Wizards of Widgets by students at Carnegie Mellon University
Coincidentally my brother went there. It's probably the top computing science university in the US, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
5 students presenting
3rd year students (of 4 years, remember you Brits). 14 week project -spring semester - must deliver something solid
5 students teamed with an academic advisor, and a Bb solutions engineer
Wanted to have a quick and easy way of getting access to materials, and a way of alerting when something is added
3 main parts:
one step login
easy course material access
alerts
Components of the software:
-Front end application with Yahoo widget
-Interaction with Blackboard through building block
-Connectivity with XML to pass messages between the two
Logs in using a generated token rather than your Bb password – which you get from the community system building block one time then reuse. It doesn't know your password, so can't be compromised. The building block also tells you what server you are probably using.
Sees updates by day, then class for what's new
Shows three main things: Announcements, Grades, and Documents
Shows all grades for your courses – pulls the grades through
What about feedback, risk of not engaging with it as a result? - Said they hadn't thought about it but would consider it for the next version. Also, had a suggestion that just be notified there is a grade, rather than being told what it was. That would allow you to see the feedback before the grade, and comply with FERPA.
Pretty funny students actually – could do a comedy act here in Vegas if don't want to be programmers.
Refreshes every 15 minutes, or you can push the refresh buttons
Desktop widget alerts what is new
Looked at Backpack but sees it as different, this is a lite version rather than a big application. Solves problems of downloading all data and porting to new computer. Hadn't been told about Bb Sync until the conference!
Just windows? Nope, works on anything Yahoo widgets work on, so probably mobile soon too.
Improvements for version 2.0. Trying to continue the work for another year as their senior year project.
-longer announcements could show up better
-authentication through user selected password or Bb password
-links don't download a document, you have to login again and navigate to the file
-direct navigation to the areas you are looking at
-drag and drop functionality for assignment submission (though using the digital drop box still)
Not accessible currently.
George Kroner from Blackboard beet red at this point, given how much praise they gave him for his help.
Their address: bbdesktop@gmail.com
Looking for comments on what could be done to improve it.
Server load? - not sure about institution wide, but their testing seemed ok
Biggest challenge of working with students
-allow them to do things on development server
-make something that will help people, make things easier
-people (including academics) didn't understand building blocks.
-students are now the expert on building blocks.
-try to educate students on possibilities – now they know more about Blackboard and enjoy it more
-use more features on sites, because students don't know about it
-led to them discussing with other parts of the university, like IT security for campus, authentication
Coincidentally my brother went there. It's probably the top computing science university in the US, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
5 students presenting
3rd year students (of 4 years, remember you Brits). 14 week project -spring semester - must deliver something solid
5 students teamed with an academic advisor, and a Bb solutions engineer
Wanted to have a quick and easy way of getting access to materials, and a way of alerting when something is added
3 main parts:
one step login
easy course material access
alerts
Components of the software:
-Front end application with Yahoo widget
-Interaction with Blackboard through building block
-Connectivity with XML to pass messages between the two
Logs in using a generated token rather than your Bb password – which you get from the community system building block one time then reuse. It doesn't know your password, so can't be compromised. The building block also tells you what server you are probably using.
Sees updates by day, then class for what's new
Shows three main things: Announcements, Grades, and Documents
Shows all grades for your courses – pulls the grades through
What about feedback, risk of not engaging with it as a result? - Said they hadn't thought about it but would consider it for the next version. Also, had a suggestion that just be notified there is a grade, rather than being told what it was. That would allow you to see the feedback before the grade, and comply with FERPA.
Pretty funny students actually – could do a comedy act here in Vegas if don't want to be programmers.
Refreshes every 15 minutes, or you can push the refresh buttons
Desktop widget alerts what is new
Looked at Backpack but sees it as different, this is a lite version rather than a big application. Solves problems of downloading all data and porting to new computer. Hadn't been told about Bb Sync until the conference!
Just windows? Nope, works on anything Yahoo widgets work on, so probably mobile soon too.
Improvements for version 2.0. Trying to continue the work for another year as their senior year project.
-longer announcements could show up better
-authentication through user selected password or Bb password
-links don't download a document, you have to login again and navigate to the file
-direct navigation to the areas you are looking at
-drag and drop functionality for assignment submission (though using the digital drop box still)
Not accessible currently.
George Kroner from Blackboard beet red at this point, given how much praise they gave him for his help.
Their address: bbdesktop@gmail.com
Looking for comments on what could be done to improve it.
Server load? - not sure about institution wide, but their testing seemed ok
Biggest challenge of working with students
-allow them to do things on development server
-make something that will help people, make things easier
-people (including academics) didn't understand building blocks.
-students are now the expert on building blocks.
-try to educate students on possibilities – now they know more about Blackboard and enjoy it more
-use more features on sites, because students don't know about it
-led to them discussing with other parts of the university, like IT security for campus, authentication
Really impressive session overall, energetic, excited, etc. These students have great things ahead of them, and they were really well received. Most of the session was answering questions, as the presentation only took 20 minutes or so, but no one minded as it was great to hear them talk about what they did and respond to work. They took the point I raised about only showing grades might lead to instrumentalism in assessment in stride. One of them said he had never gotten feedback (they still use the digital drop box!), though his friend said they did but that he just hadn't read it (sort of proving my point...).
No comments:
Post a Comment