During the Blackboard Teaching & Learning Conference 2012 in Antwerp we gave a presentation in cooperation with Leen van Kaam from Saxion University of Applied Sciences. After a short introduction, Leen explained that Saxion has 12 schools with different needs and requirements when it comes to using Blackboard.
Leen explains: “Every school has it’s own Blackboard policy, there are differences in culture and their emphasis on pedagogy. This means that our schools also have different support needs. With EesySoft we have a flexibel, fully integrated and and context-sensitive support environment that can deliver the right information, at the right time to the right person”.
3. Short demo
• Pro-active support
• New functionality
• Instructions to first time users
• Known problems
• FAQ’s
• FME’s (Frequently Made Errors)
• On-demand support
• Anytime, anywhere, anything
4. • University op applied sciences
• 3 locations(Enschede Deventer Apeldoorn)
• 22.000 students
• 1800 lecturers and 600 other staff
• 12 schools
5.
6. Adoption Phases
• Experiments "Letting a hundred flowers
blossom”
• Formal policy of a school
• Bb 1.0: course materials and information
(announcements)
• Bb 2.0: Tools for assessment (Assignment, Safe
Assign, Grade Center)
• Bb 3.0: Tools for communication (interactive tools)
• Bb 4.0: Pedagogy, Didactics
7. Simultaineous development?
• Experiments "Letting a hundred flowers blossom”, i.e
» i.e. School of Education, School of Creative Technology,
• Formal policy of a school
• Bb 1.0:
» i.e. School of Finance & Accounting, School of Environmental
Planning & Building, School of Social Work
• Bb 2.0:
» i.e. School of Applied Psychology and Human Resources
Management, School of Marketing & International Management,
School of Social Work
• Bb 3.0:
» i.e. School of Governance & Law, School of Health
• Bb 4.0:
» i.e. School of Health
8. • And every school has it’s own ways to do
things......
– i.e. 44 different course templates
9. • Every school has it’s own Bb policy
• Differences of culture between schools
• Emphasis on pedagogy
• 3 languages
– Dutch
– English
– German
10. User support
• Manual Tool
Personal help • Quick Reference Card
• What’ s new …..?
Users How do you do that
in Bb? Tool
Inspiration Lecturers Students
Good practices FAQ Tool
In the educational process I Where should I go to …..?
want to realize…… How to do
Procedures
that in Blackboard?
Educational Context/pedagogy
11. User support
• One window: no need to think where you
have to go for support
• Learning on the job: no need to go anywhere
• Just for me, just enough, just in time
12. Eesysoft for user support
• Learn how to use Eesysoft for our dream
• 4 different project area’s:
1. Support for tools and procedures
2. Differentiated support for realization of formal
school policy
3. Support for educational context and good
practices
4. Monitoring the progress with Eesysoft
13. • We all share the same problem
• We all share the same dream
– One window
– Learning on the job
– Just for me, just in time, just enough
• Also share (parts of) the solutions?
14. Special offer
Blackboard Teaching & Learning Conference
Free 30-day trial
INCLUDES:
Installation of EesySoft Building Block
Setup of your virtual server environment
Max 3 test users
Online training
Hinweis der Redaktion
Saxion is a university of applied sciences in the eastern parts of the Netherlands. We have 22.000 students, 1800 lectures, divides over 12 schools.
Here you see this growth. In red you’ll see the growth of monthly active users (up to 17.000 this year) in blue you see the growth of monthley active courses (this year 2700 courses).
The first period all schools allow experiments to discover what their education in Blackboard needs... After a while they’ll adopt a formal policy. In this policy you’ll find an agreement about the minimum requirements of a course used for education of the school.
We see the same process of adoption at all schools, but not a simultaneous development. Some school (like the school of Health) make very fast progress. This is possible, because they had already made e-learning materials before 2009. Every school has it’s own pace depending i.e. on schoolculture and other activities.
Not only every school has it’s own policy, maybe even every department has..... That’s only natural. There is a big cultural difference between software devellopers and nurses, or between social workers and lawyers.Saxion is not satisfied if Blackboard is only a tool to get information. To use Blackboard in a good eduactional context is our goal. It is not about Blackboard, it’s all about education! And last but not least, we have to deliver this in 3 languages.
So the requirements for our usersupport are demanding.What do I mean by Usersupport. First we deliver manuals for the use of Blackboard, and because a manual of 100 pages isn’t read, we use outline of the manual, so called Quick reference cards. There is also information about whats new, and how to do this or that in Blackboard. And of course we have our list of frequently asked questions........... These support materials all give information about about how to use the tools.....But we also have procedures: How can you get a new Bb course? How to enroll guest users? Are there tools to make quick batched for enrollment of students etc..... I already told you about our emphasis on pedagogy. We expect lectures to have questions like : how should I organize peer feedback between students? How should I facilitate selfreflection of students.....? Etc. And last but not least: we think that lecturers needs good examples to realize better course. If all those online help fails in the question, we need a window for F2F help (f.i. By telephone, skype etc...)
We deliver all this different kinds of support but you cannot find in in one place. You’ve got to know the way where to find it. And that’s not what we want. Our dream is just one place, one window for all help (like google might be). And we would like this window always to be just where the user is. It doesn’t work when a user has a question and you’ll say “next week we’ll have a Blackboard training and there you’ll learn this’, or ‘go to website this or that en look for .....’ Our users complain, that when they are English, they also see support in Dutch. Lecturers complain they see support for students, of for other schools. Beginners complain they see information for advanced users......
That’s why we adopted Eesysoft to realize our dream of usersupport.We started a project this year with 4 different project area’s. We used a Bb wiki to ask the different schools what tool materials they want to use and where they need it. This moment we prepare the delivery of the first sets of delivery. Important is the Monitoring part. You don’t know what successes your activities might bring if you don’t measure! Eesysoft has tools to monitor. I.e. When the School of Social Work agrees as their Bb policy to adopt Assignments and Safe Assign next year, we want to be able to deliver them independent figures of use in the beginning of the year, after the first 3 months, after 6 month’s, after 9 month’s and after a year. And only figures of courses of Lectures and students of Social work. So their policy won’t be blind.....
I think you all have experienced the same things as I presented. I think you all have to meet the same requirements of usersupport.You all have the same dreams about doing this. It’s a lot of work to organize and realize a real good usersupport. It would be nice if we could share materials and knowledge within the tool we use. Why not share good practices? Or share instruction materials about the tools..... Or.......