Have you ever wished you could attend a CTL seminar or brown bag but had a conflict? Audio-only podcast are available of all our seminars and brown bags. Check them out to see what you may have missed!

http://mymedia.msstate.edu/outputset.php?id=2474

I've had a couple of questions recently about Second Life. I've found a website that might provide additional information....it's the Annotated Bibliography of Second Life Educational Online Resources.

If you've experimented with your class in Second Life, I would love to hear about your experiences----drop me a line!

The New Media Consortium and the Educause Learning Initiative have announced the release of the 2009 Horizon Report. Each year, the Horizon Report identifies some of the key trends in technology that are likely to have an impact on teaching, learning, and research within higher education. Some of these technologies are expected to have an impact in the near future; others are projected to have an impact within four to five years. If you're interested in the future of technology in higher education, the Horizon Report is a must read!

The Horizon Project is a longstanding collaborative project between the New Media Consortium (NMC) and the Educause Learning Inititative. For the past six years, they have produced the Horizon Report, which focused on the use of technology in higher education. There is now a K-12 edition, produced by the NMC and the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN). The pdf report, available for free on the web, is a must read for anyone interested in today's and tomorrow's technology in the K-12 system.

Six technologies or tends are highlighted in the 2009 report: collaborative environments, online communication tools, mobiles/mobile computing, cloud computing, smart objects, and the personal web. Each technology is treated in a different section, with an overview, a discussion of the relevance for the classroom, examples of the technology in practice and resources for futher reading.

The latest issue of Educause Review (March/April 2009) is now available. This month's issue focuses on the relationship between learning spaces and pedagogy, assessment, and education models. ER articles are freely available on the web.

The National Education Association (NEA) has a very good Web site that houses information regarding teaching, learning and assessment in higher education. For example there is a link to an article on e-Cheating, a very timely topic in higher education. Check out the site at http://www2.nea.org/he/abouthe/techip.html

A good article on pedagogical features in textbooks in the Chronicle - check it out here.

A recent article in Change magazine provides a different perspective on the role of instructional technology. Michelle Miller draws upon her background in cognitive psychology to discuss the positive role instructional technology can have in the classroom. Change is available through the Library's online collection and the article is available online to MSU faculty, staff, and students.

(The link above was built to allow remote access; you simply have to add the proxy server to the persistent link. Authorized remote users can log in with their netid and netpassword. You can do this for other readings from the library's online collections that you might like to add to your myCourses page. Don't know how? Contact us!)

U.S. News & World Report has an article on the use of Twitter in the classroom. The author provides several examples of how faculty are using the social networking/microblogging site to enhance communication both in and outside of class. The article is available online.

Not familiar with Twitter? Twitter permits microblogging or the posting of 140 character messages (known as "tweets") to others on the site who have signed up to "follow" you. In turn, you select those that you wish to follow. Many professional associations, including Educause, have Twitter accounts. Even some professional journals have Twitter accounts.

The Educause Learning Initiative has a a short introduction (pdf) to Twitter: "7 Things You Should Know About....Twitter."

Mississippi State University has renewed Turnitin.com for the 2009/2010 year. Purchased through the Office of Student Affairs, Turnitin is part of a campus-wide endeavor to foster a climate of ethical research at MSU.

Effective June 30, 2009, Turnitin will include some new or revised features. These include:

The default setting for all new assignments will be to exclude bibliographic and quoted material from the Similarity Index. (Instructors may choose, at their discretion, to add this back.)

Coming July 30, 2009:

(1) Optional exclusion of small matches in the originality report. Instructors may choose to set a percent match (between 1 and 100%) to be excluded from the report.

(2) Expanded similarity index show sources of matches: in addition to the overall similarity index, each Originality Report will also display the percentage of the paper's content that matches content in each of the three source repositories (student papers, web sources, and periodicals/journals/publications.)

(3) Automatic check of a user's system capabilities with Turnitin Systems Requirements. This has always been an option; with the July 30 release, this check will be performed automatically.

(4) Improved handling of document submissions and multiple file uploads. This update will double the size limits for individual file submissions (increased from 10MB to 20MB) and for zip file uploads (increased from 100MB to 200MB.) Users will also be notified if they submit a paper that exceeds the maximum size.

The Center for Teaching and Learning provides faculty support for any instructor of record who wishes to use Turnitin.com in their class. Turnitin may be used as a web product or through myCourses. For additional information about Turnitin, contact the Center at 325-1403.

Be sure to check out the website for the Maroon Edition: MSU's First Year Reading Experience:
http://www.maroonedition.msstate.edu/

On the website, you'll find lots of information about this exciting new component of the MSU First Year Experience program. This year's book is A Painted House by John Grisham.

MSU has a site license for the plagiarism detection service, Turnitin.com. Turnitin has had a number of upgrades and interface enhancements this summer. Here are some of the latest changes:

Languages: Turnitin now supports 10 different languages, including English, Spanish, French, German, chinese (traditional and simplified), Japanese, Korean, Malay Bahasia, and Thai.

Performance Imrpvodements: recent upgrades to the application web servers should result in improvements to both performance and system reliability.

New Features include:

An option to exclude quoted (and bibliographic) material from papers' Similiarity Index for an entire assignment (not just individual papers);

An option to exclude small matches in Originality Reports to help streamline the process of evaluating your students' papers for unoriginal content. Instructors can choose the size of excluded matches as a number of words (such as 8 or 11) or a percentage of all words in the paper (such as 4%);

An expanded Similiarity Index that shows multiple sources for highlighted matches in the Originality Report---not just a single possible source;

Automatic check of user's system capabilities and compatability with Turnitin system requirements;

Improved handling of document submissions and multiple file uploads. This includes: double the size limit for individual file submissions (from 10 MB to 20 MB) as well as an increase in the size of zip files (batch) uploads (from 100 MB to 200 MB); improved user notification for submissions that exceed the maximum size (and guidance to help fix the issue); and a new status bar indicating the status of uploads.

As always, you can use Turnitin with your classes via the Web service or through your myCourses class site. The Center for Teaching and Learning can set up a Turnitin.com workshop for your department! For additional information about Turnitin.com, please contact Dr. Deborah Lee at 325-0810.

Plagiarism is a serious issue in today's classroom. Barry Gilmore's Plagiarism: Why it Happens, How to Prevent It offers some tips for encouraging original work in your students' papers.

1. Specify the sources: provide students guidance in determining what are appropriate types of sources for their projects.

2. Require source proof: this would include both the source document and the notes the student developed from the source. (Be sure to warn students to NOT rip source documents from library books and journals!)

3. Build collaboration into the process: have students work in teams to develop their resources and papers.

4. Color code sentences by type: as an exercise, have students highlight different portions of their paper, based on sections written by them, sections based on other sources, and direct quotes. (This is easily done in word processing packages such as Word.)

5. Specify an audience: have the student identify a target audience for their work and discuss how publications (newspapers, trade journals, research journals) target their audiences.

6. Readjust the stakes: break the writing process down into its component parts—thesis statement, outline, bibliography, etc… Base the grade on each part and not just on the finished product.

7. Require specific components: consider specifying the number of quotes allowed, the types of sentences to be included, etc…

8. Involve peer editing: allow students to share ideas and approaches by incorporating a peer-review process.

9. Break the process into pieces: research has consistently shown that breaking down the writing process into smaller pieces significantly reduces the likelihood of plagiarism.

10. Require current sources: existing essays on the web often contain dated material; requiring current sources insures the student must consult newer materials.

The Center for Teaching and Learning has several seminars that can assist with developing effective writing assignments and offers support for the use of Turnitin.com in the classroom.