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Coming Soon: Interactive Content Made Easy with H5P

Example H5P Hotspot item – click the + to try it out

Adding engaging and interactive content to your online course materials will get easier very soon.  The University has bought an enterprise licence for H5P for use by colleagues for a year.  Towards the end of August we’ll be making it available to all Canvas and MLE Teachers giving them the ability to make accessible interactive widgets, like the ones on this post. H5P isn’t just restricted to Canvas and MLE, it can be used on web sites too. 

We’re particularly excited about H5P!  Once it is turned on there will no longer be a need to be an HTML guru to do things like: 

  • Add accordions 
  • Add single question formative quiz questions 
  • Generate branching scenarios 
  • Create 360 degree virtual tours … and much more 

H5P has been successfully used by our friends in other universities– it’s very well documented and each content type has its own tutorial. 

We will be using the fully supported (H5P.com) version of H5P and, while we are plumbing this in, if you would like to have a peek at what is in store do check out H5Ps web pages for their documentation.  We would recommend holding fire on creating accounts on H5P.org and wait instead until we have our Newcastle H5P site up and running. It won’t be long! 

How you can help us? 

We have H5P for a one-year pilot initially – so we will need feedback on how you are using it, how your students are finding it, and how you would like our H5P support to develop. 

If you would like to get early access to H5P, receive updates, or help our evaluation please  JOIN OUR H5P COMMUNITY by filling out this form.

Sample H5P Course Presentation – try moving between the slides and answering the questions

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Conversations about Canvas Commons

Canvas Commons

All colleagues who have a Teacher role in Canvas can access and contribute to a huge repository of content in Canvas Commons.  You can use Commons to share content with the global Canvas community or choose to restrict its visibility to teachers at Newcastle University.  You can also share content with yourself!

For the Art of the Possible we hosted workshops to explore Commons with Colleagues.  Our participants got stuck in enthusiastically.

What we liked:  

  • Commons is a great way to access generic content e.g. getting started with the library, or to share content across programmes.  (Our induction project team are using Commons to share induction materials with schools this year.)
  • Even if you don’t want to use the content it’s helpful to see how others have approached teaching your subject – it can give ideas and inspiration
  • The ability to gather quiz questions to adapt
  • It could help improve consistency between modules / courses
  • Commons is a good way to hold content that needs to be included in all/some courses – assignment templates, school policies, supports consistency.
  • You can use Commons to hold content that is private to you – making it easy to add content into multiple courses.
  • It makes it easy share content across the institution – rather than importing/exporting or adding permissions
Commons example

Why would you share content to Commons?

  • A way of sharing effective practice, building your reputation, and that of the University
  • Evidence your impact / influence for promotion
  • Building in consistency
  • When you don’t know who specifically will need to access the content
  • By sharing you are contributing to the educational community
  • To share knowledge and expertise

Some Cautions

Several participants commented on the huge amount of material in Commons, we saw how we could filter this by stage (UG/PG) or restrict our searches to content shared just with the Newcastle University.   We saw how we could share permalinks to content elements in Commons to make finding resources easier.

Canvas Commons content isn’t policed so we had good discussions about the need to check content for accuracy, and also to look out for international differences (eg prescribing guidance, legal regulations etc…).  We spoke about how different creative commons licenses could be added to support reuse and about how to give attribution to Commons Content shared with CC licenses.

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Learning Analytics

Woman with data in her head

Do you know how analytics might help you in your teaching? 

There are lots of definitions of learning analytics but the most widely cited definition that aligns with Newcastle University’s approach is what Siemens and Gašević’s describe as “the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of data about students and their contexts to help institutions understand and optimise educational processes, learning and the environments in which it occurs.” 

With this in mind, colleagues came together at the latest NUTELA session to explore analytics and share what worked for them. We’ve included videos and some key ideas from each of our presenters below: 

Using analytics to gain insights into students’ access. 

Rachelle Maddison, INTO  

Rachelle used analytics with a small group of international students during the lockdown to check if they could access resources on Canvas. Rachelle’s transparency about the purpose of using Canvas New Analytics promoted trust and partnership with students.  

In this video, Rachelle explains how this helped her to make changes to her course content early in the academic year. 

Using Canvas New Analytics for Course Review 

Danny Homer, LTDS 

Danny employed his analytics expertise using Canvas New Analytics reports with Power BI for in-depth analysis and visualisations of course participants’ online interactions. Danny explains how he was able to overcome the limitations of the available analytics interfaces using New Analytics reports. 

ReCap Analytics as an insight into the instructional and content redesign for Executive MBA at NUBS 

David Grundy, Newcastle University Business School 

David used ReCap analytics with a small group of 15 students and a larger group of 220 students. See how David worked around video parameters to review the content and format and make ReCap videos more digestible to students. 

How to use ReCap Analytics 

Carol Summerside, LTDS 

Carol introduces ReCap analytics which give insights into viewer interactions with recordings. She demonstrates how to access analytics and shares some practical tips for getting started.  

