On this page, you can:
Register for Upcoming Trainings
Register for Upcoming Trainings Conducted by Zoom
Watch Recorded LDDI Trainings
Watch Recorded Summer 2020 FDI Trainings/Workshops
Register in advance for these trainings After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the session.
Active Learning Activity: Teaching Students to Ask Better Questions
Description: How important is it to be able to ask a good question? Richard Feynman, a Nobel Laureate, says “there is no learning without having to pose a question” and yet studies have shown that teachers ask the majority of questions. In this session, you’ll learn how to facilitate an instructional strategy called the Question Formulation Technique (QFT) to get your students formulating and working with better questions. This technique has decades of research and is very simple to integrate in any discipline. If you’ve been wanting to lecture less or need new ideas for getting all students to actively participate in your courses, please come.
Led by: Stacie Cassat Green, Instructional Design Consultant
Date: February 7, 2022
Time: 1:00pm-1:50pm
Register in Advance: https://union.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYvceGuqjwoHdInzgbzyg_VOBwCr_NShAGf
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
Editing with Panopto
Description: Learn how to do basic editing using Panopto. You'll learn how to navigate the scrubber, trim or clip video content and edit the transcript. There are 2 offerings of the same workshop.
Led by: Ginny Solomon, Union College LDDI
Date: Thursday, January 20, 2022
Time: 3:00pm - 4:0pm
Register in Advance: https://www.google.com/url?q=https://union.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYrdOivqD8rGNyYO7BrKKgfAHcpeLCCh_ar&sa=D&source=calendar&ust=1642627812583968&usg=AOvVaw0jvUKT6qkFsmt1HKzKpFbl
Date: Friday, January, 21, 2022
Time: 11:0am - 12:00pm
Register in Advance: https://union.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJUoc-2hpj8qHdZBXdanKDX969fW4dder6xd
Best Practices in Designing Your Site for Nexus
We'll take a look at some examples of Nexus sites that show best practices in design such as chunking, module progression and organization, using fonts and colors, and other design considerations. There are 2 offerings of the same workshop.
Led by: Ginny Solomon and Sonia Sandoval, Union College, LDDI
Date: Wednesday, February 16, 2022
Time: 3:00pm - 4:00pm
Register in Advance: https://union.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0odeigpz4uHtCkmwdCK2bmfoz4TlD30ILr
Date: Thursday, February 17, 2022
Time: 11:00am - 12:00pm
Register in Advance: https://union.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJEkf--ppzsoE9DK1tqOHd_zWTj1gqeSJYqA
Panopto Training (Led by Panopto)
Weekly Gradescope Workshops: Thursdays 12PM EST (Led by Gradescope):
Led by Gradescope, sign-up for this online workshop and learn how instructors use Gradescope. Gradescope will offer guidance on how to deliver assessments remotely and outline various options to meet your immediate needs, including:
- Fully online assignments, no paper required
- Existing paper-based assignments
- Combining online and paper-based approaches
WHEN REGISTERING, MAKE SURE YOU CHANGE FROM THE PACIFIC TIME ZONE TO EASTERN TIME ZONE
Getting Started with Zoom Meetings: Register
AUDIENCE: BEGINNER-Ready to start using Zoom, but need some help? Drop-in for our daily (Mon-Fri) quick starts! A Zoom expert will take you through a 45-minute high-level tour of Zoom and cover the basics to get you up and running. It’s as simple as logging in, scheduling a meeting, and finding the controls. Start Zooming today! Stick around to get all your burning questions answered through live Q&A!
AUDIENCE: INTERMEDIATE- Gain the skills you need to be an amazing Zoom host. This 60-minute user onboarding session with live Q&A will review features applicable to Zoom Meetings and using the Zoom Client software. We will discuss scheduling and hosting your events with an emphasis on best practices. This session is public and open to all Zoom users. Attendees will be muted and able to submit questions via text.
Zoom Meetings for Education (Faculty and Students): Register
AUDIENCE: ALL- In this session you will learn:
- How to download the Zoom applications and join a Zoom meeting;
- How to schedule a meeting and send out invitations;
- In-meeting controls and differentiation tools (including the waiting room, share screen, breakout rooms).
