Collin College Podcast

Collin College Podcast

By Collin Department of Strategic Initiatives

A podcast dedicated to providing faculty, staff, and student at Collin College with the information that they need to use technologies, tools, and services at Collin College.
Available on
Apple Podcasts Logo
Overcast Logo
Spotify Logo
Currently playing episode

Canvas Best Practices

Collin College PodcastApr 03, 2020
00:00
49:19
Workday - How will it impact our day-to-day? What processes will change? With Guest Melissa Irby
Dec 04, 202015:19
Workday - What is it? What are its benefits? When is it coming? With Guest David Hoyt
Oct 09, 202012:17
Making Content and Courses More Accessible and Compliant

Making Content and Courses More Accessible and Compliant

In this week's episode of the podcast, Mark sits down with Summer Helm and Francis Choy of the eLC. Francis and Summer are experts on just about everything as it applies to accessibility and compliance. During the episode we talk about why accessibility is important for all users, not just a few, and we take a deeper look at the many ways that a course may not meet accessibility needs. With their wealth of knowledge, the guests breakdown some of the more common mistakes that are made when curating course content and they also discuss many of the low-hanging fruits that faculty can begin to assess today if they are wanting to work towards having a course that is more accessible. Finally, Mark asks his guests to talk about some of their biggest challenges and successes as they have worked towards creating their own content of faculty content that is more accessible. 

Technologies discussed

Blackboard Ally - https://www.blackboard.com/teaching-learning/accessibility-universal-design/blackboard-ally-lms

Canvas Studio - https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-9669-50736467895

Canvas Accessibility Checker - https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-26400-how-do-i-use-the-accessibility-checker-in-the-rich-content-editor-as-an-instructor

Windows 10 Accessibility Features - https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/accessibility/windows?activetab=pivot_1:primaryr2

Microsoft Office Accessibility Features - https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/accessibility/office?activetab=pivot_1%3aprimaryr2

MacOS Accessibility Features - https://www.apple.com/accessibility/mac/vision/

ReadSpeaker - https://www.readspeaker.com

Dragon Speech Recognition - https://www.nuance.com/dragon.html

WebAIM - https://webaim.org

WAVE Accessibility Evaluation Tool - https://wave.webaim.org

Jun 19, 202001:27:18
Faculty Fellows Lessons Learned During COVID-19

Faculty Fellows Lessons Learned During COVID-19

In this week's episode, members of the department of strategic initiatives at Collin sit down with some of the Virtual Campus Faculty Fellows to discuss how the Spring semester went for them. During our discussion, we breakdown successes that the faculty celebrated, and challenges that they encountered as they progressed through the semester. Additionally, they talk about some of the key pieces of software that they used as they proceeded through the semester.

Jun 12, 202047:20
COVID hacks and lessons learned

COVID hacks and lessons learned

In this week's episode the Department of Strategic Initiatives team sits down to discuss the lessons that were learned during the shelter in place. Some of the more important lessons included:

  1. Learn when the groundskeeping crew will be visiting your apartment community if you plan on having Zoom or Teams calls.
  2. AC Window units are a must if you are going to isolate yourself in a room with little to no ventilation.
  3. The first person who can create an app that can translate requests into not only understandable guidelines for a toddler, but guidelines that a toddler will actually follow is going to be a very wealthy person.

So join us as we explore the things the challenges and successes of our time working remotely, and the things that we have missed and will once again enjoy as we return to the office.


May 29, 202038:38
Content Creation Tools: Working with What You've Got

Content Creation Tools: Working with What You've Got

In this week's episode, Mark takes a trip down memory lane to when he first started working at Collin College. As he moves through the podcast, he recalls various times when he was able to identify a need that his students had, and select the appropriate tool to address that need. From creating lecture videos and review sessions, to discussing how a podcast can be turned into a useful feed of information that students can use as a way of studying while they commute, Mark covers some of the most commonly requested features that he faced during his time as a lecturer at Collin.



May 22, 202053:46
Principles of Design and Asset Creation

Principles of Design and Asset Creation

In this week's episode Mark sits down with Kasie Moon, the assistant graphic designer in the department of strategic initiatives to talk all things design. Join us as we discuss the laws and principles that encompass good design, and how these principles can be applied to Powerpoint presentations and Canvas courses.

After talking about how we would go about creating or preparing our assets for implementation, we also then discuss the different file formats that we could use for our assets and what the advantages and disadvantages are for each.

Reference's in this week's episode

Cognitive Overhead - How many logical connections or jumps your brain has to make in order to understand or contextualize the thing you’re looking at? Read more about Cognitive Overhead

Hick’s Law - The time it takes to make a decision increases with the number and complexity of choices. Read more about Hick's Law

Jackob’s Law - Principle of usability ((described by Jakob Nielsen)) that recommends the use of familiar patterns in design in order to facilitate user-experience, because users prefer it when a site works in the same way as all the other sites they already know. Read more about Jackob's Law

Law of Pragnanz - People will perceive complex information in the simplest forms possible. Read more about Law of Pragnanz

Law of Similarity - People perceive elememts together based on type and color. Read more about Law of Similarity

Serial Position Effect - We best remember the first and last items in a series. Read more about the Serial Position Effect

Show Me What You're Working With Apps

Affinity App Suite - Creative Suite that allows for image manipulation and asset creation. Download the Affinity App Suite for Windows, MacOS, or iPadOS

Sketch - Asset and Layout Design Tool for MacOS. Download Sketch for MacOS

Font Awesome - A webfont library of over 7,000 icons. Download any icon as an SVG file. Visit FontAwesome Website.