To find out more about analytics, visit the Digital Learning website or sign up for a Canvas Analytics webinar. 

Get involved in NUTELA  

NUTELA is a group of academics, professional service staff, and technicians who care about improving learning and teaching at Newcastle University. 

Our termly sessions focus on technology in and for teaching. They’ve been a bit different this year but usually involve some pizza, pop and a chance to practice. 

Microsoft Team 

Join the NUTELA Team to continue the conversation about using technology in your teaching.  The Team includes resources, upcoming events and the chance to connect with colleagues across the University. NUTELA advocates are also on hand to answer any NUTELA related questions you might have. 

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Assessment resources on Digital Learning website

Resources are available to help staff prepare for the semester 2 assessment period, including: 

Exams

Assignment set up 

  • Guidance is available on whether to use a Canvas Assignment or a Turnitin Assignment. 
  • It is important that module teams agree which assignment type to use before it is set up in Canvas, and that marking is done in the correct tool. SpeedGrader (link to Canvas Orientation course) must be used for a Canvas Assignment, Turnitin Feedback Studio (link to screencast) must for a Turnitin Assignment. 
  • When an assignment is created, the maximum number of marks available (for example 100) must be entered in the Points field.  The points should never be set as zero, as this causes technical issues. 

Marking and moderation 

Further help 

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Learning and Teaching, New ideas and resources

Ideas and Inspiration, Flexible Learning 2020

Find out more about what colleagues and students have been working on in some of the Flexible Learning case studies and resources.

Social spaces for students

This online resource will provide you with examples of how to use social spaces for students in a digital virtual environment. The resource includes documents highlighting examples of practice and how to use them. As well as cases studies from our university and other institutions taking you through what has worked well and what to maybe avoid.

Canvas tips and favourite features

Hear from academic and professional services colleagues who share some of their Canvas tips, favourite features and positive feedback from students.

Read more on the Digital Learning website

Synchronous online sessions

Top tips from the Academic Practice Team.

The team cover how they planned synchronous sessions, how they used them to build community, and what they did to keep these Zoom teaching sessions engaging and accessible.

Peer assisted learning

Carrie, a peer assisted learning leader, chats with Zoe, a student, to share the challenges and successes of moving to online learning. 

Hear more about the Language Resource Centre PAL Scheme.

New resources and support for teaching online

Maintaining Student Engagement Workshop

In this 60-minute workshop, we will explore together ideas for how you can engage students in online learning including:
• Some dos and don’ts of online learning;
• Methods for setting expectations;
• Alternatives to lectures;
• Keeping students engaging with you and each other;
• Keeping students involved week-to-week.


View dates and book your place.

Considerations for teaching and studying with poor internet

Colleagues and students alike may well be affected by slow or variable internet connections which in turn will make many aspects of online teaching and learning troublesome.

Some helpful strategies to help minimize difficulties.

More control over your content in Microsoft 365

We’ve just rolled out a new way you can control how your students and colleagues interact with content stored in Microsoft 365 (formerly known as Office 365). Module and community enrolments now appear as Security Groups in Microsoft 365. You can use these groups to apply permissions to content or add members to a Microsoft Team.

Find out more about these updates to Microsoft 365.

New Online Training Course for Personal Tutors

A new online course, An Introduction to Personal Tutoring​, is now available on Canvas.

Existing webinars and resources

Colleagues have been taking part in webinars and online courses over the last few months and we are continuing to run a lot of our more popular sessions. Find out more about webinars, drop-ins and online courses.

Guides

An extensive range of guides and further resources are available on the Digital Learning site.

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More control over your content in Microsoft 365

We’ve just rolled out a new way you can control how your students and colleagues interact with content stored in Microsoft 365 (formerly known as Office 365).

From this week, module and community enrolments appear as Security Groups in Microsoft 365. You can use these groups to apply permissions to content or add members to a Microsoft Team.

To look up a module or community in a Microsoft app use the following naming conventions:

  • Module-ModuleCode-AcademicYear e.g. Module-ACC1011-2021
  • Communities-CommunityCode e.g. Communities-COMMUN68

Easily control who can view your Microsoft Stream content

Over the last few months, we’ve seen an increased use of Microsoft Stream for sharing video content with colleagues and students. Up until now to share you either had to:

  • make your Stream videos visible to everyone in the organisation
  • manually add people to a permissions group
  • share content with an existing Microsoft Team

Now you can share your videos with a Canvas Course by typing the relevant module or community code.

Applying Stream permissions

Find out more about publishing Stream videos in Canvas

Quickly create a Microsoft Team for your Canvas Course

Microsoft Teams is being used across the institution to compliment modules requiring a collaboration space and supporting group projects.

Originally, the only option you had to add students to your team was by using a Join code but now you can leverage the enrolment groups to bulk add your module or community members to a team.

Adding a community to a Team

If you’d like to find more about how colleagues are using Teams in teaching or have questions about setting up for certain scenarios why not join our Teams@Newcastle community.

