Leeward Community College
One last push as we head into finals weeks and grading. We are almost through the semester! In case you missed our workshops last week, we’ve got you covered. Also, we are working hard to provide a professional development series this summer to help you prepare for Fall semester. Don’t miss out on this opportunity; you CanDO it!
Gmail now has a button in the toolbar to add an email message to Tasks. Not only will it add to your Tasks list (conveniently in the right side panel of your Gmail) but it automatically puts a link to your email message so you can pull it up quickly from Tasks instead of rummaging through your emails.
Once you have the item in your Tasks, you can edit its title and put a due date (which puts an entry in your Google Calendar, too). When you’ve completed the task, click the radio button next to it to cross it off your list! ✔️
Google Meet, a video conferencing platform, is now conveniently in your Gmail making it quick to create or join a Meet. [How-to use Google Meet in Gmail]
Create signatures for different situations or audiences such as: personal, professional, condensed, etc. The “Insert signatures” button is in the Gmail message window when you compose a new message, reply, or forward a message. [How-to create a Gmail signature]
Google Meet is a video conferencing platform that many of us are using for remote meetings, office hours, and class sessions. Before you wouldn’t be able to share a streaming video in your session to your audience, but now you can! You can now share audio and video (with audio) by selecting the option to present an individual Chrome browser tab.
Google Meet can now show up to 16 webcams on the screen in tiled view. By default, Meet automatically displays the most active content and participants. Usually if you have three or more participants with webcams in a session and are not presenting (i.e. screen sharing), you will have the tiled layout shown.
Photo credit: Google
The new Google Sites is here! Classic Google Sites will be phasing out in 2021 so if you have any Google Sites you want to continue using, convert them to the new Google Sites before next year. The new Google Sites is modern and simplified with an adaptive interface allowing you to easily create professional-looking websites without having to code. [How to use the new Google Sites]
For those of you who have been using Google Sites as weekly or topic modules for your courses to present content, but use Laulima for assignments, quizzes, forums, etc., you may want to consider using Laulima Lessons, a tool to create/present content modules. Not only is Lessons easy to use and allows you to present your content in an organized and visual way (like being able to embed content), but the advantage over Google Sites is that it can integrate items you have in other Laulima tools. This allows you to pull everything together in Lessons. You can link-in specific assignments from Laulima Assignments, specific discussion topics from Laulima Forums, and more. Contact the Educational Technology unit for assistance.
As the semester winds down and much student learning has taken place, there is a common question being asked, what’s my grade? The answer should not come as surprise because a final grade is comprised of many smaller grades earned throughout the semester. Having an organized and well maintained gradebook communicates that much need feedback to your students. During a semester “grades” factor into decisions like to whether a student chooses to drop or withdraw from a class and instructors may look at grades to help identify students who need additional outreach and support. Maintaining an up to date and accurate gradebook is also a item on the Leeward CC DE Guidelines for sound course design (Leeward DE Guidelines 5.6). We recently held a webinar on this subject and are able to share the presentation, “What’s My Grade? Laulima Gradebook (12:48).”
Lastly, here are some summary points to remember:
Dashes don’t equal zeros.
As we approach the end of the semester, missed scores for Gradebook Items should be converted to zeros to provide the most accurate calculated grade to the student. There is a button in Course Grades (scroll to bottom of that page) to convert all dashes in your Gradebook to “0”s. (Best practice tip: Throughout the semester as assignments are graded, put in zeros for those who did not submit their assignments so students can see their actual course grade at any point during the semester since dashes do not count against their course grade.)
Three steps to successfully publishing (final grades).
If you are in doubt on your successful submission you can email LeeCC campus Registrar, Grant Helgeson (helgeson@hawaii.edu). Include: Subject & Course Number CRN (e.g. ENG 100, CRN: 12345)
We’ve made it through the transition of moving classes online and teaching remotely! Mahalo for your continued commitment to your teaching and your students. Are you ready for finals week and submitting grades? We have a few resources to help you wrap up the semester including alternative and online assessments, using Laulima Gradebook, professional development to prepare your classes for Fall semester, and more.