Time will be allocated at the end of the session for live Q&A.
Mini-Conference on Inclusive Pedagogy: 12/3/2021
Union College hosted its first ever, virtual mini-conference, focused on inclusive pedagogies on December 3, 2021. The research shows that designing your courses to help each student feel like they belong improves student learning for everyone. Each of the six sessions spotlighted an inclusive pedagogy with concrete instructional strategies you can try in your courses.
Watch recorded sessions
Session materials
Panopto Screen Capture and Streaming
Find out how to how to use Panopto to record presentations, import videos, link to courses and assignments, create in-video prompts and quizzes, edit and approve captions, create playlists and other features.
Watch recorded session
New Ideas and Tools for Teaching WAC
Most of us teaching WAC have not been formally trained about how to teach the writing process. To support you in your planning for the winter and spring terms, we held a workshop to offer some concrete strategies and assignments you may use in your course. These assignments have been developed with Joe Johnson, Director of Writing Programs, and Kara Doyle, Associate Professor of English, along with our consulting instructional designer, Stacie Green, to help you accomplish two goals:
-Improve your students writing
-Reduce your assessment time
In this workshop, you’ll learn about several assignments we’ve developed specifically for WAC courses that you may use, customize for your course/discipline, and easily copy to Nexus. Pick and choose among the assignments or use them all. We’ve created these assignments as forms or templates in a portfolio tool called Pebblepad that Union has purchased. While you may use any of these assignments without Pebblepad, as we’ll make the content available to you via Google Docs, we hope you will consider how the pedagogies that underpin learning portfolios could be used to improve students ability to write across the disciplines. This session was led by Stacie Cassat Green, Instructional Design Consultant + Denise Snyder, Director of Learning Technologies and Environments.
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Silver Linings: Stories of Innovation at Union College
People who study creative thinking have identified that constraints actually promote creative thinking. The dark cloud of the pandemic has certainly presented us with some big constraints about how we teach and students learn this year, forcing us to adapt and innovate. Watch to gain inspiration from your colleagues as they share the “silver linings” they have found in their teaching because of the pandemic.
This session was led by Stacie Cassat Green, Instructional Design Consultant for Union College + Panel of FDI "Incubator" Alumni:
- Holli Frey, Joy Wang, Doug Klein: How team teaching, alumni speakers, group work, and Perusall worked in their Climate Change Minerva course
Andy Morris: new project, “Hometown environmental history”
- Nicole Theodosiou: NSF grant simulation process
- Anouk Verheyden-Gillikin: How group work helps connect students
- Shawn Wehe: Mock exams in fluid dynamics (formative assessment)
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Rebooting student motivation in a pandemic
Motivation drives engagement and engagement drives learning. When student engagement seems low, it is time to look at motivation. What motivates them to take your course(s) and how can you use that to drive successful learning? In this workshop, we discussed motivation and engagement, including some practical ideas for how to “reboot” student motivation when the mid-term slump happens. The session was led by Stacie Cassat Green, Instructional Design Consultant for Union College.
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Conducting Remote Exams in a Pandemic: Tips for Faculty
Challenges of teaching during a pandemic are many, and one particular hurdle is conducting remote exams. Issues such as multiple time zones, technical glitches, academic integrity, and grading will be addressed in this workshop. We recommend replacing high stakes exams with several smaller tests or alternate assessments such as reports, posters, presentations, or papers. However, in some cases, the only practical option is an exam. Watch to gain some ideas for implementing tests in an online environment, as well as utilizing the "Safe Exam Browser (SEB)", that allows teachers to restrict student access to external websites or other applications while they are taking an assessment online. This session was led by Kevin Barhydt, Senior Inclusive and Learning Technology Analyst.
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Digital White Boarding with iPads (hybrid or remote)
Learn how to draw, write, and show real-time examples as you teach using an iPad. This session reviewed live digital whiteboard options using iPad apps: Notes, Google Jamboard, Explain Everything, and more. The iPad Course Reserve Loaner program was also discussed. This session was led by Sonia Sandoval, Learning Environments Services Specialist & Denise Snyder, Director of Learning Technologies and Environments.
