Currently viewing the tag: "NILE"
Have you ever wondered if students bother to read the feedback that you so carefully provide them with? Have you ever been overloaded with providing formative feedback that students can use without necessarily engaging more deeply with your advice?
In this case study, Maggie Anderson, Senior Lecturer in Human Resources Management in NBS, reflects on how addressing this issue through the CAIeRO process changed her pedagogical approach to the provision of formative feedback/feedforward and how the Journal tool can be used to encourage earlier student engagement and increase individual learner responsibility.
SaGE Essentials
This session is for both staff who are new to Submission and Grading Electronically (SaGE) and those who need a refresher on the current process. The event will cover the SaGE workflow including marking in Turnitin; passing grades to the NILE gradecentre; downloading grades to send to the SATs; and working with the External Examiner. (12 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 9/10/13 | 9:30-12:00 |
| 15/10/13 | 2-4:30 |
| 25/10/13 | 9:30-12:00 |
| 31/10/13 | 2-4:30 |
| 4/11/13 | 9:30-12:00 |
| 13/11/13 | 9:30-12:00 |
| 21/11/13 | 2:00-4:30 |
| 25/11/13 | 2:00-4:30 |
Register on https://www.eventbrite.com/event/7917592733
Adding value to your SaGE experiences [NEW]
Available for staff who already have SaGE experience but would like to attend a small group session to review their current processes and see if anything may be changed or improved
(Limited to 4 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 23/10/13 | 9:30-11:30 |
| 4/12/13 | 2-4:00 |
Register on https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7918363037
SaGE Beyond the Basics (Rubrics)
A dedicated session for those who have already attended the SaGE Essentials session and are confident with the basic SaGE workflow. The event will focus on both the Turnitin and NILE rubrics which are currently available. Rubrics are useful for specific styles of marking and may only be suitable in certain situations. (12 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 17/10/13 | 2-4 |
Register on https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7918451301
SaGE Beyond the Basics (Using the NILE assignment submission area / groups and video submissions)
A dedicated session for those who have already attended the SaGE Essentials session and are confident with the basic SaGE workflow. This event will focus on the NILE assignment submission area which may be used for both individuals and groups. It will also cover alternative styles of assignment submission such as video submissions. (12 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 24/10/13 | 2-4 |
Register on https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7918517499
NILE Essentials – Making the most of your NILE site
This session will introduce the new NILE sites which are being used for all 2013/14 module and course areas. Find out the Top Ten most common mistakes with existing NILE sites and how to avoid them to improve the student experience. Attendees will develop confidence with working in their NILE area to add new and exciting content. (12 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 12/12/13 | 2-4 |
Register on https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7918563637
NILE – Beyond the Basics (Encouraging collaboration and NILE interaction using Blogs, Journals and Wikis)
This session will allow participant to explore the Blogs, Journals and Wikis tools inside NILE which encourage greater collaboration. (12 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 28/10/13 | 2-4 |
Register on https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7918585703
NILE – Beyond the Basics (Developing assessments using Tests and Pools.)
This session will explore the test, survey and question pool tools within NILE. These tools may be used with features such as adaptive release and the performance dashboard to allow greater student interaction with content and a higher level of tutor understanding of student engagement. (12 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 6/11/13 | 10-12 |
Register on: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7918627829
Working with sound, video and lecture recording
Find out about the most recent advances which will allow you to capture individual student presentations or whole lectures. The session will provide an introduction to flip cams, Panopto and the new video tool embedded in NILE (Kaltura). (12 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 15/11/13 | 10-12 |
Register on: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7918651901
Increasing in class session interaction using smartboards and the voting handsets
Many opportunities now exist to increase the amount of student interaction within traditional lectures. Smartboards are located in many of the teaching spaces but are often only used to display PowerPoints. This event will introduce the range of tools which allow the Smartboard to ‘come alive’. In addition to the Smartboard, voting handsets may be used to increase the amount of feedback students provide within sessions. This event will provide practical experience on using these tools. (12 places)
| Date (s) | Time |
| 19/11/13 | 2-4:00 |
Register on: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7918698039
All of the sessions above are also available on request for bespoke events (such as for Subject group training). Please contact your Learning Technologist or mail LearnTech@northampton.ac.uk for details on arranging these.
