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It’s here – the University’s official iNorthampton app is now available to download from the Blackberry App World!
The new Blackberry version has much of the same functionality as it’s Android and iPhone counterparts – it allows you to check maps, search the staff directory, get updates on news and events, and more. And you can download it for free now – just search for ‘iNorthampton’ on the Blackberry App World.
Unfortunately we haven’t yet been able to include the library search in this version, due to differences in the way apps are built for the Blackberry platform. You’ll notice also that the iNorthampton app for Blackberry doesn’t include the mobile version of NILE, but the good news here is that mobile NILE is still available for Blackberry users. Simply download the separate Blackboard Mobile Learn app, which is also available free from the App World, and search for Northampton on the first screen.
The iNorthampton app is a work in progress and we’re always keen to hear your feedback. Help us to improve on future releases by adding your comments to this blog, or emailing them to us at: mobilefeedback@northampton.ac.uk.
During the start of the 2011 academic year, the Learning Technology team noticed an issue with staff and students receiving high numbers of old announcements from NILE. Whilst the problem was investigated, we took the decision to reduce the notification functionality.
We have been working with the supplier to investigate the problem in more detail and believe the problem is now solved and we have reactivated the full notification system.
Staff will now notice that when they post important announcements, they will see the ability to push these out to student’s email accounts again regardless of individual notification settings:
Tutors can use the announcements feature in modules on NILE to post important messages about a course or module (e.g. room changes, information on assignments etc.). Students will be able to see these announcements when logging into NILE. It is also possible to receive these via email, by making changes to personal notification settings.
Should staff or students wish to subscribe to these emails, they may need to modify their notification settings (by default most email notifications are set to ‘off’ to prevent unwanted emails being sent out to users). If you are not sure how to do this, please watch the video or follow the steps below:
To edit your preferences, go to the ‘My Places’ link at the top of any screen in NILE, and click on ‘Edit Notification Settings’. From here you have a few options:
- ‘Edit General Settings’ controls whether you receive individual emails, or a daily digest. There is also a shortcut to switch due date reminders on and off (please note these reminders depend on the tutor specifying a due date when an item is added in NILE)
- ‘Individual Module/Organisation Settings’ lets you choose what type of notifications you will receive for each module (e.g. new announcements, new content added, new message on blogs or discussion forums etc.)
- ‘Bulk Module Settings’ allows you to set your preferences for all of your modules at once.
For more details on the notification features in NILE, see the Notifications Dashboard guide.
If you notice large numbers of old announcements being sent to your email account then please email LTSupport@northampton.ac.uk with your username and details of the announcements which are being received.
Have you downloaded the University’s mobile app, or used the mobile web version? If so, we’d like to hear from you.
The app was created based on feedback to a staff and student survey that we ran last year. It’s based on what you told us you wanted, and we’d like to keep it that way as it develops. There are a number of ways you can have your say about what’s next for iNorthampton.
1. In person. Watch out for our mobile survey team, who will be around both campuses in the next few weeks, asking for your opinion.
2. Email us your comments: mobilefeedback@northampton.ac.uk.
3. Tweet your thoughts, using the #iNorthampton hashtag.
4. Come and be part of our video on 2nd and 3rd November. Email us on mobilefeedback@northampton.ac.uk if you are available for this and would like to take part.
Staff and students now have the technology available to record all or part of any presentation made as part of University activity.
Whilst the technology makes it easy to make the recordings, there are legal issues around these which control how they are used and promoted. The regulations for staff and students are different based on the fact that staff are employed by the institution. This guide (DOC, 40.5Kb) offers an insight into the differences in addition to a template form (DOC, 33Kb) which may be customised and adapted for staff and student’s own recording sessions.
Whilst the technology makes it easy to make the recordings, there are legal issues around these which control how they are used and promoted. The regulations for staff and students are different based on the fact that staff are employed by the institution. This guide (DOC, 40.5Kb) offers an insight into the differences in addition to a template form (DOC, 33Kb) which may be customised and adapted for staff and student’s own recording sessions.
Why have I suddenly got two blog tools appearing in my NILE site?
The blog tools that we have always had in NILE are actually plug-ins (that is, they are made by a different software company to the people who make NILE, and are literally ‘plugged in’ to the NILE platform). If you have used blogs in the past, you will be familiar with the ones that look like this:
These tools are still available for you to use – you will see this option referred to as ‘Campus Pack blog’ in the tools list in your NILE sites. Sadly though this tool does not yet work so well with the mobile version of NILE in the new iNorthampton app. So for those of you who would prefer your students to be able to blog on the move, we have also switched on the blogging tools that are built in to NILE. You will now see extra options for ‘Blogs’ (or Blog Link from the Collaborate button) and ‘Journals’ in your NILE site.