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Getting Started with Sway
Sway is an online platform for quick, beautiful, and engaging content displays. Sway formats content intelligently so the user can focus on creating the content, rather than organizing it. It allows users to quickly create an image journal, a short essay enhanced with images, YouTube videos, hyperlinks, or a brief research report. This session was led by Kesheng Yu, Senior Learning Technology Consultant
Sway Resource Link
Getting Started with Gradescope: Delivering Assessments Remotely with Gradescope
The workshop offers guidance for beginners on how to deliver assessments remotely and outline various assessment options to meet your immediate needs, including:
- Fully online assignments, no paper required
- Existing paper-based assignments
- Combining online and paper-based approaches
- The workshop will also cover the grading and rubric-building workflow on Gradescope and walk attendees through both the instructor and student interface for creating and submitting assignments and viewing feedback. You will learn how to:
- Use ‘assignment analytics’ to gain insight into student learning
- Create better rubrics to increase student learning
- Write each comment only once - apply previously used comments with a click
- Make rubric changes as you grade - changes apply to previously graded work to maintain consistency
- Grade your existing exams and homework on Gradescope
Watch 12/7 recorded session
Watch 1/6 recorded session
Zoom: Integration with Nexus & Ensemble Workflow
Learn about using the Zoom tool in Nexus , as well as using something called an "Ensemble Video workflow" to send your Zoom recordings automatically to Nexus. The session discussed using polls in Zoom, how to do some basic editing in Ensemble, and different ways to store your videos like Google Drive vs. Ensemble. This session was led by Ginny Solomon, Manager of Learning Technology and Environments Support.
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Upgrading Your Assessment Strategies
Tired of the papers and/or exams you use to assess students? This is a good year to experiment with new ideas as there is nothing “traditional” about how we are doing education right now. In this workshop, you’ll learn about different assessment strategies you might try. Think of this workshop as a salad bar—there are many options, but you don’t have to use all of them. This session was led by Stacie Cassat Green, Instructional Design Consultant for Union College
Watch recorded session
Using Scavenger Hunt Games to Improve Engagement
Many of us are having a harder time keeping students engaged this year. In this workshop, you’ll learn how to use Goosechase, a free scavenger hunt app, to add the “gaming” elements of missions, points, and competition to add some fun ways to interact with your course. By the end of the workshop, you’ll know how to set up a game (it is very easy!) and have several ideas for how you might use the app in your course. This session was led by Stacie Cassat Green, Instructional Design Consultant for Union College.
Watch recorded session
Teaching with Zoom
Learn how to hold classes remotely in real-time using Zoom. Zoom is a web-based video conferencing application available to all Union College faculty, staff and students. With Zoom you can connect and collaborate online with anyone, anytime, anywhere. This training discussed how to integrate Zoom into your Nexus course website, and quick tips for organizing Nexus in a thoughtful way for remote learning. This session was led by Stacie Cassat Green, Instructional Design Consultant for Union College, and Denise Snyder, Director of Learning Technologies + Environments,
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Creating Instructional Videos When You are NOT a Video Producer
Thanks to the pandemic, many faculty find themselves wanting to create short lecture videos for their courses that look good and engage students. In this workshop, Stacie Cassat Green demonstrated how to use a tool called Intercut that uses your phone and computer to create videos that automatically cut between you and your slides. The resulting video looks more professional, less DIY AND it does all of the post-production work that you might have wanted to do in iMovie if you had months of time to do this. You’ll also learn the basics of how to make PowerPoint work as a teleprompter and set up your office to make your videos.
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Zoom Pro: Whiteboard, screen sharing, and screen capture
Are you ready to move past the simple features of Zoom? Learn how to draw, write, and show real-time examples as you teach. We will go over live whiteboarding, as well as screen capture basics, so you can have your course content ready before you start your meeting. We will discuss Zoom, Explain Everything, and Ensemble Anthem. This session was led by Sonia Sandoval, Learning Environments Services Specialist.
Watch recorded session
Summer 2020 FDI Workshops
Watch 20+ recorded sessions