The main project for WCLN development for the 2024-25 year
Project Goals (click goal to jump to details):
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Goal #1: Track Progress
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Goal #2: Vetting Lessons & Readings
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Goal #3: Adding Media to Lessons
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Goal #4: Taking Assign Specifics out of Lessons (Eng / SS)
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Goal #5: Citing MLA or APA in Papers (Grades 10-12)
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Chrome Bookmarks
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Kick-off Meeting Recording
Goal #1: Tracking Progress
This is a large project spread over a number of months, with multiple developers. Thus, keeping track of our progress is very important.
Please mark your initials within the following table as soon as you've finished each unit.
Tracking Table: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NB7WGFKgGbSJj0YDZQyndO1Av83DM9WWYoDCpHaE0QA/edit?usp=sharing
Goal #2: Vetting Lessons & Readings
We are NOT rewriting courses.
This project is about scanning through each Lesson (book) and reading (page) to identify things that could look better or be presented better. Center images and videos? Practice questions formatting? Too much text? Adding graphics/videos? Any other polishing??
Edit Readings. Remember that the readings are "live" so edit them carefully. If you need Lesson adjustments, talk to Brent, Barb, Lucien, or Ashton.
For this step, make sure you are familiar with the Development Guidelines: https://wcln.ca/mod/page/view.php?id=72370
If you feel that something "major" is needed for a lesson/unit, talk to Brent about a possible future project.
Goal #3: Adding Media to Lessons
As you vet the content (Goal #2), keep an eye out for Media/Game opportunities.
To do this well, you MUST be very familiar with the Media options. If you're new to this, charge us for an hour (or two) of just going through and playing and getting familiar with the various types of media that are available. Play around and plant the seeds in your brain for recognizing good opportunities.
Information | Submission Form | Building Queue |
Media Page | Media Form | Media Builds |
AI Media Page | AI Media Form | AI Media Builds |
wordwall.net | General Form | General Status |
AI Prompting Ideas - Discussion Forum (Anna).
Goal #4: Taking Assign Specifics out of Lessons
Mostly for English and Socials courses.
We have evolved to the point of being able to establish a firm position on where specific instructions should be - ie. in the assignment/submission description area and NOT in the lessons..
Advantages:
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- Teachers can swap or adjust assignments, depending on their students and preferences.
- Teachers can count on the lessons being solid and general enough to accomodate various assignments.
- The lessons will be maintained for everyone, as they experiment with various assignments.
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Disadvantage:
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- Acknowledging that some developers/teachers in the past wanted assign descriptions in lessons to "force" students into lessons.
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Warnings:
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- Readings are edited on WCLN.ca site and updated immediately for EVERYONE.
- Assignments are edited on WCLN.ca site and D2L masters, and require us to post instructions for each teacher (not updated automatically).
- Thus, we need to time these changes carefully. Post with new assignment descriptions and warn of lesson changes in a week. We'll remove detsils from the lessons a week later.
- If you are adjusting a "worksheet" (or any document - docx or pdf), you MUST work with Brent/Barb to grab/replace the file on the WCLN server.
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Goal #5: MLA or APA Citing for Papers
Only for Grades 10-12.
We want to teach students how to better cite, and also clarify where AI assistance fits into the picture (ie. not blocking it, but not using it exclusively).
As you're vetting the course (Goal #2), watch for places where you tell students where they MUST use citing, and send them to instructions.
Use these links for directing students (NOT absolute links):
WCLN.ca > Student Support > MLA Citing
WCLN.ca > Student Support > APA Citing
Notes:
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- MLA for humanities.
- APA for social sciences, sciences, math.
- Examples can be found in PE10 and Psych 11.
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Example
Chrome Bookmarks
To help with efficiency, having all of your development project links organized in a single location helps a lot. A possible bookmark folder for this project might look like this:
If instructions for bookmarks would help:
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- Right-click in bookmark area and choose “Add Folder” with name = “Media Dev”
- Find each link you want, then drag the URL into the new folder.
- Reorder them as wanted by dragging up and down.
- Right-click, edit - can rename bookmarks as something quick to identify.
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Kick-off Meeting Recording
This project kick-off meeting happend on Sept 21st, 2024.
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- Couldn't make the meeting time?
- Returning to the recording for reference?
- Joined the project after the initial meeting?
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