TLC Conference

NASA’s Digital Learning Network (DLN) is a comprehensive project that delivers interactive instruction in support of long-term retention of knowledge to formal and informal education communities in all fifty states and the U.S. territories. NASA Education’s core purpose is to inspire, engage, educate and employ the next generation of explorers and innovators. The DLN supports this purpose by providing free, live video-conference and web-based connections with NASA engineers, scientists and education specialists to students and educators around the nation. Utilizing a variety of distance learning technologies, the DLN reaches on average 125,000 educators and students per year.  The DLN is actively improved by using academic research in order to grow through best practices.   Researchers have utilized the DLN's resources and shared their results with the project informing changes that have benefited not only NASA, but the educators and students whom they serve.

This presentation will be fifty minutes in length, with a twenty minute presentation, fifteen minute demonstration, and fifteen minute question & answer session.

Greg Dement, Phyllis Griffard, Connie Kang, and Rachna Sadana are a subset subset of the biology faculty who are collaborating in a Community of Practice as part of the Comprehensive Student Success Program (CSSP) grant from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. Their goal has been to not only improve the ABC pass rate in the gateway biology courses - thus improving retention in the STEM majors, but also improve engagement in the classroom and deepen learning. During the summer of 2013, their Community of Practice developed robust, challenging modules for Team-Based Learning (TBL) that were implemented successfully following fall in all sections of Biology 1301 and are now the model for both Biology 1301 and 1302. A feature of TBL is the readiness assurance process that “flips” the background learning from the lecture hall to preparing before class. Now class time is used for team engagement in rich applications of this background. These curricular innovations have made use of several technologies: Blackboard-based readiness assurance tasks and scratch-off (IF-AT) cards for team quizzes, and formative in-class assessment using the cloud-based Learning Catalytic application on Nook devices.

This group will share their experiences in a 30-minute hands-on panel presentation, discussing how they collaborated to develop the modules, use these technologies in the classroom, and why they think they are working.

Dr. John R. Kelly, Assistant Professor in the Urban Education Department at the University of Houston Downtown, will introduce his version of a flipped classroom and describe how to combined universal design/differentiated instructional concepts with the technology within Blackboard Learn to build 21st century classrooms for online, hybrid, and F2F courses. Dr. Kelly will provide conference participants ideas on ‘how to’ transition the traditional professor directed survey course (lectures and slides) and flip-it into a high-impact technology driven, student-centered/directed, interactive, and collaborative course that digital natives (students) are demanding. Course content is featured in modules and presented by means of Blackboard tools such as blogs, web quests, wikis,  games, surveys, discussions, journals, twitter, mashups, online quizzes, and webinars throughout the semester. Having students work independently using content within Blackboard to initiate instruction on new topics prior to class allows for opportunities to offer students meaningful real world experiences using evidenced based instructional methods that engage students’ critical thinking – service learning, project based learning, and team-based learning. The models structured approach makes it easy for students to navigate the course and frees up time to provide immediate individual feedback that is responsive to each student’s needs, which Dr. Kelly believe has had a major impact on students’ interest, scholarship, and course evaluation. The benefits of this model of instruction for students and the professor will be discussed.

Colleges today are supposed to give graduates the “immediate skills” they need to launch their professional careers, and they now need more digital communication skills and need to understand why they are needed (Young, 2009, p.9). From the employer’s perspective, graduates with skills such as effective digital communication contributes to aligning stakeholders–employees, customers, communities, vendors, etc., therefore, allowing the business to operate at peak performance. Given the changing workplace in terms of factors influencing business communications within organizations, e.g. social networking technologies, social media and workforce diversity, there is a need for academicians and industry representatives to collaborate in preparing business majors for professional careers. Supporting the aforementioned in collaboration with a variety of organizations, course applications for business communication were designed that integrate social networking technology. The intent of these applications is to help students learn professional expectations of digital communication by providing opportunities to practice “skills” applicable for use in the workplace.

