Digital ACT Studio and Digital Media Commons

Today's post is about two technology-related resources located in the Library- the Digital Act Studio and the Digital Media Commons (DMC). They are sister centers to the Speaking and Writing Centers, and both are located in the lower level of Jackson Library.

The Digital ACT Studio assists faculty, staff, and students with aesthetic design and storyboarding of projects that incorporate digital media. The staff helps clients think critically about design choices for projects involving digital media such as posters, brochures, ePortfolios, web pages and blogs. Digital media can include but is not limited to PowerPoint, videos, digital photography, animation, audio/podcasts, and infographics. The Studio's work space is flexible- everything is on wheels so the work space can easily be reconfigured to suit the needs of a class, and in addition to the main open space, there are also smaller rooms that can be used for small group work and breakout sessions.

The Digital ACT Studio staff, or "Digiteers," say that they:

Practice a collaborative approach to sessions, where designers and consultants engage in one-on-one conversations about projects.. Our goal is to help people become better designers and to that end, we encourage them to be in control of their projects and to participate actively in their DACTS sessions.

Some of the workshops the Studio can offer individuals or groups include: Storyboarding & Planning, ePortfolio Design, Best Practices for PowerPoint, and Poster Design Through PowerPoint.

Walk-ins are welcome, but the Studio also takes appointments, and especially during busier times like finals, appointments are recommended. The Studio also offers online consulting for distance students, and instructors can schedule a visit for an entire small class. You can find more information about the Digital ACT Studio, view the workshop listings, and request appointments through their website at:

http://digitalactstudio.uncg.edu

Whereas the Digital ACT Studio assists with design concepts and best practices, the Digital Media Commons (DMC) can help with the actual training and use of software and equipment. The DMC is focused primarily on student support. For example, the DMC can help students learn MovieMaker and lighting techniques to create and edit video, and train students on using Adobe Creative Suite to create projects such as digital brochures, newsletters, videos, and ePortfolio material.

The DMC has a large group study area as well as small group work areas, and a 3D lab. There is a small charge (currently 10 cents per gram) for printing items on the 3D printer. The DMC also has media rooms used for individual study or audio/video recording, and computer stations that can be used on a first come/first serve basis. There is a room with a camera and projector where students can practice making a presentation, and also a gaming lab with 4 Xbox 360s and 1 Kinect.

 

The DMC also has what they call the VIA space- the video, imaging, and audio space. This room contains a green screen for recording video, studio photography equipment, fabric backdrops for headshots, and the DMC offers workshops on how to use the equipment correctly.

Finally, the DMC also will check-out equipment for students. Some of the items they offer for check-out include web cams, headsets, camcorders, and tripods.

You can find more information on the DMC at their website:

http://library.uncg.edu/spaces/dmc/

I encourage you to visit the website for more information, and even arrange a tour for yourself. Please also share these resources with your students.

Campus Pack for Canvas

Campus Pack is a suite of tools that integrates with Canvas. Campus Pack provides blogs, wikis, journals, and a robust ePortfolio tool. We only have access to test Campus Pack through March 25, so there isn't time to incorporate the tools into a live course, but if you would like to meet to take a closer look in the test environment, just let me know. If you are at all interested in any of these tools, please send feedback ASAP so that we can encourage ITS to adopt the product.

What Are the Campus Pack Tools? 

  

The Journal is a self-reflective tool in which the default permissions are configured so that the journal is private between the student and the instructor. 

The Blog is a space for students to collaborate on projects and comment on each other’s work.  While posts contain individual entries, the collaboration is centered around instructor feedback, commenting, rating, or voter widgets.  Blogs can be deployed in a course, group, or individual manner.  

The Wiki is a collaborative tool that allows students and instructors to build one or more pages of a course website.  All students or groups can create a collection of pages and share with the course, a group or the entire world. 

If you are not grading the Campus Pack tool, you can add it directly to a Module by clicking the "+" beside the module and choosing to Add External Tool. 
 

If you want to grade the tool, you must add it as an ASSIGNMENT. Under Submission Type, choose External Tool, for the External URL field, browse to find and select Campus Pack from the options that come up. 

 

If you have already made a Blog, Journal, etc in your CP account, you can import an existing Blog, Wiki, or Journal that you have made by selecting the “Copy From Existing” option.

"Add a Shortcut" will create a link to an existing blog, wiki, or journal in your course. Note that this does not copy the tool, it just creates a shortcut link to the existing tool. 

Remember to publish your assignment when you are ready for your students to interact with the assignment.  Publishing your assignment also allows for it to show up in SpeedGrader, making it easier for you to grade the CP assignments. You can see the results in a new browser or click on the URL at the top to see the results within SpeedGrader:

Campus Pack ePortfolio:

Your portfolio will open with some default content areas, or portlets, on the page, such as Latest Activity, Course Membership, and Content Shared with Me. 

To begin adding your own content, click the “Add Portlet” button toward the bottom of the page. When you click this button, you will have several types of possible content options to choose from:

You will likely spend most of your time adding folders and/or Rich Text/HTML Widgets. A folder gives you a block on the page where you can add links to blogs, wikis, and journals. You can add brand new blogs, wikis, and journals, or you can copy blogs, wikis, and journals you have created in classes into your folder. Below are the content options available to you to add to a Folder. Note that you can choose to add blank blogs, journals, etc… from the main list, or you can click the smaller button at the top right to copy (a blog, wiki, etc) from an existing course.

The Rich Content Widget presents you with a text editor that allows you to place a formatted block of text directly on the page. Below is an example of what the Rich Content Widget looks like, shown in the process of my creating two links to place on my page:

In the example below I have added three new portlets: one folder called Resume, in which I created a new wiki for my resume; one Rich Content Widget called “My Websites” that contains two web links; and one Rich Content Widget called “What is Instructional Technology?” that contains formatted text. Note that because the “Resume” portlet is a folder, there is an option to add more content to it (in addition to the one “Anita’s Resume” wiki already linked).

You can delete certain default portlets, such as Course Membership, and you can edit and/or delete the other portlets that you add to the portfolio.You can drag and drop the portlets to rearrange the way they appear on the page.

When you are ready, you need to set your portfolio permissions so that others in your class can view the portfolio. To do this, click on the edit wheel icon below your profile image and choose Permissions:

There are three areas of permissions: Owners, Authors, and Viewers. Owners have complete control over your portfolio, so generally you do not want to grant anyone else owner access. Authors can contribute content, which might be useful if the portfolio is being used for a group project. Generally, however, you just want to set permissions for viewers, so that others in the system can view your portfolio. Click on “My Courses” in the first column, then choose the course you want to share with in the second column, and then select the appropriate option from the third column. Click the Add button. Then, select a start and end date for how long your portfolio should be visible. Finally, click the Save & Exit button.

Finally, note that if you click on the edit wheel below your profile image, if you choose “Export,” you will see that you have the option to export your portfolio as a website (in .zip format) so that you can take it with you when you leave UNCG:

Again, if you are interested in using these tools in Canvas, please contact me as soon as possible so that I can pass along the interest to ITS.