We’ve produced a short guide which we hope will enable new students and staff to navigate their way around NILE. The guide doesn’t cover everything that NILE does, but we hope it is enough to get started.
We have put a link to the guide on the front page of NILE but feel free to share this link:
Let us know of any errors and we’ll update the guide.
After the upgrade on NILE over the weekend you may have noticed that the My Sites box on NILE is not always showing all your sites. This is an intentional change in the way that NILE works to help improve performance and loading times on the Home tab. It has been known for the My Sites box to delay the page loading by 40-90 seconds!
To be able to see all your sites listed in the My Sites box you need to ensure that you are enrolled on no more than 100 sites. If you are on more than this then you will encounter problems.
To remove yourself from sites that are no longer needed, use the Manage my NILE sites box. Find the box on the left of your home screen on NILE and then click the name of the site you would like to remove yourself from. On the next screen tick the box to the left of your name and click ‘Remove’. Do this for each of the sites you want to remove yourself from and once you get below that 100 sites mark, you will be able to see all your sites listed.
If you get any trouble with this, as always, just get in touch and we’ll help 🙂
The LearnTech team have collated the top 5 tips / things to do for summer 2013 (with regards to NILE)
1. All sites have now been created on NILE for 2013/14 academic year. You should check for variations of sites as there may be various sessions associated with your modules and then merge these if needed. Rachel McCart is available to assist with this work.
2. Once you have found your sites then you should add yourself to to them and also add additional tutors / externals (if known). Rachel McCart is available to assist with this work.
3. Ensure that content is accurate and current (If you have copied material from an existing site then only copy what is needed. Do not copy:
- Submit your work / Turnitin submission points
- University Support and Resources
- Announcements
- Blogs
- Grade Centre Columns and Settings
- Group Settings
- Journals
- Wikis
Please ensure that you DO NOT copy any assessment submission areas, or Grade Centre columns into the 13/14 site as they need to be set up from scratch and cannot simply be copied from last year.
Check the menu structure on the left of the NILE site to ensure this is still correct. Check the student view with edit mode turned off
4. Setup up the submission points for assessments with the correct dates for submission / release of grades. Refer to the guidance for details.
Students will automatically be enrolled onto sites if they have reached the PRE stage and have been correctly allocated on the Student Record System.
Even if you do not require support with migrating data, merging modules, setting up turnitin, please do still contact Rachel McCart to ensure that your module/course site(s) are showing on NILE, for 13/14. In addition, Rachel will also enrol you, and any other tutors you require, onto your NILE sites.
If you need further help and advice tthen please mail the LearnTech team or phone on x2696
Over the past few years NILE (the Northampton VLE) has become critical to the student experience and great efforts are taken to ensure that the service remains available at all times. The equipment behind NILE is hosted in a Tier 1 datacentre along with other critical systems such as banks and hospitals.
When anyone accesses NILE then the connection assumes that:
- The hardware behind NILE is up and running
- The software which is running NILE is up and running
- The network connection between NILE and the person using it is fully working (note that 100 s of connections may be involved in making this link).
On the 25th April, 2013 there was 10 mins of unplanned downtime which led to the following tweet from a student:
“80% of grade exam tomorrow and nile goes down, f**** useless”
This led to the development of a report on NILE downtime over the past year. From May 1st, 2012 to May 1st, 2013, NILE was actually unavailable for 7 hours and 40 mins. [Some of this would have been late evening / early morning and not noticed]. On the basis that this covers a 24 hour service – this period would have a total of 8760 hours.
