Support for Instructors
1.> Use Moodle for teaching:
1-1.> To apply for a Moodle account, please send your request to Dr. Edward Shih at edwards@uwest.edu.
1-2.> To duplicate your existing Moodle course to a new semester, please send the request with the course name, course code, and the term of this course to Dr. Shih (edwards@uwest.us). Your courses will show up on your Dashboard within two days. Dr. Shih will also enroll the students in your course by the class beginning day.
1-3.> Apply backwards design with the course mapping (Wiggens and McTighe, 2005) in designing online courses that are instructionally and pedagogically sound and help meet QM standards.
1-4.> For more tips and practices in designing online courses, review the examples at Las Positas College and Open SUNY.
2.> To enroll your students to your Moodle courses:
2-1.> By the class beginning day, you should see your students enrolled in your courses by checking the Participants in your Moodle class. If not, please contact the Registrar office to see if your class rosters are available to be sent to Dr. Shih (edwards@uwest.edu).
2-2.> Dr. Shih will create the logging account for your students, enroll them in your class, and send the logging and relating information to the enrolled students.
2-3.> Sending and receiving messages
To send messages via Moodle to your enrolled students, under the heading click on “participants” and then simply click on the name of the student to whom you would like to send your message. Find the small icon and 'Message" beside the name on top and click on it. Type your messages. Finally, click on the button that says “send message.” Please note, if both of you are logged into Moodle at the same time, then it will act as an instant message service.
2-4.> Switch your role to Student
The switch roles feature allows a user to switch temporarily to another role from the user menu 'Switch role' so that they can see what the course would look like to someone with that role. Click your name at the up-right corner to pull down the user menu and then select "Switch role to ..."
3.> Ultimately, we will go through the following stages in our online education:
3-1.> Create course contents and activities. Please take the following requirements into account in this stage:
- A course map that lists how each of the course and module objectives will be connected/aligned by what learning activities and the achievement can be measured accordingly.
- (That is, the alignment in the institutional objectives, course objectives, module/unit objectives, instructional materials, learning activities & assignments, assessments, and tools used.)
- The instructional materials and activities that will offer the interaction among teacher-student, student-student, and content-student.
- The accessible documents (Word documents, presentation files, captions for audio/video files, etc.).
%%%Checklist 1 will be executed in this stage; click here to download the Checklist 1.
3-2.> Implement Universal Design for Learning and meet the Accessibility act (Section 508). Please note that you will work on the following requirements in this stage:
- Usability
- ADA & WCAG 2.1 Compliance
- multiple representations, multiple engagements, and multiple expressions.
%%% Checklist 2 will be executed in this stage; click here to download the Checklist 2.
3-3.> Address faculty readiness for online teaching: the transforming role of faculty in online education. Please be sure to accomplish the following requirements in this stage:
- Increase engagement
- Promote active learning
- Support adaptive learning
- Foster the characteristics of the online facilitator
%%% Checklist 3 will be executed in this stage; click here to download the Checklist 3.
3-4.> Address student readiness for online learning and students support
3-5.> Make revisions and improvements after the course was taught twice, based on the feedback and Moodle statistical data.
3-6.> Seek QM online course certificate and then apply for accreditation from regional/Distance Education accreditor.