Newsletter Archive - Edition 9

eLearning Comfy (Un)Conference: Thank you for coming and resources!

eLearning and Professional Development hosted a one-day (un)conference focused on comfort and hearing from our DDLC learning communities on June 3. The conference included share out sessions from our three learning communities looking at anti-racist teaching, building community and alternative assessment and grading, a Canvas show and tell from faculty, and conversations with our Instructional Designers. We created a conference Canvas shell where we will share recordings and resources from the conference.

In March of 2021, the Presidents and Chancellor made the decision to merge the three eLearning teams. Though merging Canvas has been in discussion for several years, this move to a single team provided the resources necessary to bring the project to fruition.

By combining our three Canvas sites into a single site, we provide:

• A single-entry point for all courses at Seattle Colleges.

• A reduction of multiple accounts for students and faculty across the colleges.

• The ability for eLearning to provide faster support to students, faculty, and staff.

• Greater consistency across student and faculty experiences in Canvas.

For more information, including a video explanation of the whole project and you can prepare please see our new Canvas Merge Project homepage. There you can also request an appointment with our LMS (Learning Management System) Admins to discuss individual situations, submit scenarios for usability testing, and visit our FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions).

See the project homepage and this newsletter for future updates.

Summer Canvas Reminders:

• For faculty teaching in Summer Quarter who have multiple of the same courses, if you are wanting to merge your courses for easier editing, please email us at eLearning@seattlecolleges.edu ASAP. Please include the course names and item numbers.

• Students will be added to Summer Quarter Canvas shells by June 13th.

End of Quarter Checklist:

Canvas courses are automatically concluded and added to the Past Enrollments section of your course list--at the very bottom. If you are looking for a past course, check your full list of courses on Canvas.

Courses conclude a week after the last day of the quarter. It is easier to complete these tasks before your course is completed.

1. Export a copy of your grade book

You can download a copy of your Canvas grade book so that it will be easier to access student grades. It is also important to occasionally back up your grade book throughout the term. While Canvas is a reliable system, no system is infallible.

Canvas exports your grade book to a .csv (comma-separated values) file, which should be readable by almost any spreadsheet application.

If you do export your grade book, make sure to store your copy in a secure, FERPA-compliant location. Citrix meets these requirements. How do I download scores from the Gradebook?

2. Export a copy of your course

You can still copy a concluded course into a new course shell, but no system is infallible. Exporting and saving a copy of your course will save you potential frustration should anything unforeseen happen to the online copy of your course. How do I export a Canvas course?

3. Gather copies of sample work

If you would like to be able to use outstanding student submissions as examples in future courses, you should first get the express written permission of the students. Then download or cut and paste copies of the sample work. Make sure to retain a copy of the written permission with a copy of the sample work as part of your personal records outside of Canvas.

4. Decide how you will handle any incompletes

Students will no longer have access to submit assignments once a course concludes, but they can still access assignment prompts and can submit work to you via an attachment to a Canvas email (or plain old email). Many incomplete requirements can be managed in low-tech ways.

If you have activities that must be completed in Canvas (e.g., complex quizzes or tests), or want students to submit through Canvas contact us at eLearning@seattlecolleges.edu

Queering Teaching (In June and Beyond)

In recent months, we have seen a rise in antagonism toward anti-racist education and toward the teaching of Critical Race Theory in K-12 and as these conversations were raging, running in parallel, though also connected, were renewed anti-LGBTQ education policies. While these two things seem separate, they are working in tandem and pushed by the same group of politicians and parents. Florida’s Don’t Say Gay Bill, is a clear example of one of these bills, that was followed right after Florida also banned the teaching of Critical Race Theory. We have also seen a push to ban books with LGBTQ content or themes, limiting students’ engagement with LGBTQ identities and stories.

This month is Pride month, wherein several parts of the US and around the World, we see Pride celebrations (though many happen at other times of the year as well). June marks the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots in New York City and the resulting protests that are commemorated by Pride celebrations now. While Pride remains a protest as the struggle for equity is always present for the community, it also is a time to celebrate LGBTQ folks. It can also be a time to reflect on our own practices of inclusion. In teaching, queer pedagogy asks us to challenge our teaching from the perspective of equity and inclusion of fluid identities around sexuality and gender. This would apply to both the students in the classroom, how students navigate their classroom, and their college, and the content being taught in the course. For example, João Nemi Neto in Queer pedagogy: Approaches to inclusive teaching, looked at foreign language learning textbooks and their use of family trees and depictions of families that all assume heterosexual relationships that follow traditional depictions of binary gender. In Neto’s example, students learning a language where they are learning to express themselves in that language are only given the language and context to express heteronormative relationships, but not queer relationships, LGBTQ identity, or fluid gender representations. However, with a more inclusive curriculum, LGBTQ students would be able to see themselves and gain the tools to express themselves.

If you reflect on your teaching, how do queer identities and relationships get represented in your teaching content? Are LGBTQ folks being represented in the content as contributors to that field? How can LGBTQ students feel represented in your teaching?

Beyond content, it is also essential to think about our practices of inclusion. We have been online for 2 plus years and a benefit of that modality is that students have had more privacy, and for some, a better sense of safety when expressing their own gender; they also have pronouns usually listed right by their names. However, now that we are moving back to in-person, some students will struggle with this changing dynamic and will need support. One way an instructor can do is to reflect on their own practices to remember the names and pronouns of students. Sometimes, especially with names, they do not match the “official records” on a roster, and instructors should prepare when students tell you to call them by a certain name and to use certain pronouns. Not all students are going to feel comfortable changing their names on Canvas or ctcLink and trust to only tell you as their instructor. Doing small icebreakers often throughout the quarter, creating a custom roster for your course using Excel to track names/pronouns, and having a student survey that asks for their name and pronouns, all can help you remember students’ names and pronouns.

Zoom Vanishing Pen