But Wait, There's More: Some Light Summer Reading

Many readers access the Tip of the Day blog through ElsieTalk, which provides a direct link to new content every week. These Tip of the Day articles typically end with external content: articles or other resources from outside the blog that seemed timely, relevant or interesting. As the blog winds down for the year, the Tip team is providing a summary of all of these resources from Academic Year 2020-2021 in one convenient location.

Several of the resources come from The FLTMAG, a free magazine on technology integration in language teaching and learning published by IALLT. This magazine is worth visiting periodically, as content is published regularly on a variety of topics written by educators from across the country.

Technology: Big Picture and Current Situation

• CEHD Connect Magazine has a profile of Shantia Kerr Sims, associate professor and coordinator of the educational technology program at the University of Central Missouri titled Harnessing the Power of Educational Technology: Pandemic reveals the strength of the discipline.
• Luca Giupponi, Michigan State University, has authored The Pandemic as a Catalyst for Transformation about the experience of the past year from the perspective of a technologist.
• Instructors considering teaching partially in-person Fall 2021 may be inspired by Rick Treece’s article Face-à-Face, which details his experience using a HyFlex model to teach FREN 3014 French Phonetics during Fall 2020.
• The Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) team in LATIS has provided six short Concrete Ideas for Building Community and Making Online Learning More Engaging to help instructors build community and connection.
• Check out Online Teaching Tips for the Plague-Averse, a public Facebook group for exchanging brief, helpful suggestions for teaching remotely. This group is administered by Eliot Borenstein from New York University, and Shannon Donnally Spasova from Michigan State University.
• The UMN Academy of Distinguished Teachers have published their Tips for Teaching in 2020-21, ideas culled from their summer 2020 Happy Hour discussions.
• Are you looking for a simple resource for students on learning languages remotely? The University of Wisconsin-Madison Language Institute has produced a printable two-page document titled Tips for Learning Remotely.

Technology: Tips and Tricks for Video

• If you or your students need to record video with a smartphone this semester, check out the short YouTube video produced by IT with tips and tricks for recording with the highest quality possible.
• IT has handy troubleshooting tips for these common Kaltura Capture problems: Recording Doesn't Finish Uploading and In a Multi-Source Recording, Camera View Appears Large, Screen Recording Small (PIP)
• If you find that it it taking too long to upload your recorded videos, check out IT’s helpful guides: Kaltura: Tips for Reducing Upload Times in Kaltura Capture and Zoom: Tips for Reducing File Size and Upload Times for Local Recordings
• The EDUCAUSE Review has offered a set of recommendations to help instructors get the most out of asynchronous video activities in their courses in the article Asynchronous Video Conversations: 11 Tips and Best Practices.

Technology: Tips and Tricks for Zoom

• If you are looking for ideas for annotating student assignments, see One Cheap (And One Even Cheaper!) Way to Annotate Homework, by Shannon Donnally Spasova in The FLTMAG, which includes the innovative idea of using Zoom’s annotate feature, not while hosting a meeting, but instead to annotate students’ written work.
• Brian Barnett (Director of Language Instruction in French) and Fidele Tchoffo Tsasse (Graduate Student in French) authored Using Breakout Rooms to Break It Up: Lessons from an Intensive Summer French Class. Zoom’s Breakout Room features have changed since their summer class, but their advice remains as relevant as ever.

Technology: Tips and Tricks for Canvas

• The New Rich Content Editor (RCE), which debuted in Canvas in January, changes the way accessible content is created and how users of assistive technologies navigate the toolbar. See Accessibility and the New RCE for guidance on ensuring your content is accessible, and tips for navigating the system.
• Are you confused by the new Canvas Rich Content Editor? Let Shana Crosson from LATIS talk you through it in her video New Canvas Content Editor.

Technology: Tips and Tricks for Other Tools

• See Three Flipgrid Hacks, the first of a new series on Michigan State University’s Online Language Teaching blog that will share hacks for using popular tools for language instruction.
• Shannon Donnally Spasova from Michigan State University, continues to publish interesting ideas for making language learning fun in The FLTMag. Her most recent article, Flippity for Online Games and Tools, introduces Flippity, which offers a set of 25 templates that allow you to easily turn a Google spreadsheet into a variety of online classroom activities, tools, and games.
• If you’re looking for ideas for an online information gap activity, check out the variation of Clue that Shannon Donnally Spasova from Michigan State University (MSU) created for her Russian class. She describes it in her Rethinking Index Card Games for the Online Classroom post in MSU’s Online Language Teaching blog.
• Looking for more ideas for using Jamboard? Check out Getting out of a Jam with Google Jamboards from The FLTMAG, a free magazine on technology integration in language teaching and learning.
• Michigan State University’s Online Teaching Blog features an article by Alice Musick McLean on Blogging Through the Slog of the Quarantine about the experience of incorporating blogging into an intermediate-level Portuguese class.

Other

• The University Relations blog has a post titled Keeping Internal Communications in the Spotlight with ideas for effective internal communications. Their thoughtful advice can be applied in many settings, including the classroom.
• This Teaching with Writing Blog post offers tips for Encouraging Audience-Accessible Writing Habits.
• The Good Teacher Project, a 1992 Language Center video production, is now online through LC Elevator. This is a collection of interviews with University of Minnesota instructors who have been designated as excellent pedagogues. A downloadable transcript is included.