What’s the difference?
The built-in blog tools are better at some things, and worse at others, in comparison to the Campus Pack plug-in blogs. Here are the main things you need to know:
- Both tools will allow you to have a group blog, or a private blog that can only be seen by the individual and the tutor. In the Campus Pack blog this is a setting in the blog tool when you create it, whereas the built-in version has two separate tools for this – the ‘blog’ tool for open groups or shared individual blogs, and the ‘journal’ tool for private individual or group blogging.
- If you are dividing your students into groups within your NILE site, the built in tools will allow you to create a blog and/or journal for each group when you create the group. With the Campus Pack tools, you have to do this separately – create the groups first, then create the blogs and allocate them.
- Both tools will allow you to create a column in the grade centre and specify grades for students’ work. The built-in blog and journal tools will allow you to add grades within the blog itself, while you’re checking the posts. This feature is not available in the Campus pack tool.
The built in tools do not currently have an RSS or email subscription option, or an export option, and they do not have granular permission levels (for example, allowing non-members to view a group blog). If you need this kind of granularity, please ask the team for advice.- The built in blog and journal tools are easy to access on a smartphone, via the iNorthampton app. The Campus Pack blogs do not currently display well in mobile browsers.
Tell us what you think
If you are a regular user of blogs in NILE, we’d love to hear your thoughts on either or both of these tools. Please send us any questions or comments at: LTSupport@northampton.ac.uk.
Switching tools off in NILE
Don’t forget that if you only want to use one of these tools, you can switch the other one off to avoid confusion (or if you prefer, you can switch off both!). To do this, go to your Control Panel and click on Customisation, and then Tool Availability. Remove the ticks for any of the tools you don’t use in your site.
You can choose which notifications you receive from NILE, choose not to receive any or receive a Digest which collates all announcements and notifications and will send you a summary.
To choose any of these options you need to log into NILE, click onto ‘My Places’ at the top of the screen and select ‘Edit Notification Settings’.
- To simply change your settings to only receive a once a day Digest of activity click ‘Edit General Settings‘ and specify which options you prefer. Click Submit once you are happy with your choices.
- To change settings for each module you are on click on the module name from the list under ‘Edit Individual Module Settings‘. You will see the page below. To switch all notifications off untick the On/Off box at the top left (red circle). If you would like to change your settings for individual items/activity within the module tick the relevant box to receive notifications and untick it to stop them.
Click ‘Submit’.
Repeat this for each module you would like to change the settings for.
You may already be aware that the University’s mobile app is now available for Apple and Android devices, with a Blackberry version coming soon. But did you know it allows you and your students to have mobile access to course and module sites on NILE?
The Learning Technology team is looking for innovative staff with an interest in the potential of mobile learning, to help put this part of the app through its paces. We’d like to hear from any staff who want to use mobile learning with their students – even if your plans are simply to ‘mobilise’ your existing sites on NILE. Tell us what works and what doesn’t in the new mobile interface, and share any questions, course design tips or changes you’ve made to your sites.
If you’d like to do something a bit more adventurous, that really takes advantage of the affordances of mobile learning, we’d like to hear from you too. Mobile learning has a lot of potential to allow you to do things that you might not otherwise be able to do in your teaching. This might include simple things, like using student-generated content (photos, videos, audio recordings etc that they can easily create on their phones), or allowing students to use their handsets to feed back in lectures. Or it might involve more complex projects, like supporting students doing authentic tasks on placements and field trips, building quizzes or games, experimenting with augmented reality… Needless to say this side of things is not restricted to what’s possible through the University app, so if you’d like to go beyond that, we’d love to hear about that too.
We are looking for pilots to run this academic year, so if you have an idea please get in touch, even if you’re not clear on the details (we may be able to help you work these out). The team will be on hand to help you get started, and to support you and your students throughout the module – we may even be able to lend you some devices to use.
You can find out more about the app at www.northampton.ac.uk/mobile. If you’re interested in giving it a try, please email the Learning Technology team at: LTSupport@northampton.ac.uk.
Background
As part of a wide project on Mobile Access to Learning and Teaching (MALT), in October 2010 the University of Northampton conducted a survey to ask staff and students about their needs with regards to mobile technology. The survey told us that demand was high – over 50% of staff and students already owned smartphones – and identified the need for more directed support and services within this area.
