Reading Time: 10 minutesRecently, I was tasked with creating a remedial English course for dual-credit students – but for this course, I needed to expand beyond my standard role as the instructional designer and also be the subject matter expert. Playing both roles is difficult, so I decided to employ ChatGPT to help with parts of the design. I started with what I knew. Because this is a dual-credit course, I knew there would be English content the students were passing over and, as a result, not getting in their high school courses. I also knew that the learners in this course would go directly into another college writing course.…
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Generative AI: Current State and Future State (e.g., tomorrow)
Reading Time: 3 minutesWriting a blog post detailing the current state of Generative AI (GAI) feels like a futile exercise. Why? During the writing of this post, the state of the industry will change. So, read with caution because like GAI, I can make mistakes. Having dispensed with the disclaimer, let’s get into what you are looking for in this post—the current state of GAI. First, OpenAI’s ChatGPT continues to lead the GAI industry, but Microsoft and Google are making advances with Copilot and Gemini, respectively. Amazon, Mistral, Facebook, and other open source models continue to push OpenAI to innovate and produce more value, but they cannot compete with ChatGPT.…
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Canvas Update: Discussions Enhancements
Reading Time: 4 minutesLast week, we talked about the updates Canvas is making to assignments. This week, we’re turning our focus to the discussions redesign in preparation for the changes to go live this weekend. These updates go a little deeper and have some added functionality. Let’s jump in and see what’s changed! 1. You can mention users in your posts! Canvas has added the ability for you to mention specific people in your posts. Simply type the @ symbol, and Canvas will give you a drop-down of all the people able to be tagged. 2. Canvas collapses threads automatically Canvas will collapse discussions threads so you only see the…
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Canvas Update: Assignments Enhancements
Reading Time: 3 minutesCanvas has been working on modifications to both assignments and discussions – and the changes are now ready to be live! In these two weeks leading up to the release of the updated assignments and discussions, we’ll be going through everything you need to know about the changes. This week, we’re looking at the assignment enhancements. These are primarily student-facing interface adjustments to track the “life cycle” of an assignment more easily. Let’s take a look! Here’s a screenshot of an updated assignment page. With the update, Canvas has moved or added a few things: The next chunk of the page is very much the same as…
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Generative AI, In Practice: ALT Text, Part II
Reading Time: 5 minutesLast week, we looked at some examples of alt text that Copilot generated for us and evaluated what we’d need to change before using them. It had done a good job with simple graphics, though the nuance of having elements faded more to the background and the meaning of that was lost on it. Copilot did not do a good job describing a still shot from a movie. But today, we’re going to look at this from a different angle – what can we do to help GAI create better alt text for us? Are there ways to prompt or feed it context to get drafts more…
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Generative AI, In Practice: ALT Text, Part I
Reading Time: 4 minutesNow that we’ve finished our series on Generative AI over on Transform Your Teaching, we wanted to take this opportunity to dive into specifics for some of the ways GAI can help speed along parts of your process. CTL recently worked on a course project that included designing a lot of figures and graphics to be included in lesson pages – and each of those images needed to have alt text written for it. Now, I’m no stranger to writing alt text, and it isn’t the most complicated piece of work to do; but it can take a decent bit of time when you’re starting with a…
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Transform Your Teaching: Recapping Generative AI Applied
Reading Time: < 1 minuteIn this episode, Dr. Rob McDole and Jared Pyles conclude the series on Generative AI and reflect on what they learned. Check out the episode to hear their top three takeaways. They also announce the launch of a new tool we are using to hold asynchronous video discussions with listeners. Join on Flip with all your questions and reflections on the topics we cover. Podcast links Show notes Jared’s takeaways: Rob’s takeaways: Resources We want to hear from our listeners, so we’ve launched a discussion on Flip – a video discussion platform. Join us with all your questions and reflections. Join Transform Your Teaching’s Flip discussion…
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Transform Your Teaching: Generative AI Applied with Dr. Jodie Penrod
Reading Time: 1 minuteIn this episode, Dr. Rob McDole and Jared Pyles chat with Dr. Jodie Penrod who has a PhD in Educational/Instructional Technology from Ohio University and is the Chief Information Officer at Marshall University. Check out this episode to hear how Marshall University has approached Generative AI and how other educators can use GAI to enhance teaching and learning. Podcast links Show notes Marshall University has decided to embrace using Generative AI and harness it to fit their goals. Their advice for faculty in using GAI falls into three categories: open use, moderate use, and prohibited. They created these categories to provide a framework to get started. Faculty…
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Transform Your Teaching: Generative AI Applied with Dr. Thomas White
Reading Time: 2 minutesIn this episode, Dr. Rob McDole and Jared Pyles talk with Dr. Thomas White, president of Cedarville University. Check out this episode to hear about possible applications of Generative AI at Cedarville and in higher education at large. Podcast links Show notes Dr. White sees how influential Generative AI will be on higher education and has explored it by using ChatGPT4 and plugins. While using the tools, he has found uses outside of education – recently using Generative AI to help book his family’s vacation. However, Dr. White’s main emphasis for Cedarville faculty is that they need flexibility and freedom to handle how GAI is used in…
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Transform Your Teaching: Generative AI Applied with Kim Woodruff
Reading Time: 2 minutesIn this episode, Jared Pyles and Dr. Rob McDole talk with Kim Woodruff who is the Director of Instructional Design at Manhattan College. Check out this episode to hear about Manhattan College’s current experience with Generative AI and possible applications that instructors can try. Podcast links Show notes Manhattan College’s approach to integrating Generative AI (GAI) begins with conversations with their faculty to reach them where they are at. They do not want to push for innovation too quickly, so they provide tips and tricks based on sound pedagogical ideas. Kim often encourages instructors to be experimental and use GAI to perform authentic tasks. Manhattan faculty have been…