Page 28 - Campus Technology, August/September 2017

SPECIAL SECTION: ONLINE LEARNING
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CAMPUS TECHNOLOGY | August/September 2017
notes with whatever it is you’re talking about.” For example, if somebody posts a question on a given topic, other users can post their responses, which can be moved around, and the results can be viewed as a group for further discussion or for work outside of the virtual meeting.
Socrative provides quick questioning, quizzing and surveying. Reporting can be downloaded to Google Drive for later analysis. For example, the community might develop a feedback survey in the program to post after each virtual session to continue helping the group improve its processes.
Promote the Use of Collaboration Spaces
Most institutions these days already have a shared area, whether it’s Google G Suite, Microsoft OneDrive, Dropbox, an institutional intranet or an LMS, where students can share documents they’re working on. The use of those “is really important,” said Mullinix. “I don’t mean just to submit [papers] for grading. I mean a common space, and preferably somewhere they can collaborate and build on each other’s work. That can be a powerful tool.” For example, when Walden developed a new doctoral capstone resources website, forum group members headed out on a virtual scavenger hunt, shared the tools and resources they found most useful and explained why within a Google document.
On top of those, however, Mullinix recommends three additional online programs:
The work of building a community has paid
off with heightened student engagement,
increased collaboration, shared insights and
cross-inspiration.
Nearpod, already popular among K-12 teachers, lets users click on a link and bring up on their own devices whatever the person presenting wants to display. As Mullinix pointed out, with Nearpod, “you could log in from anywhere and be part of that presentation.” A Nearpod collaboration utility allows the presenter to pose a question and have students post text and images in response.
Prezi, the mainstay slide-sharing service, now offers the ability for multiple users to work on presentations simultaneously. “Instead of saying, ‘Please wait, Mike, I’m almost done,’ now [any user] can just take over,” said Mullinix.
Haiku Deck, an alternative presentation program, has an education edition that keeps the slideshows within the class, allows for copyright-controllable image and video embedding and works across devices.
The work of building a community has paid off, said Mullinix. Not only was there heightened student engagement, but she saw evidence of increased collaboration among forum members, shared insights and cross- inspiration. The result was just what one would expect from a real community: more sharing of “personal stories and journeys, successes, issues encountered and not feeling so alone.”
Dian Schaffhauser is a senior contributing editor for Campus Technology.