More specifically , the services rated most useful included: NILE (the institutional learning environment); timetables; University news; library and maps.
As a result of the needs identified, a project was commissioned to produce a mobile solution. The project brought together teams from across the University, including Marketing, the Web team, Library, Student Services, CIS and Learning Technology, as well as interested staff from the Schools. The detailed work took several months to complete, as we needed to revisit information being pushed out by a whole range of institutional systems, and reformat these with the user experience in mind.
The project team has worked closely with the chosen supplier (Blackboard, the company who also make the software we call NILE) throughout the summer, and iNorthampton – which includes mobile apps for the three main platforms, as well as a mobile web version – was created as a result. Needs identified from the survey were prioritised in order to create the first release of the app (‘Phase 1’), which went ‘live’ in the app stores in September 2011.
Phase 1 (Sept 2011)
- Campus Maps for Park and Avenue
- Timetables and course info
- Ability to browse the library catalogue
- See University related videos and photos
- Latest campus news
- Ability to find staff in the University communications directory and get in touch instantly
- Latest University events
- Access to learning resources on NILE
Phase 2…….and beyond
The pace of change is rapid in the mobile environment, and so iNorthampton is an iterative project – we anticipate this will be ongoing with continuous improvement based on feedback and needs. We have already identified some priorities to look into for ‘Phase 2’ (including linking events to locations on the map, including travel information, information on accommodation; and links for the digital prospectus). We’d love to hear your ideas.
Further suggestions
iNorthampton is owned by the staff and students of The University and we need to ensure that it provides the tools and services which you want to see on your mobile devices. If you have any suggestions or comments, please send them to the team at mobilefeedback@northampton.ac.uk.
On 6th September, JISC launched a new guide: Emerging Practice in a Digital Age: A guide to technology-enhanced institutional innovation available at http://www.jisc.ac.uk/digiemerge. To augment this guide, JISC infoNet also developed a Mobile Learning infoKit with version 0.1 of this resource now available at http://bit.ly/mobilelearninginfokit.
We were very pleased that our own Learning Technologist, Julie Usher, was able to contibute to the Mobile Learning Infokit as this reflects the recognition that Northampton is doing useful research within this area
The Mobile Learning infoKit is a practical guide for educational institutions planning to implement mobile learning initiatives. Currently, it comprises of a wiki-based resource collating information and guidance from JISC and others sources. It will develop to include a section on future trends, incorporate additional examples, and be made available in a variety of formats.
In July, the Learntech team posted information about rethinking the way in which inductions are handled. This was also suplemented with some top tips for staff as they prepare for the new academic year.
The information below builds on this with more recent information for staff who will be using technology in the context of their module.
As you plan your induction for students there are some key items of information of which you / your students need to be aware, that will help ease their progression into the University.
Accounts: All students at enrolment will be provided with a username and password for their University account, which enable them to access key resources such as the University computers, NILE, and Library materials. Full support is provided in both libraries to help any student log into the systems and access their accounts. Support via phone and email is also available, details are provided at the end of this message.
Students should use their University ID number (shown on the student card) as their username. The password will be their date of birth in a six digit format, followed by the first two letters of the family name (with the first letter being a capital letter and the second letter being in lower case) and followed by the = sign. [This is known as the University login.]
Example
username 31234567
password 081086Fa=
(This example shows what the password would be if the family name is Farmer and the student’s date of birth is 8 October 1986.)
All students need to go to the User Portal, set up their security questions, and change their initial password BEFORE they start to use the main university resources. It is important that they are encouraged to do this, as the initial password is a temporary one and will expire after 15 logins if it is not changed.
NILE: Students may then use their University account to login to NILE. They will then need to add the modules which are relevant to their course to their account. To help with this, tutors need to ensure they provide the exact module code(s) and name(s) to students, so that they can search effectively. Students will also find it helpful to be given some context of how tutors anticipate using NILE within the module, and guidance on the information they can expect to find there.
Training: Staff may request bespoke sessions for particular aspects of Learning Technology or specific use of NILE by using the general enquiry form
Email: The student’s personal email account which they provided at enrolment will be used for all electronic University communication. The student may find which account is being used by the University. A University provided email account is available for those students who do not wish to use their own account for University business. Students who wish to change the email address used by the University will need to contact their relevant Administration Team.
Should any student have a problem with any of the above then they should contact the library either in person or by the main contacts below:
Phone: 01604 893089
Email: libraryhelp@northampton.ac.uk