Assembly - Icon and asset creation tool for iOS. Download the Assembly App for iOS

May 15, 202001:15:56
The Canvas Rich Content Editor's Big UI/UX Update

The Canvas Rich Content Editor's Big UI/UX Update

In this week's episode Mark sits down to discuss the changes that have happened the rich content editor of Canvas. For those of you who haven't heard of this element before or maybe didn't know its name, the Rich Content Editor (RCE for short) is the blog-like interface that appears on Pages, Assignments, Quizzes, and Discussion Boards in Canvas, and allows instructors and students to curate and insert content. Recently, Instructure, the creators of Canvas issued a huge update for the Rich Content Editor that brings with it a fresh approach to its User Interface and User Experience.

Mark talks through not only the changes that happened to the RCE, and his suspicions as to why they happened, but he also dives, head-first, into the concepts of User Interface (UI) and User Experience (UX) Design. As he explores the definitions, best-practices, and methodologies of both of these critical components in software development he also attempts to edify the significant changes in the RCE as they apply to both UI and UX. 

So buckle up and enjoy this week's episode as we explore UI, UX, and how they apply to the RCE.


Reference's in this week's episode

Canvas Guides - "What is the Rich Content Editor?" Want to read up a bit more on the RCE in Canvas? Check out this article in the official Canvas Guides on the Rich Content Editor. Read the Guide on the RCE

Canvas Guides - "The New Rich Content Editor" Want to see the changes that happened with the RCE in video form? Instructure has also produced the following video on the new RCE. Watch the New RCE Video

Webflow Blog - "UX vs UI: key differences every designer should know," read this illuminating article on the principle differences and touchstones of UI and UX design. Read the Webflow Article

UX Honeycomb - This Medium article discusses the UX Honeycomb and breaks down the different components of it. Read Medium Article on UX Honeycomb

Asana - Task management application with a Unicorn animation when some tasks are completed as a means of enhancing the user experience. Asana Website

Steve Job's Keynote for iPhone (2007) - Watch the video of the original iPhone's debut wherein Steve Job's discusses what makes the iPhone a "revolutionary new product"


Show Me What You're Working With Apps

Microsoft Office App - Download the all new MS Office App for iOS, Download the all new MS Office App for Android

May 08, 202001:13:17
Online Exam Proctoring with HonorLock

Online Exam Proctoring with HonorLock

In this week's episode, Mark sits down with eLC members Ann Blackman (Director of the Collin eLearning Centers) and Brad Hennigan (Instructional Designer, Plano eLearning Center) to discuss online proctoring. During our dialogue, we discuss some of the most frequently asked questions that the eLC fields when it comes to proctoring online exams, solutions we have used in the past, and the advantages of our current solution, HonorLock. Additionally, we take a deep dive into faculty and student testing scenarios within HonorLock, and breakdown what happens at any given point during each scenario. What's more, Ann and Brad shed some light on some of the HonorLock successes and challenges that have been brought to the eLC by both faculty and students.

A huge thanks again to Brad and Ann for their time and perspective in this week's episode, and all of the members of the eLC who have provided countless hours of support and training to the Collin College faculty and students.


Apps & Resources Discussed in the Podcast:

HonorLock - Honorlock website

Show Me What You're Working With Apps:

FindTime - Send meeting-time polls to other Office 365 users, and, when an agreed upon time is received, the app automagically schedules the meeting for that time. Learn more on the FindTime Website.

Calendly - Need to have a vendor set a meeting time with you, but don't want to go through the back and forth of finding a day and time that do/don't work for the both of you? Hook Calendly up to your Office 365 email account, and then just send the link to your calendar to the vendor. Calendly Website, iOS App, Android App


May 01, 202001:02:26
Powering Up Your Automations
Apr 24, 202047:13
Security Best Practices
Apr 17, 202001:02:32
Virtual Campus Faculty Fellows Q&As.

Virtual Campus Faculty Fellows Q&As.

In this episode, members of the Collin Department of Strategic Initiatives (Kasie Dodd, Mark Garcia, and Nicola Marshman) are joined by members of the Faculty Fellows cohort (Amira Albalancy, Anne Thornton, Betsy Brody, Karrie Newby, Kelly Martin, Kelly Putnam, Lydia Danton, Melissa Johnson, Mike McConachie, Mindi Bailey, Pamela Gaiter, Sukanya Subramanian, Suzanne Jones), who led the charge with adopting methodologies and technologies aligned with the Collin Virtual Campus initiative. In this session DOSI asks the faculty members to provide some perspective on challenges and successes that they have had in taking previous classes from face-to-face to an online modality. 

While they are at it, the Faculty Fellows also discuss some of the ways they have tried to adapt in the current environment, as a result of COVID-19, to take some of their more unique or challenging courses from face-to-face to online.

Apr 10, 202048:45
Canvas Best Practices
Apr 03, 202049:19
About the Podcast

About the Podcast

In this episode Mark Garcia talks about the goals and purpose of the podcast.

Apr 03, 202002:32