UHD Canvas Best Practices

Highlighting: Promoting student engagement (student to content, student to student, and student to instructor). Use of VoiceThread in intro & lectures.

1. What are the skills you want students to develop when using VoiceThread activities in your course?
   I would like students to use the tools that VT allows such as posting documents, graphics, notes, etc. and of course, express themselves by typing or orally.
2. Why was it important for you to add activities using VT and not, for example, a discussion in the LMS?
   I like VT because of its ease of use, capabilities, sharing media, having the ability to moderate discussions. The discussion board has some limitations such as sharing graphics, flow charts, and concept maps.
3. What are your key facilitation and design takeaways from creating, moderating, and grading these activities that you can share with your colleagues?
   In my courses, I like to use and offer different instructional tools so students with different learning styles can take advantage of them. Some assignments are 'individual presentations' that can tell me a lot about student understanding of the topic. I use Rubrics for grading to keep it transparent; the use of Rubrics on Canvas is quite user-friendly.

Highlighting: Research application assignments, low-stakes assignments that scaffold a final research project, real-world skills.

1. What motivated you to design the Research Application assignments in steps that build up to the final research project?
   The Research Application assignments were a suggestion from my colleague, Dr. Toni Hoang. The key motivation for including these assignments is to give the students early, low-stakes assignments to make regular progress on the larger, semester-long research project. These assignments serve as stepping stones for the final project and are used to make any necessary adjustments to ensure a successful final project and, thus, completion of the course.
2. What do you hope students gain completing this project throughout the semester?
   I hope students learn the value of communication research in their future careers and that they see a clear purpose of communication research in their career. It is my hope that students can use this project as either a writing sample for graduate school or as a study they can share with prospective employers or clients to promote their expertise and consulting capabilities.
3. What types of feedback will students receive through this project?
   Students receive feedback directly from me regarding their research question, measurement/instrumentation, literature review, and statistical results write-up. My feedback primarily focuses on suggestions for ensuring a successful completion of the project, generally in terms of study scope and statistical testing. Students receive feedback from their peers and me about the final project as a whole, with a focus on clarity of study rationale, research question framing, discussion of study findings, and presentational skills.
4. How does this project reflect a real-world scenario for students in the program, and why is that important?
   This project gives students the opportunity to ask and answer a question related to their career goals and interests. This is important because it equips students with expertise and confidence they can bring into a professional environment.

Highlighting: Job package assignment(s) / real-world applications, peer feedback, giving effective feedback to learners.

1. Can you give us a quick rundown of the Job package assignment?
   This assignment essentially asks students to create job materials for a job ad of their choice. They create a resume, cover letter, and a memo describing their writing choices for the resume and cover letter in the job package.
2. What are the skills you want students to develop in this assignment?
   Ideally, students would practice working on these key job materials so that it becomes easier to create them for an internship or a job after graduation. So, the assignment asks them to practice researching the companies they are applying for, tailoring materials for their target audience, considering design choices for the resume, and learning how to persuasively frame their experiences to address the requirements of the job ad.
3. Why was it important for you to have peer feedback in this assignment?
   Peer feedback is a great way for students to support and learn from each other. First, they get a second pair of eyes on their materials and their peers typically bring to their attention things that they would not otherwise have noticed. Second, they get to see how other people in the class are creating their materials, what design choices they are making, and how they're framing their experiences. This gives them ideas on what works well and how they can revise their own work.
4. Why would you suggest other faculty create project-based assignments?
   I think project-based assignments help students practice the skills they'll need in the workplace. So, it nicely connects what they are learning in the classroom with what they will be asked to do at work. It also helps students better see the value in the assignments, which in turn prompts them to put in the time and effort to successfully work on these assignments.