faculty may wish to contact their students via e-mail. Faculty can obtain a list of the Penn State e-mail addresses of all students enrolled in their class through eLion and use this list to send a message. For instructions, see the Copy E-mail Addresses from eLion topic in the ANGEL Help & Information Guide.
Following are the nonessential features that would be temporarily unavailable on the ANGEL My Profile page, if necessary, to alleviate load. Alternative means to access these features in ANGEL, where feasible, are noted. Access to these features on the My Profile page would be restored once ANGEL is stable.
The Penn State Testing Center is already nearly fully booked for spring final exams, so faculty who want to schedule e-testing during finals week should do so as soon as possible. Finals need to be scheduled through your department using the normal ISIS process on the ARUAF screen, your department must request the Pollock Testing Center specifically, and must also copy eTest@psu.edu on the request. The deadline for scheduling a spring 2009 final in the Testing Center is January 12.
The Center houses an e-testing lab that features more than 160 Windows machines, laser printers, state-of-the-art security measures to ensure academic integrity, and staff to answer students' questions about hardware and software. To meet high demand during spring finals week, several technology classrooms will be used for e-testing during this time, including 134 Cedar Building, 113 IST Building, and 64 Willard Building.
The Center is jointly operated by Information Technology Services and the Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence. To learn more about the Testing Center, go to http://testing.psu.edu.
]]>Penn State faculty who are planning future courses may wish to incorporate Turnitin, a plagiarism prevention tool that promotes learning while saving class time.
Turnitin is an originality detection system owned by Turnitin.com, to which Penn State has a license. Faculty can submit students’ papers themselves or allow students to submit their own papers to the system to perform originality checks against millions of Web pages, books, journals, and previously submitted papers. Turnitin can be used as a tool to teach plagiarism prevention. Any instructor who is teaching a Penn State course can request a Turnitin account by e-mailing turnitin@psu.edu. To learn more, visit http://tlt.its.psu.edu/turnitin/.
Turnitin is administered by Teaching and Learning with Technology, a unit of Information Technology Services.
]]>If you wish to have a message board restored from any course or group that has already been archived, you must request this archive from ANGEL support before the end of the spring semester and convert the message board to a discussion forum.
To review the original announcement for the phase-out and instructions to convert a message board to a discussion forum, see the Help and Information Guide article at http://angelkb.ais.psu.edu/article.asp?article=1578&p=2. For any questions, contact ANGEL support at angelsupport@psu.edu.
]]>The Copy Course tool allows instructors to copy one of their existing ANGEL courses into another course section. A master course is a special course set up as a template that multiple instructors can import into another course section. The ANGEL Archive tool is used to download a backup of a course as a ZIP file; this file can then be imported into another section using the import Content Package tool.
Instructors who need to use these tools to set up a course for the spring semester are encouraged to plan ahead and perform necessary course imports or exports prior to finals week. During finals week, instructors can continue to create course content and create master courses and learning object repositories. Students can continue to upload/download files and access lesson content.
For any questions, contact ANGEL support at angelsupport@psu.edu.
]]>To see the new site, please visit http://its.psu.edu/training/.
]]>In Pursel’s “IST 110 Information, People, and Technology” course, students explore the virtual world Second Life, developing objects and evaluating how the environment is being used for business purposes. He said that by creating items such as interactive signs and even full-scale buildings on the college’s Second Life island of “Istania,” they learn to use scripting language and 3-D modeling tools. He said, “We’re throwing the kitchen sink at Second Life to see what it works best for.”
Smith teaches a graduate design studio course in the College of Education’s Instructional Systems program (INSYS 597A) in which the class is developing a history game for sixth graders. The course centers on prototyping educational materials and the process of proceeding from an idea to a storyboard. “There’s a whole range of techniques I want them to get through that now I’ve embedded in the process of doing game design,” he said.
The work that Pursel and Smith are doing represents a growing interest in both the potential educational uses of games and the impact of games on our culture. Penn State's Educational Gaming Commons initiative was created to establish community of users who will support both physical and virtual infrastructure to promote the broad impact of gaming within the teaching, learning, and research environment.
For more about Brian Smith and Bart Pursel and to read other faculty success stories, see http://tlt.its.psu.edu/success-stories/. For more information about the Educational Gaming Commons, see http://gaming.psu.edu/
]]>Teaching and Learning with Technology (TLT) has installed multiple collaborative learning spaces in the student computing lab at 201 Pollock Building, University Park, to help fill a need for spaces on campus where two to six students can gather and spread out their materials. Installation of additional learning spaces may be considered in the future.
Each space is designed with a different configuration to accommodate a variety of activities. Some are partitioned, semiprivate spaces providing table space and a large computer monitor. Some are open spaces featuring casual soft seating. Much of the furniture is movable and wireless Internet is available for persons with laptops. A bright color scheme gives the spaces an inviting feel.
TLT will continue to adjust and improve these spaces, based on student feedback, and plans to add enhanced technology to facilitate collaboration in the near future.
For more information on Collaborative Learning Spaces, see http://tlt.its.psu.edu/learningspaces/.
]]>To help students sharpen their study skills, instructors can assign any of over twenty free, self-paced online iStudy for Success! modules. The modules, which can be imported into an ANGEL course or group, are designed to provide students with an introduction to college-level learning and help ensure that their academic experience is a positive one. Topics include "Academic Integrity, Plagiarism, and Copyright," "Active Reading," and more. For a description of each module and instructions on importing a module into ANGEL, visit iStudy for Success.
Turnitin is an originality detection system owned by Turnitin.com, to which Penn State has a license. Faculty can submit students’ papers themselves or allow students to submit their own papers to the system to perform originality checks against millions of Web pages, books, journals, and previously submitted papers. Turnitin can be used as a tool to teach plagiarism prevention. Any instructor who is teaching a Penn State course can request a Turnitin account by e-mailingturnitin@psu.edu. To learn more, visit Turnitin.
Both resources are administered by Information Technology Services.
]]>