NUTSHELL NOTES "Teaching tips in a nutshell" - The University of Colorado at Denver's One-page Newsletter for Teaching Excellence

You'll need to e-mail Monica Younger at Monica_Younger@maroon.cudenver.edu and ask her to give you a user name and password. Once you have them, CU-Virtual is usable. Help files are present, and the software requires little work to learn to use.

To set up a conference site, contact the same Monica Younger and give her the name of your course or research site. You'll need to furnish a list of names of those who should have access to your site (students in your class or people on your research team). They then obtain access to CU-Virtual in much the same way you did. Students who don't have home computers can still access their class conference site through the student lab computers. Based on the list that you furnished, Monica will arrange, within a day or so, access for them to the site, and assist them in troubles they may have in getting on. Monica takes care of thousands of users and she is a GEM--I've heard accolades about her helpfulness from new Virtual users from every possible source. You and your students/colleagues are in good hands.

Virtual is a superb instructional aid. It provides us with the ability to advise students, answer their questions, and it allows them to help one another—all without any commuting to appointments. It provides a new precedent for posting lecture notes and files. You won't have to stress your department's copy budget—simply post your notes and materials on the site where everyone in class can access them. If they lose the paper you handed out, it's there; if they miss a class, you won't have to address their need by carrying around past weeks' materials. If you make PowerPoint® presentations, you can also post these. Whatever you post, you can use Virtual's "History" function to see who read it and when. You can get, grade, and return assignments without any exchange of paper, and you can work individually with students in real time.

It can increase student involvement in countless ways. One example lies in getting students prepared for class. Suppose you assign "Chapter 3" for reading. You can also assign each student to make one review question per page of that chapter and post it to the "Chapter 3 Folder" at the class site. Next, you can tell each to get a colleague's review file, answer his/ her questions, then post responses back to the same folder. When you are ready to discuss "Chapter 3," these students are very ready because they have already read, grappled with, and discussed the material. You also have a clear record of who actually prepared and how. Experience with CU-Virtual develops skills needed for delivering a full on-line course, should you need to do that in the future.

For scholarly activities, Virtual seems to be an aid without parallel. "Attached" files travel unscathed without modification via Virtual and arrive ready to open without decoding. A manuscript can be worked over by several distant authors, each using a different color font, without need to resort to overnight mailings or conference calls. Virtual is a great asset!

Teaching in the New Urban University- The OSCAR Spectrum, Friday, February 20, 8:30 a.m. - 4:00 p.m., St Francis Center, (with breakfast and lunch too!!).

HORRORS! Are You STILL Missing from E-mail?

Last semester, we did announcements via the UCDfac@lists e-mail list rather than through this newsletter. If you have not been getting these announcements, please send your name and e-mail address to Ed Nuhfer, Campus box 137, or e-mail same to enuhfer@carbon.cudenver.edu. All faculty and instructors, including honoraria, should have an e-mail address. One will not be able to continue to function without serious disadvantage for much longer at CU-Denver without one. Getting on CU-Virtual is a fast way to get an e-mail address.

Mark FEBRUARY 20, 1998, for the full-day workshop with TONY GRASHA, author of Teaching With Style and developer of OSCAR - a teaching method that stresses addressing multiple learning needs of diverse students. This is an ideal workshop to help meet the needs of CU-Denver's students. To register, contact 556-4915 and leave message or e-mail to Ed Nuhfer.
Upcoming TLTR events Sponsored by Teaching Effectiveness:

February 10: At 12:00 noon, Media Center 008. We will discuss Web issues over Pizza. Topics of note will be departmental web pages, course web pages to supplement syllabi and enhance courses, individual faculty web pages, the University's web presence and its marketing potential, . . . and any other web issues that attendants would like to discuss. Then, from 1:00 - 3:00 PM we will be offering a teleconference from the National Technological University (NTU) entitled "Hands-on World Wide Web."

March 5: At 12:00 noon the Academic IT committee chaired by Jean-Claude Bosch will report on the current status of the draft of the Strategic Vision for AcademicTechnology at UCD. More on this as we get closer to the date. Pizza will again be served. Hope to see you there!
To register, contact 556-6158 and leave message or e-mail to Carl Pletsch cpletsch@carbon.cudenver.edu.
Last Call - Flashlight Workshop

Friday, January 30, noon-4:30 P.M. St. Francis Center --with lunch!

Flashlight is the only program of national significance to date on the assessment of instructional technology. This event is a training workshop in use of the "Flashlight Toolbox." Flashlight was produced by Stephen Ehrmann of AAHE and Robin Zuniga of WICHE through the Annenberg/CPB Projects. The tools developed are applicable to evaluating grant-funded technology projects, multi-media presentations, distance-learning courses, etc. The workshop will have a "how to use it" focus with case studies and examples as well as a full copy of "The Flashlight Evaluation Handbook."

The tools are now available on-line to all faculty & instructional staff for downloading via CU-Virtual. To get onto Virtual, read this newsletter. When you are on CU-Virtual, you get access to the toolbox by simply e-mailing Monica_Younger@marooon.cudenver.edu and requesting access to "Flashlight Toolbox." When you open the toolbox, you click and drag the files to your hard-disk and open them with your word processor. They are yours to use as long as you are employed by CU. Robin Zuniga is our instructor. Only a few spots remain.

To register, contact 556-4915 and leave message or e-mail to Ed Nuhfer.