This gives NILE a one year uptime of 99.91% against our contracted uptime of 99.8%.
Whilst we apologise for any unplanned downtime (ideally NILE should NEVER be unavailable), Northampton has done everything possible to ensure that we have the most robust infrastruture possible – it would be interesting to see the report of any tech service which has actually been available for 100% of the time over one year – we would certainly love to be in this position.
By the way….in responding to the Tweet above, whilst most grades may be available on NILE, the official location to get student grades is at www.northampton.ac.uk/results
The JISC 2012 paper on Extending the learning environment provides information which assists in informing the review process of VLEs.
Earlier in 2012, Northampton went through a VLE review process and the notes and links below may be of interest to institutions which are going through a similar process. I have sub-titled this post ‘Caviar or Red Herring’ as the process may be seen as either a quality opportunity to ensure that you have the best product (the Caviar) or an opportunity to spend significant time comparing products with very similar functionality (the Red Herring) – you may not be sure which you have until you get to the end of the process…..and could end up with a mix of the two !
** Please note that the review below was conducted early in 2012 – all products mentioned were reviewed at that time and have changed significantly since in terms of functionality and version. **
We started the review process with a number of key principles:
- The institution is committed to reviewing its virtual learning environment to ensure suitability for purpose and cost effectiveness.
- Any change must enhance the student experience. Staff and students should evaluate the options and be involved in the change decision. Dedicated and nominated staff within the Schools should be allowed time to review the options with the support of their Dean.
- The change process can be disruptive for staff and students due to the migration needed. This can be mitigated though recruitment of dedicated staff to support the process.
- Whether we maintain the current platform under the current VLE or move to an alternative platform, the review is an opportunity for staff to fully engage with all students and University stakeholders.
- Material and structure should be reviewed and improved where possible. Templates and support will be provided and staff will engage with these. Additional long term support will need to be considered.
- All platforms under the VLE should be externally hosted at present to provide maximum uptime.
[The decision to go hosted with the current VLE (Blackboard] was made in 2007 based on the need for high level system availability which could not be guaranteed with internal hosting. This decision was based on Northampton’s internal culture and infrastructure. It was decided at the time of the VLE review that the system should be maintained as a hosted operation]
As part of the process we were aware that several other institutions had conducted VLE reviews in the past year and contacted these to obtain a copy of their findings – some were more open than others (for obvious reasons).
This brief report is a summary of the six VLE reviews which we were able to obtain.
Reviews were instigated by either / and:
- Issues caused with current internal hosting
- An impending significant upgrade to the current system
- A perception that a move will save money
Four of the six will continue to use Blackboard; one is moving to Moodle on cost grounds; ** are considering moving to Moodle.
Uptime is considered a key issue for all reviews and most are considering, or have already moved to hosted option regardless of the product chosen.
Functionality reviews have tried to compare the latest features of each system and there is an inevitable cross over between them. Analysis of the reviews seems to indicate that Blackboard currently has a more intuitive structure ‘out of the box’. Flexible designs may be achieved in Moodle.
All reviews have noted that there is a ‘transition cost’ which pushes up the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). Moodle options necessitate the need for a developer (or team) in house to make best use of the system and customise the interface.
The majority of academic staff within the reviews noted no pedagogical advantage in moving from Blackboard to Moodle and felt that any such a change would present a significant risk to the current status of the University’s core business and its likely future development. Retraining would be needed in any transition.
** noted that staff development and training needs were often overlooked, or severely underestimated in transitions. They had migrated to Moodle as a perceived cost saving.
Recommendations:
- The TCO of any migration is fully costed
- Staff and students need to be fully consulted in current and future needs
- Regardless of the option chosen – staff need to be fully supported and encouraged to make best use of it. Some current poor student reviews within the current VLE were prompted by poor academic engagement with the system rather than any lack of functionality.
- The review process must review the latest available version of each VLE.
