"Using the Internet Outside the Classroom"

Today’s Topics

Establishing and Using Automated Class Mailing Lists

Downloading Rosters

Using Filters to Manage E-Mail Holding Virtual Office Hours

Using Excel as a Gradebook Program

 

One of the best places to start any web research on Using the Internet Outside the Classroom should start with a visit to The Division of Information Technology’s Faculty Technology Guide, which is one of the best laid-out and most helpful web sites available for instructors wishing to improve student communication, participation and learning through the use of information technology.

http://ftg.ucdavis.edu

Automated Class Mailing Lists

The latest incarnations of ACMLs not only allow you to communicate with all your students easily, but they also provide a number of functions that make managing rosters much easier. These include:

• These lists will be updated nightly with the latest enrollment information from Banner.
• Once the list is created, all currently enrolled students will be automatically subscribed to the list.
• The list owner can receive a nightly update of adds and drops on the list.
• List owners have the ability to add additional users to the list.
• Lists can be gatewayed to a web archive.
• Lists can be gatewayed to a class newsgroup. If this option is chosen, mail to classname@ucdavis.edu will also be posted to the 'classname' newsgroup.

For explanations of ACMLs, and the web interface/form used to create one for your class, visit the following URLs:

http://ism.ucdavis.edu/info/email/ACML.html

Downloading Rosters

Most of us have already downloaded rosters. In order to do so, you must first establish a Kerberos login ID and, ideally, determine the CRN for your class. Then visit the following URL to download your roster directly from the Registrar.

http://registrar.ucdavis.edu/rosters/

Eudora and Using Filters

All of us should be using Eudora to collect and manage our e-mail. The program allows you to organize your mail, open attachments, and move seamlessly to other programs (like Microsoft Word or your web browser) much more easily than you ever could with a first-generation mail program like Pine. Consult the following URL to find the answers to your questions about Eudora, including setting your settings:

Additionally, by using filters with your Eudora program, you can quickly and easily sort your mail into manageable folders. When you establish an ACML for your class, and require your students to use it, you’ll appreciate how much filters can help you minimize the busywork of reading through all those messages. The best way to learn about filters is through trial and error in your mail program. You might also consult the following slide presentation created by Roger Kenner of the Open and Distance Leaning Office at Montreal’s Concordia University:

http://rkenner.concordia.ca/email98/filtr1.html

And here is a collection of general tips, including using filters, on managing the amount of data that assaults you every day, especially if you belong to any sort of e-mail discussion list or group:

http://www.frugalfun.com/manageemail.html

Also, review this article in the IT Times on using filters with Eudora.

 

Holding Virtual Office Hours

Tim Leamy, one of the lab managers here at UC Davis, has written a program meant one day to replace the popular "Interchange" function in the Daedalus Integrated Writing Environment. This program that Tim calls "Web Chat" could also be used to hold virtual conferences with students because it uses the web rather than any local area network (such as the network that connects all our computers in the Olson Macintosh Classrooms). I should add immediately that "Web Chat" is currently (January 2000) being beta-tested, that the program may have bugs, and that neither Tim nor I make any promises that the program is stable. Nevertheless, if you instruct your browser to visit

http://timbo.ucdavis.edu/chat/

you’ll begin to see the possibilities the program holds for conferences that you can oversee while sitting at home in your pajamas, assuming you don’t reach a busy signal when you try to log on.

 

Using Excel as a Gradebook Program

Finally, Mike Kolody and Anne Fleischmann have written an excellent handout on using Microsoft’s spreadsheet program, Excel, as a gradebook program, an application that we could all use in week ten of the quarter, and perhaps throughout the academic year. See this handout.

You might also consider the following general discussion, with pictures, of recording and computing grades with Excel,

http://www.glasscity.net/users/jlee/XL_INTRO.html

as well as this discussion of translating letter grades to numerical equivalents:

http://www.wfu.edu/users/matthews/plus_minus/excel_example.html

Good Luck!

U.C. Davis | English Department | University Writing Program | CAI Program

Andy Jones, CAI Coordinator