Your Training and Professional Development Experiences

As part of our continuing process of evaluating and improving our Training and Professional Development opportunities at CCCOnline, we'd like to open up a discussion about what your experiences. What workshops and webinars have you participated in that you would like to offer feedback about, either positive or negative? What kinds of workshops or webinars would you like to see offered at CCCOnline that have not been offered? What subjects would you like to see covered in a workshop or webinar that you, so far, have not?

This discussion will take place in the CCCOnline community in Desire2Learn. Enter the CCCOnline Community, go to the discussions tool, select the Training and Professional Development forum, and select the "Your Training and Professional Development Experiences" topic. Here you can post your thoughts and ideas, or respond to posts from your colleagues.

Thank you in advance for contribution to this important discussion!

Sean Renner
Training and Professional Development Coordinator

Changes to the Library Resources Web Pages and New Resources

This week, exciting news from CCCOnline's Instructional Online Librarian Mary Cash! 

Hey everyone, take some time to check out what’s new with our Library Resources.   

*First, the Library Resources and Research & Writing Toolkit pages have officially moved from the student wiki over to the ccconline.org website: http://www.ccconline.org/Library_Resources.   

*Once you’re on the main page of the Library Resources, you’ll also notice a link to the EBSCO article databases.  So, in addition to being able to access the databases once you’re logged in to D2L, you can also click on the EBSCO link, login with your S# and password and get into the databases right from the Library Resources page.  

*Inside D2L, you will also notice a change to the Helpful Links widget, with just one link to Library Resources instead of several.  Click on the Library Resources page, and you’ll see the same page that you see out on the ccconline.org website; you just won’t need to login to access the databases.

*Please take some time to check out the article databases as well; we now have some additional databases – including  CINAHL (nursing and health science database), History Reference Center, Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection, Science Reference Center, Points of View, Consumer Health Complete, and more.  We still have the always wonderful Academic Search Premier, and Business Source Premier.  Visit the Library Article Databases Tutorial to see descriptions of all of our databases.

*Note also that CCCOnline is now a member of AskAcademic, the 24/7 academic Ask-a-Librarian service offered through the Colorado State Library.  Check out the AskAcademic widget on the Library Resources main page.  Students can still email me, cccolibrarian@ccconline.org, with their questions; I will have more first-hand knowledge of specific research assignments in their courses, but do encourage your students to use the AskAcademic reference service.  The service is manned by trained reference librarians from the AskAcademic member libraries – visit the AskAcademic website to learn more: http://www.askacademic.org/ and here’s a list of the participating libraries: http://www.askacademic.org/participating.html.  CCCOnline pays a small fee to the Colorado State Library and mans the virtual reference desk for 2 hours a week in return for great reference and information service to both students and faculty.

Be sure to check back to the Library Resources web pages from time to time   - I have some ideas for new features and will be adding those as I have time. Have interesting ideas related to anything library related?  Have questions?  Email me at mary.cash@cccs.edu.

 

Thanks, Mary Cash, Instructional Online Librarian, CCCOnline

Online Learning News

Below please find several recent Online Learning-related news links. (Our last installment of these links was published in January.)   We welcome your additional links and conversation in the CCCOnline Community.

“Professors and Online Learning” by John Thelin (7/10/12)
Commentary from Inside Higher Ed:
http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2012/07/10/professors-shouldnt-be-afraid-online-learning-essay

“Online Learning and Liberal Arts Colleges” by Steve Kolowich (6/29/12)

From Inside Higher Ed:
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/06/29/liberal-arts-college-explore-uses-blended-online-learning

“Conflicted: Faculty and Online Education, 2012” by Steve Kolowich (6/21/12)
From Inside Higher Ed, about their joint study with the Babson Survey Research Group.

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/survey/conflicted-faculty-and-online-education-2012

“4 Professors Discuss Teaching Free Online Courses for Thousands of Students” by Jeffrey R. Young (6/11/12)
From The Chronicle:

http://chronicle.com/article/4-Professors-Discuss-Teaching/132125/?sid=gn

"Online Classes and College Completion" by Rob Jenkins (3/13/12)
From The Chronicle:
http://chronicle.com/article/Online-ClassesCollege/131133/?sid=cc

“5 Foundational Principles for Course Design” by Joshua Kim (2/2/12)

From Inside Higher Ed’s “Technology and Learning” blog:

http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/5-foundational-principles-course-design

Happy Fourth

This week, we’d like to wish a happy and safe Independence Day to you and yours. Enjoy the holiday!

Question for discussion: If you incorporate holidays into your courses, how do you do so? Comment with colleagues in the CCCOnline Community.