Faculty Resources

Winding down the Spring 2021 term

If you have recordings that you want to keep be sure that you download your Zoom recordings. As a reminder, after 120 days Zoom automatically moves recordings into the Trash bin. They are stored there for 30 days and can be recovered during that time.

The best method for saving Zoom recordings for future use is to request an Echo360 space and upload your saved recordings into Echo360.

****As a reminder, it is recommended to use Echo360 to store videos rather than uploading them directly in your Moodle or Blackboard course space. Echo360 has automatic speech recognition and the ability to add and edit transcripts for accessibility. Storing videos in Echo keeps your course space file size down (which helps with copying and exporting content) and ensures that students on different platforms or devices can easily access and view the videos.

Preparing for the start of the Summer 2021 term

Preview Week begins Monday, May 10th for courses that begin on May 17th. By the start of Preview Week faculty should have their summer Syllabi posted in their Blackboard or Moodle course space and a "Getting Started" or "Course Overview" section available for students that provides them with information on how course is structured, instructor and/or TA contact information, and an overview of the technologies used in the course. See the Preview Week Suggestions document for screenshots and recommendations for what to include for a successful student Preview Week experience. 

Move of Moodle to off-site hosting and upgrade to version 3.9

• Moodle will be moving to off-site hosting. Students and instructors will access their summer and fall Moodle course(s) at https://umass.moonami.com
• In addition to the move to off-site hosting Moodle will be upgraded to version 3.9.
• Summer faculty who wish to reuse existing content will need to:
  • Back up their existing Moodle courses.
  • Use the course backup to restore content into the new Moodle Suumer course. 
• Fall faculty - More information will be shared in the next few weeks as to how the fall migration will be handled so stay tuned! 

The IDEAS team will be offering "Whats new with Moodle in the Cloud" workshops this summer. View the IDEAS Webinar calendar for more information and upcoming offerings. 

Migration from Box to OneDrive

• As a reminder, Box is being retired and all existing Box content will be migrated to Microsoft OneDrive.
• The migration of content from Box to OneDrive will happen automatically, however, links that currently exist within Blackboard and Moodle that point to Box content will need to be updated manually. 
• IMPORTANT - when you share files from OneDrive make sure you check the sharing settings! View this short screencast to learn how to share files and folders from OneDrive and adjust sharing settings from "allow editing" to "view only."

To learn more about OneDrive:

• Join the OneDrive and Teams Resources Microsoft Team by logging into Teams and in the "Join Team with a Code" box enter the following code: 6spf9hj
• View the learning options and participate in upcoming synchronous help sessions provided by IT. 
• Join April Bellafiore, Director of Multi-Modal Education for the College of Natural Sciences, for an overview of OneDrive and Teams. Click the date below to pre-register:
  • Wednesday, May 12 @ 10am 
  • Thursday, May 13 @ 1pm
  • Monday, May 17 @ 9am
  • Tuesday, May 18 @ 11am
  • Thursday, May 20 @ 10am
  • Monday May 24 @ 2pm

Zoom captions, transcriptions and accessibility

If you are using Zoom please consider using the Live Transcription option that is now available. You will need to make sure that you and your attendees have the latest version of Zoom installed in order to use this feature. The Live Transcription option gives attendees the ability to see automatic speech recognition (ASR) captions underneath the Zoom meeting window while the meeting is in progress. They can also select the Full Transcript option which allows them to see the full transcript next to the Zoom meeting. The Full Transcript does show each person who speaks and also timecodes the conversation. Watch this short screencast on how Zoom captioning and transcriptions work.

If you are recording your session to the cloud you can go into the Zoom recording and edit the transcript for accuracy and completness once the recording has been processed and the text transcribed. 

CNS Faculty Development

CNS Faculty Development and Programs help meet the mission and strategic goals of the College of Natural Science by actively supporting the research, teaching, and service work of our faculty while also promoting their wellbeing and resilience. Visit the CNS Faculty Development page for information on upcoming events and resources for individuals, teams, and departments.

Synchronous and Asynchronous Engagement Strategies

Visit the Synchronous and Asynchronous Engagement Strategies document for recommendations on sharing workload and time considerations with students, course design strategies to help with information overload, engagement strategies for both Zoom and Moodle, and student success strategies to incorporate into remote and online courses. 

Additional Resources

• Flex Forward portal
• University Quality Standards
• Flexible Course (Re)Design Modules
• IDEAS Workshops and Webinars
• Library Resources for Remote Instruction
• Information Literacy Modules 

The CNS Keep Teaching site was designed in Spring 2020 to provide guidance for working remotely, best practices, tools and technologies for remote learning, recommendations on how to offer exams online and suggestions for maintaining academic integrity in the submission of online work, and other helpful resources.