Although most students practice digital communication via social networking sites for personal social interactions, they often cannot adapt and or transfer skills required in academic or professional contexts. For instance, most students use writing styles and language during these social exchanges that may not be suitable in business settings. Subsequently, students must rethink and learn the most effective, best practices from industry, to use these tools.

One practice adapted from industry to simulate internal digital communication is the use of discussion boards. Discussion boards are used by organizations for internal communications, advertising products, conducting customer service surveys and other practices. By adapting discussion boards for use in academic settings, students can develop digital communication skills and practice writing styles and language suited for the workplace in a familiar environment. Mindful of said, I use a variety of mini lessons to create topical interest that build on previous knowledge while extending critical thinking skills for broader understanding of expected professional performance. This gives students an opportunity to analyze the situation and define the purpose carefully before writing/posting a message to the discussion board.  This presentation will share findings from discussion board applications used to align and enhance delivery of course content and engage students in the learning process.

Director of the Academic Support Center, Dr. Isidro Grau, will discuss implementation and use of TutorTrac software in the Academic Support Center.

TutorTrac, a product of the RedRock software corporation, is a complete management software system for academic tutoring centers. In fall 2013, TutorTrac was installed for use in the UHD Academic Support Center, which provides tutoring in the areas of writing, reading, math, and statistics. TutorTrac is a fully web-based program that retrieves current class information from Banner, so students’ names and course registrations are readily available. This assists the Academic Support Center staff to determine exactly who attends tutoring sessions in support of specific courses and/or course sections. In addition, TutorTrac helps eliminate student name confusion, misspelled names, and inaccurate course information. Having up to date information allows Academic Support Center staff to select the classes students are receiving tutoring in as well as review tutor appointments that are initiated by the Sage Early Alert System.

TutorTrac has enhanced both how the Academic Support Center reports utilization of student tutoring services and analysis of student retention in targeted barrier courses. In addition, TutorTrac is a unified information system, which allows for secure student data sharing between the Advising & Mentoring Dept, Sage Early Alert System, Participating Academic Deans, Chairs, and Faculty, the Dept of Institutional Effectiveness, and Academic Support Center Staff.

Meet & Greet for Faculty and Staff. Refreshments to be served.


For Faculty and Staff only. 21 and over only please. 

Histrionix™ Learning Company provides interactive, game-based curriculum (and teacher training) to public, private and home schools that improves student achievement by engaging all learning styles, enhancing critical thinking skills and encouraging creative problem solving, which are the building blocks of thoughtful, twenty-first century students — and citizens.

Rick Brennan - the co founder & CEO of Histrionix and a UH alum - will discuss game based learning and its application to the social sciences by introducing his company’s curriculum aligned social studies simulation and strategy game called HISTORIA.

HISTORIA will be published by NYC based E Line Media and Alaska based Upper One Games - the first ever indigenous game company - and released for sale nationwide in the fall of 2014.

The fifty minute presentation will include a short history of Histrionix, an introduction to the tenets of game based learning twenty minute description and a first look at the new iteration of HISTORIA followed by fifteen minute question and answer session.

Presentation will be preceeded by a welcoming message from Ed Hugetz, Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost of the University of Houston-Downtown.

UH General Counsel to speak on copyright issues in teaching technology.

Smartphones are ubiquitous and easily accessible. Our presentation aims to show faculty and students how to take advantage of mobile applications in online education. "Get Smart with your Smartphone" will cover four apps for Android and iOS platforms including Google Hangouts and Scopia Mobile for video conferencing, and Google Drive and Evernote for document sharing. This presentation will showcase how these mobile apps can be easily used as free alternatives to online classroom/lecture capture tools like Blackboard Collaborate. We will provide a brief overview of each application and list suggestions on how to best use them from a faculty and student perspective. Streamline virtual classroom discussions and minimize the tech-related learning curve by using one of these simple video conferencing apps. Maximize organization and productivity by making class projects shareable and readily available in the cloud; no USB drive required.