I thought it would be a good idea to see if Open Campus had any statistics on LSM usage so I called our Open Campus Instructional design coordinator (Gloria Kersh) at SFC. I was going to interview her to get a broader picture of the relative usage of the synchronous versus asynchronous tools of our LMS (Angel). I was hoping for a counter. She had no information about this but she did tell me that our chief programmer just put up a survey tool on Angel. For me, this is huge. I was beginning to worry about having the time to program the online survey and the server smtp script and then convincing ITS that I could implement them without bringing the network down. This tool in Angel will administer the survey and collect its results (all I do is populate it with questions) while securing the anonymity of responding students.
Also, since my students have not seen any of the more sophisticated synchronous tools, any responses submitted to questions regarding their desirability would be suspect. I shall then reluctantly refocus my inquiry toward synchronous versus asynchronous communities. My class is definitely of the asynchronous nature. I shall definitely include a description of Elluminate Live!'s capabilities and include a question as to whether or not this would encourage them to attend synchronous communications but I cannot in good faith emphasize it.
All-in-all, my survey is to be of a most informal nature. I am doing exploratory research, after all. I just want to find out what SFC students think of our communication tools. That will then be a part of the overall paper concerning synchronous and asynchronous communication in online courses.
Tonight I am going to test that survey tool. I am going to pose one question. This is to find out the answer to my question (Do you need more help than I have given you in your Digital Storytelling slideshow project?)and to make sure that the survey tool works (Tips for Writing a Survey.)
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Wonderful--I would appreciate it if you would send some observations during the process. I can think of several ways we could use this in our classes, particularly the asynchronous ones. Here's a description of creating the survey; it sounds really easy. This also gets you past the ITE roadblock. http://ets2.wordpress.com/2009/01/14/extra-credit-survey-agent-content-item-agent/
ReplyDeleteHi Suzon,
ReplyDeleteI love your thought-process with this. I know you will get a lot of feedback regarding Angel and its communication style (or the lack of it). We will all benefit from your research.
Please share your results as you go. I'm curious to what you will find.
--Debbie
We use Blackboard at LSCC and there is a built in survey tool also. It does come in handy and the results are all "crunched" for you. I would love to hear how it comes out.
ReplyDeleteMike