- Considering the current IT infrastructure, we need to maintain a hosted solution regardless of the option selected.
The final report which was presented to the University Executive Group summarised the 4 month review process. Please note that some confidential details have been removed for obvious reasons.
The decision to remain with Blackboard for a further three years was based on a wide range of factors and not just the basic cost. The TCO which included price, cultural issues and migration meant that the decision was the best for Northampton at that time. I’m fully aware that other institutions will conduct reviews which will be conducted within a completely culture and with different needs which will lead them down a different path. We will be looking for a formal review again in 2014/15 – let’s hope that this is a ‘Caviar’ experience.
For further details on the review process please contact Rob Howe
The default My Sites box on your NILE homepage is an unhelpful, alphabetical mess. We attempted to alleviate a little bit of the ridiculousness by prefixing site titles with ’12/13′ last year so at least all your 12/13 sites will appear at the top of the box, but we have come up with a better solution! It’s called ‘Group by Term’ and you can enable it on your own NILE homepage by following these instructions.
Hover your mouse over the My Sites box and click on the cog icon at the top right:
In section 1 of that screen, tick the box next to ‘Group by Term‘:
So far, we have two Terms set up on NILE, one for the 12/13 academic year, and one for 13/14. You can specify which one(s) you would like to be displayed in your My Sites box (Show Term), and also whether you would like see the Term, by default, in its expanded or collapsed state (Expand Term) – click on the image to zoom in.
Choose whichever options you require, click Submit and you will see a better organised My Sites box:
Between July 21st 3pm BST and July 22nd 3am BST , NILE was upgraded to the latest version.
Northampton was previously on Blackboard 9.1 service pack 9 and is now on service pack 13.
Whilst during the academic year mainly security fixes are applied, annually we need to ensure that NILE is at the most stable version with the latest features to benefit staff and students. Our hosting contract provides us with at least 99.9% availability for NILE 365 days a year providing we ensure that we maintain our version.
The new version contains new functionality which will be of use to staff and students and ensure that NILE is maintained as an advanced virtual learning environment to maximise the student experience.
For more details on the main changes then please follow the links below. Major new features were included in service packs 10 and 12. Service pack 11 just included a number of minor improvements.
*SP 11 and 13 are maintenance service packs that included fixes and improvements to features introduced in Service Packs 10 and 12 respectively.
A list is available for those that wish to check browser compatibility with SP12.
A staff and student focus group were consulted on the changes which were introduced. If you would like to join this group then please contact Rob.Howe@northampton.ac.uk.
From the 8-10 April, 2013, three members of the LearnTech team presented papers at the European Blackboard Teaching and Learning conference. The annual conference allowed the team to network with teams from other institutions who also use Blackboard and ensure that Northampton was making best use of the technology available.
As with most large conferences, there were often multiple stands covering different areas available at the same time. These covered subjects such as the increasing use of mobile devices; Analytics; benchmarking of courses; quality of courses; product roadmaps; e-submission and marking techniques; and integration tips.
Adel Gordon teamed up with Pepijn Kalis of Blackboard to present a session on using rubrics to enhance and augment the marking process – their presentation, hosted on Slideshare, demonstrated a number of different approaches to the use of this tool.
Rob Howe presented a session which explained the audit process which was used to inform the development of NILE site templates. The Powerpoint (also on Slideshare) used an analogy of students finding content being similar to the problem of finding Wally in the “Where’s Wally” books.
During the final session of the conference, Rachel Maxwell was joined by Kardi Somerfield from Northampton Business School to present a session on how to develop engaging / sticky NILE sites which encourage students to return. The presentation built on the research conducted during an URB@N project to identify what students wanted from NILE areas.
All of the Northampton sessions were well attended and the feedback very positive. Subsequent requests for further follow up discussions with many of the European institutions which attended based on our presentations show the relevance of our work. For further details on any aspect of the conference please contact LTSupport@northampton.ac.uk