Collaborate on files in OneDrive and SharePoint

You can use security groups to give view/edit access to files or folders stored in OneDrive or SharePoint. For example, you could create folder where students can view content, but the teaching team can edit. This can be useful if documents will change regularly over time such as a live data set.

You can try this out by giving Direct access to a file or folder.

Granting access to a module in SharePoint

Note: Module and community enrolments are based on SAP data. Users manually added to a Canvas Course will not be part of the group and will need to be granted permissions separately. 

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Be Course Ready on Canvas

Canvas logo

To help you to check that the Canvas course for your module is ready for your students, we have created a handy checklist which can be found on the Canvas section of the Digital Learning Website. You can also view our downloadable pdf version.

Remember, your Canvas course must be published for your students to be able to access it. This also applies to archive courses from 2017-18 to 2019-20. 

If you need help with Canvas you can access the following channels of support: 

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be Canvas Ready

Canvas logo

We are getting closer to the 31 July 2020 when all access to Blackboard ends for colleagues and students and we go fully live with Canvas.

​​There are 5 key steps which will help colleagues to prepare for the transition date and for course delivery next academic year:

bit.ly/becanvasready

More information about each of these steps, as well as links to support, can be found on the Canvas website.

​​Don’t forget Canvas 24/7 support is available to all colleagues and students for any of your ‘How do I’ Canvas questions direct from the Canvas Help Menu or via telephone on + 44 808 189 2336.​

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Numbas and the migration to Canvas

This post provides some further information on how the move to Canvas affects Numbas tests.

Will my Numbas tests roll over to Canvas automatically?

Numbas tests are attached to a particular course in a VLE, and therefore will not be moved across when we change from Blackboard to Canvas. Tests will need to be set up again for the new academic year, which is no bad thing as you will need to make some decisions about the set up in Canvas. See the section How do I create a Numbas test in Canvas? below.

Remember that Numbas tests are prepared on the Numbas Editor (the Public Editor is at numbas.mathcentre.ac.uk). This means that you can redeploy your existing test in Canvas.

How can I access scores from Numbas tests deployed in Blackboard?

If you require scores from Numbas tests deployed in Blackboard then you should access these before the close down of Blackboard on July 31st.

However, the Numbas LTI tool will continue to have a record of attempts. A request can be sent to numbas@ncl.ac.uk if you need access to data after the close down of Blackboard.

How do I create a Numbas test in Canvas?

Numbas can be deployed in Canvas in two ways:

  • as a module item, alongside other learning resources; or
  • as an assignment.
Numbas
module item		Numbas
assignment
Add Numbas content ✅ ✅
Record student scores ✅ ✅
Hide from calendar, to do list, etc ✅
Restrict by date ✅
Add scores to Gradebook ✅
Use as a pre-requisite ✅

The following videos demonstrate the set up of each. For full step-by-step instructions see the Canvas Orientation Course.

Adding a Numbas test as a module item

In the following video, I add a Numbas test as a module item in Canvas:

Adding a Numbas Assignment

In the following video I set up Numbas as an assignment in Canvas:

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Access Canvas and book on to the first phase of Canvas training now

Canvas logo

All Learning and Teaching colleagues can now log in to Canvas, our new Virtual Learning Environment, which will be replacing Blackboard from 1st August 2020. This is an exciting milestone as we transition to Canvas and with access to a personal sandbox (practice) course and an online Canvas Orientation course, colleagues have an early opportunity to familiarise themselves with the platform.  

How do you get access? 

Go to https://canvas.ncl.ac.uk and log in with your nid@newcastle.ac.uk account. Once you have access you will see your personal sandbox (practice) course and the Canvas Orientation course on your Canvas dashboard. Please do not use Internet Explorer as this browser is not supported by Canvas. 

What training and support is available? 

To support you with the transition from Blackboard to Canvas and to help you to get the most out of Canvas, a comprehensive suite of training has been developed including Canvas Fundamentals, Professional Service sessions, Assignments and Quizzes and more. 

Sessions taking place throughout April-June are now available to book. There will be further sessions released in March to run from July 2020 onwards.  

If you are based at our London, Malaysia or Singapore campuses and are unable to attend face to face training sessions in Newcastle, we are working with colleagues at each campus to organise suitable sessions, which will be communicated to you shortly.  

Further information regarding PGR access to training will also be communicated soon. 

In addition to training, the following support is available: 

  • Access to the 24/7 help from Canvas. This is a fantastic resource and is available to all staff and students. You can contact Canvas via live chat, from within the platform, phone or email for all of your ‘How do I’ questions. 
  • The online Canvas Orientation course accessed from the Canvas dashboard. This has been designed to support you in using the key features and tools in Canvas and there are a number of self-check quizzes for you to check your understanding as you work through each section.  
  • A comprehensive library of Canvas step-by-step guides and video tutorials. These can all be accessed via the digital learning website or the Canvas Community or from the Help Menu within Canvas. 
  • The digital learning website. This is a key source of information with answers to FAQs, upcoming events and project timelines. 

If you have any queries about any of this information or would like to speak with a member of the project team, please contact canvas@ncl.ac.uk.