Author: itcomm

MSU faculty member Cathleen McGreal recently participated in the Rooms for Enaged and Active Learning (REAL) Academy and has been teaching in these spaces for the Spring, 2014 semester. She recently took notes on things that worked well and common instructor and student questions. From these notes, McGreal approached IT Services – Teaching & Learning about developing brief video tutorials on these common REAL questions. Read Full Article →

Team Collaboration We work in groups.   Almost everybody does.   Even those who work independent of an organization are not able to skirt collaborating with others. It is part of who we are as humans to be social and collaborative.   We couldn’t do much of anything of significance if this were not the case. Read Full Article →

Update as of May 1, 2014: Microsoft has released an emergency patch for the Internet Explorer vulnerability. Users should apply Windows Updates and then reboot their computer. Microsoft did release a version of the patch for Windows XP systems. Windows XP users should also apply these updates and reboot.

Microsoft released a security advisory (number 2963983) for Internet Explorer (IE) on Saturday, April 26, 2014. Read Full Article →

Access to several core university systems – including ANGEL, Desire2Learn, and computer lab machines – was disrupted Saturday, January 4, between 7:00 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. The source of the problem was traced to a device that was overloading IT Services’ datacenter network and disrupting traffic to the Shibboleth identity authorization system used by the affected services. Read Full Article →

In late 2012 we began a two and a half year conversion to D2L from ANGEL at Michigan State University.  A transition like this is never easy, so we wanted to offer faculty and staff a broad conversion window so you could plan migrations that fit within your program schedule.     With that we have also offered a free supplemental training course designed to help make the transition for ANGEL to D2L as easy as possible, and help you start feeling comfortable in the new system. Read Full Article →

Learning Design and Technology at Michigan State University currently has an opening for an instructional designer (MSU classification: Information Technologist) positions. This position will work with faculty, university clients and the LearnDAT team (designers, programmers and students) to consult, develop and produce complete web-based courseware for online and blended offerings at MSU.  Read Full Article →

 

Converting your course from ANGEL to D2L?  This checklist is an excellent resource that will help you check the quality of your course materials after you have attended a D2L Conversion Lab.

Course Homepage

• Review News items (Announcements)
• Adjust release dates for the new semester – *Tip: The D2L Manage Dates feature lets you update all the release dates for course items in one action.

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  Overview

This document offers a brief overview of the updates and changes that you can expect to see in Version 10.1 of the Desire2Learn learning management system at Michigan State University. Click the link below to download a printable version.

Click to download PDF

Highlights

According to the company, that learning environment has been updated with these features:

• Video Note allows the user to use a webcam and then drop a video into the course content;
• Universal Drag and Drop File Upload simplifies the addition of files into course content from external sources (such as the user's desktop);
• The ability to create new material, such as assignments, quizzes, and discussions inside content without having to do it from within a popup or navigating to another function;
• Inline document conversion and rendering for Microsoft Office and PDF files;
• A beefed up HTML editor that allows for insertion of audio and video in place;
• Quicker access to restrictions and date management;
• A new class progress dashboard to provide student progress at a glance for instructors; and
• A revamped User Progress function that improves on visualizations and streamlined navigation among users, courses, and tools.

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Results:

This page will prepare you for the D2L Conversion Lab.

Time:

• Basic course conversion: 1 minute
• Waiting time for conversion to complete: up to 24 hours

Why this is important

Each ANGEL course or group can only be converted to the Desire2Learn (D2L) system once using the D2L conversion tool. Read Full Article →

Faculty D2L Resources

D2L Faculty Help Documentation – A D2L produced self-help center that allows you to learn D2L features/functionality.  This resource is updated at the same time our system is upgraded so you always have the latest training materials.

D2L Faculty Quick Start Guide – This is an MSU produced quick start guide designed to help you get up to speed quickly.   Read Full Article →