Expert TA Blog

For those working in the education realm these days, it seems that you can’t go far without hearing about new educational technology tools, and Instructure’s Canvas LMS is at the top of that list. While Expert TA has no affiliation with Canvas, we always love learning about new classroom technology being used in higher education. Therefore, we decided to dig a little deeper to see what all the buzz surrounding Canvas was about. Although Canvas has a lengthy list of features, here are some of the items we think instructors and students will appreciate most about the system:

1. Data/analytics reporting. All Canvas users receive access to Canvas Data at no additional cost, and instructors can export this data into an analytics tool of their choosing. With this functionality, instructors can quickly see student activity by date, assignment completions, grade distributions and individual student activity. We at Expert TA are big fans of this kind of insight because we provide an extensive analytics reporting tool as well. When both your LMS and homework system help to find learning trends and weak points in understanding, the instructor and students benefit greatly.
2. SpeedGrader. Teachers can easily view and markup student work without downloading or uploading files. This includes highlighting, strikeouts, and freehand drawing. Text messages and other media formats are also available for communicating with students.
3. Canvas Commons. Canvas has a learning object repository (LOR) that claims to have a more intuitive platform for searching and sharing content. Instructors can digitally share educational content, teaching resources and ideas for the classroom in a central hub that is organized and searchable.
4. Organization. In a review by students at Penn State, enthusiasm centered around the planning tools that allow students to keep track of deadlines and assignments. Besides the calendar tool, students can utilize the Files feature to organize documents, ePortfolios to feature project work, and setup news subscriptions among a long list of other tools meant to help students stay organized.
5. Collaboration. Student groups can collect shared documents, interact in threaded discussions, and convene online group meetings in order to efficiently complete group projects and assignments. In addition, the Chat feature allows students and instructors to communicate in real time, a perfect way for instructors to create virtual office hours. The usability seems to be one of its featured benefits over competitors as one reviewer commented, “It simply feels better to use”.

Although many would think that in 2016, technology’s intrinsic value in the classroom would be a given, educators still debate how important technology is in education as they struggle to implement it in a helpful way. We believe that every instructor who is able to get over the implementation hurdles will continue to discover tools that get more exciting every day, leading to greater benefits for both teachers and students.  

Case in point: This article from Education Week highlights the four pillars of “personalized learning” that were created by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation and EDUCAUSE.  As we gain insight from emerging research, we push ourselves every day to further develop our products in order to provide more value to students. We are thrilled to play even a small part in the future of this concept, because it combines two of our biggest passions at Expert TA: big data and student understanding. We hope you enjoy the article as much as we did. 

The Expert TA staff would like to congratulate Dr. Linda Grisham of Massachusetts Bay Community College, who recently won a prestigious Course of Distinction (COD) Award from Massachusetts Colleges Online’s (MCO) 11th Annual Conference of eLearning.

MCO says this about their Course of Distinction Awards:

Massachusetts Colleges Online created the Courses of Distinction Awards to recognize faculty whose course designs best exemplify online education’s potential to enhance teaching and learning. In addition to honoring faculty for their efforts, the COD Awards and the faculty showcases of the COD courses have become an important focus of the MCO annual Sharing Best Practices in e-Learning Conference.

Dr. Grisham’s award recognizes her work with a Physics 101 class, which uses Expert TA’s online homework system,  along with other tools to teach kinematics, dynamics, energy, wave motion, fluids, heat and temperature and kinetic theory of gases and sound.

"This hybrid online course was designed to provide a ‘blended’ experience for students, many of whom are life science majors pursuing careers in medicine, pharmacy, physical therapy and veterinary sciences,” said Grisham. 

Dr. Grisham is one of many exploring the blended classroom philosophy and uses Expert TA's online learning platform because she feels it allows students to come to class prepared to engage.

"I expect my students to complete homework assignments that are designed to reinforce lessons and work done during class and then provide an overview of topics to be covered during the next class meeting,” said Grisham. “It is critical that students come prepared each class to work as active participants, and Expert TA provides a wonderful structure to foster an environment for student success."

Expert TA allows students to learn physics online by working through problems and receiving hints, feedback or both. Instructors have the ability to choose the problems that best align with their textbook content and lectures.

We are so pleased to see the homework applications we developed provide educators with the benefits we envision for them, but most of all we congratulate Dr. Grisham on this award and her outstanding work in the classroom.