Mac tip: when an app hangs
Windows users are used to this: you're working along in a program, and all of a sudden, the program hangs, and you can't do anything. If you've been working in Windows for any length of time, you learn to press Ctrl-Alt-Del and use the Task Manager to find the frozen program and kill it.
Although it is rarer, programs (or apps, as we're more and more calling them) do occasionally hang up--either stop working altogether, or lose the ability to quit themselves (for some reason, iCal tends to do that a lot, and Mail will occasionally refuse to quit). You can always just reboot--and again, Windows users are used to doing that frequently. But it is much faster and easier to use Force Quit.
If your Toolbar is still responding, you can reach Force Quit from the Apple menu. It will bring up a list of all running programs (much simpler than finding the Task Manager in Windows). Select the erring program and click the "Force Quit" button. (If you're having trouble with your Finder, select it and the button will change to "Relaunch," which is perfectly safe.) You'll get the standard warning about data loss if you proceed, but if the program is hung, you're going to lose what you were working on anyway.
If the app is really stuck, you'll just get the spinning pinwheel when you hover your mouse cursor over the Apple icon. This is one of the key combos you really need to memorize: hold down the option and command keys and press the Esc key at the same time. It will bring up the Force Quit menu. Force quit the program, and then reopen it and keep working.
Memorize it. That key combination can save you much frustration and get you back to work within seconds.
FridayLive free Webinars: Worth checking out
Mary Nunaley posted this on the Mentors Facebook page:
I've just been introduced to the FridayLive free webinars offered by the TLT group. Several of things look interesting including designing for disabilities and how to study.
If you're interested, feel free to check out the site. I'm not a member so I don't know much more other than these were shared with me by a colleague.
http://tltgroup.roundtablelive.org/FridayLive
They have sessions scheduled through May 6, and several of them look really interesting! Thanks, Mary!
Yet another reason for Facebook
The folks at the TBR offices had quite an adventure today, according to reports we saw from Jim Dye. In a post on the ROCC Mentors group page, Jim reported:
The power plant behind the Genesco building was struck by lightning and we lost all power. As a result, all of our web sites and email servers are down as well. If you need any additional information, please ask me here.
"Our web sites" included this one, so we were unable to use the blog to alert readers to the problem. Via Facebook, Jim kept us updated as to progress on repairs. Thanks to the efforts of Jon Calisi and crew, email and ROCC Web sites were restored to functioning late Thursday evening (they had thought it could possibly have taken until Monday).
In such a situation, Facebook could have been our primary backup means of communication. If you are not already on Facebook or following our Twitter feed, it would probably be a good idea to do so just to ensure your ability to stay in touch.
Tips for discussion participation
Andrea Sanders shared on our Facebook page a link to a good article about improving participation by students in online discussions. It's short list of specific, pragmatic bullet points, expanding on things like:
- Be explicit and optimistic about expectations for course participation.
- Encourage students to talk to one another and question each other.
- Build in accountability.
- Link discussion topics to learning outcomes.
- Have students contribute discussion questions.
...along with some ideas for implementing those.
Facebook, Twitter integration
We have taken the first steps in Facebook and Twitter integration. The blog is now set up so that when it has a new post, it will automatically post a link on the ROCC mentors Facebook walls (the group wall and the page wall) and on the roccment Twitter feed.
Our next step (which should happen within minutes) will be to add a "Share This" link automatically to each post so that individuals who read a post and want to share it can, um, well, share it. Coming later today!
Here is how to find these resources:
- ROCC Mentors page on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/ROCC-Mentors/192437867434986
- ROCC Mentors group on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_166124216763545 (the group and the page have different functionality, and we're still figuring out which we really need, maybe both)
- Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/#!/roccment
Any of these resources will give you an automated way of getting a notice when there's a new post on the Mentor's blog. In fact, people who already follow one of these just got a notice! Share these avenues with your colleagues to help us stay in contact with each other.
Letter to send to students
This item was shared on Facebook by Claire Knowles Morris.
An idea shared by Elaine Adams from STCC from Lydia Linebarger, which aims to improve retention. This email targets students who haven't logged into your course (easy to find out via the class list). Note: Click on "View progress" where you will both see that they haven't logged in and also find the student's outside email address--they may not have access to RODP emails). Here is an example email you can tailor to suit you and send out:
Dear Student:
This course started on 13 January 2011. According to the Student Tracking records for your Online RODP Elementary Spanish course, you have NOT accessed or started the course. If you want to continue this course, you must log into your course immediately and begin your course assignments. Failure to do so will result in an F as your course grade. If you plan to Withdraw from this course, you must contact your home institution and complete a withdrawal form. Please reply to this email to let me know if you plan to drop this course or wish to continue with the course, but are having difficulties.
To access your course go to:
https://elearn.rodp.org/
Your RODP User Name and Password will be:
- First initial of your first name +
- Your full last name (if your last name is hyphenated it will be your entire last name including the hyphen) +
- Your birth month and day
Example: John Smith, born February 22 = jsmith0222 (no spaces / no periods)
Your Password is your:
- six-digit birth date
Example: February 22, 1976 = 022276 (no spaces)
Please be aware, no late or past-due work will be accepted.
Start your course by reading the Course Home page and then click on the Discussions tab and read all the posts, then post any questions or queries here—don’t forget to introduce yourself, too!
Sincerely,
Your Instructor
Make sure Facebook shows you what you want
One of the disadvantages of Facebook as a communication medium is that the FB developers have decided the default settings should not show you everything your friends and pages post. The exact formula that determines what you see and what you don't not only isn't known, but given FB propensities, it probably changes weekly anyway.
To be kind, they probably figure that unless they do something like that, FB is such a firehose of information you would be overwhelmed and never have enough time. Still, I would rather be the one to decide what I see.
There is a plugin for your browser, though, that will give you control over many aspects of Facebook. I highly recommend it. It's called BetterFacebook. It will do a lot of things for you (my favorite is simply being able to mark posts as read so they no longer show). In this post, I just want to tell you how to use BetterFacebook coupled with a change to your Facebook settings to make sure you see everything that posts from the ROCC Mentors FB tools.
First, download the plugin for your particular browser. (If you have Greasemonkey installed, use that one, since it doesn't require a browser restart. If you don't know what Greasemonkey is, ignore it and simply match to your browser.)
Second, change your FB settings so that everything shows. No use reinventing the wheel: the BetterFacebook folks have already posted about how to accomplish this.
When you first do this, you'll open the firehose. Over a few days or weeks, through the use of filters in BetterFacebook (and Facebooks own settings--there are a few people on my Friends list whose posts I have simply hidden, and also most of the output from Farmville and those silly surveys), you will have the flow down to something you can manage each day.
FERPA and Social Media
Here is a link to a great article on FERPA and how it impacts (or doesn't impact!) Web 2.0 tools in the classroom. I was so glad to read this article because it puts into perspective all our fears about breaking federal law. The long and the short of it is - just use social media in the classroom wisely - in the same way that you would use video or art exhibits. Make sure that students know their work in that arena will go public - and advise them accordingly. There is, therefore, no conflict with FERPA, which mainly addresses health records, grade records, and that sort of thing.
Experimenting with themes
We've had some feedback that, although the new theme for the blog looks good, parts of it load slowly--maybe due to our security. So we're going to experiment with different themes. Don't be surprised if you come here over the next few days and find it looking vastly different. It will settle down within a week or so.
Mentor communication channels examined
We will be asking for feedback on the ways mentors can communicate with each other, and receive information from the administration. To help thinking about that, I thought it would be useful to point out some relative advantages and disadvantages of those channels.