SMS Q&A Course Evaluations Stephen Marquard [email protected] Centre for Educational Technology, University

SMS Q&A Course Evaluations Stephen Marquard [email protected] http://twitter.com/stephenmarquard Centre for Educational Technology, University of Cape Town June 2010

3 Sakai contrib tools SMS Mobile messaging from Sakai Q&A Questions and Answers Course Evaluations Online course evaluations and surveys 211th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 2010

SMS 11th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 20103 Wth Sakai U 2 can snd txt msgs to grps of ppl! W00t!

SMS Overview What is it? SMS provides mobile text messaging in Sakai, including a tool for sending messages, and a switchboard for handing incoming messages to tools or scripts. Where do I find it? http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/SMS/ http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/SMS/ https://source.sakaiproject.org/contrib/sms/ http://jira.sakaiproject.org/browse/SMS More information? Screenshots on Confluence. Ask questions on the sakai-dev list, or contact UCT. 411th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 2010

Outgoing SMS 11th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 20105 In the SMS Messages tool, a.Write message (with context and sender) b.Select recipients by one or more of: Users with a role (e.g. Student) Users in a group (e.g. Tutorial 1) Users by name List of mobile numbers c. Calculate cost / credits d. Send e. View delivery status See more screenshots at http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/SMS/SMS+ Messages+Screenshots

Incoming SMS Examples 11th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 20106 Placement offers: UCT Health Sciences offers you a place in MBChB for 2010: SMS offer studentnumber accept/decline to ##### (200+ responses in 10 minutes). Q&A: What new use of Vula are you considering? SMS your answer to ##### R 3461 I would like to use Vula for surveys Q&A: Ask a question about Vula: SMS your question to #####: Q smsdemo How can I use Vula for surveys? Other possible uses for incoming SMS: Chat, Polls, Glossaries, etc.

Incoming SMS Any tool/service can accept incoming articles by registering a command prefix with the SMS service. Either implement ShortMessageCommand or configure a REST endpoint for incoming messages. Example code:https://source.sakaiproject.org/contrib/qna/trunk/impl/ src/java/org/sakaiproject/qna/logic/impl/sms/QuestionSmsC ommand.javahttps://source.sakaiproject.org/contrib/qna/trunk/impl/ src/java/org/sakaiproject/qna/logic/impl/sms/QuestionSmsC ommand.java Example REST registration: see http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/SMS/Incoming+S MS http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/SMS/Incoming+S MS 11th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 20107

Deployment considerations Service provider You need a service provider with an SMPP gateway (e.g. http://www.clickatell.com). What destination networks / countries are supported, and at what cost per message?http://www.clickatell.com Mobile numbers Populate user numbers in the user profile, or implement a provider (e.g. for LDAP lookup or some external source). Privacy and defaults Opt-in or opt-out, private or visible. Cost and accounting model Who incurs costs for sending messages? Prepaid or postpaid? Default implementation supports a prepaid model, with credit allocation per site. 11th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 20108

SMS: Privacy Our approach at UCT (Vula = our Sakai): Student, staff and third party cell numbers in Vula come from Peoplesoft, SAP HR, Third Party system Default My Workspace / Profile settings: Allow Vula users to send SMS messages to my cellphone: Yes Hide my cellphone number from other Vula users: Yes Users can opt out (0.5% so far) People sending messages see only the username, not the users cell number Use SMS wisely Otherwise people will opt out which makes it less useful for everyone.

Q&A 11th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 201010

Q&A Overview What is it? A tool which supports question-driven interaction (optionally anonymous) with web, email and SMS workflows (comparisons: Yahoo Answers, StackOverflow, Purdue Hotseat). Where do I find it? http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/QNA/Home http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/QNA/Home https://source.sakaiproject.org/contrib/qna/ More information? A question is worth a thousand answers (Paris Sakai conference presentation):http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/download/attachments/39616 558/paris-sakai-qna.pdfhttp://confluence.sakaiproject.org/download/attachments/39616 558/paris-sakai-qna.pdf Ask questions on the sakai-dev list, or contact UCT. 1111th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 2010

Why questions? Many students ask the same question Students will ask a question online which they wouldnt or couldnt ask face-to-face Students may ask a question differently (or at all) if they can ask it anonymously Students answer each others questions The student questions and answers provide a window into student thought processes, their difficulties, confusions, misconceptions and successes. Questions and answers provide academic support, peer support, and diagnostic insights.

Supported workflows Instructor-led: Student asks question > instructor responds privately (by email), and/or publicly (in the site) Collaborative: Student asks question > peers respond > (optional) instructor / TA provides or nominates a definitive answer Questions may be moderated, i.e. only become visible in the site once reviewed by an instructor / TA Site members may be allowed to ask questions anonymously

Tool demo Set up tool personality and workflow through Options and Permissions View, ask and respond to questions Create and organise categories and reorganize questions across categories

View questions and ask a new one

Viewing responses

Respond to a question (instructor)

Add an answer (student)

Organise questions

SMS support Q&A is minimally SMS-enabled Supports asking questions by SMS, receiving answers and/or retrieving answers Not really exposed in UI yet (except for Options)

Course Evaluation 11th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 201022

Course Evaluation Overview What is it? A tool for delivering course evaluations or surveys. Where do I find it? http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/EVALSYS/Home https://source.sakaiproject.org/contrib/evaluation/ More information? Ask on the [email protected] mailing [email protected] UCT screencast (instructor-managed evaluations) http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/EVALSYS/Course+Eva luations+video+tutorial http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/EVALSYS/Course+Eva luations+video+tutorial 2311th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 2010

Caveats How you might implement this depends heavily on institutional processes and policy. Evaluation System is a complex tool which has support for different institutional models of delivering evaluations. The information in Confluence is not up-to-date. No 2 sites run the tool in exactly the same way. Ask on the evaluations list! 11th Sakai Conference - June 15-17, 201024

Generic issues and concerns Response rates may be lower (dependent on lecturer involvement and feedback) but students give more written feedback online than in paper-based evaluations Moving from paper to online does not lead to less favourable ratings (U. Michigan) The set of respondents is representative of the course cohort by race, gender, final course mark: lower response rates do not skew results (IPD, UCT) Online evaluation is popular with students and provides more opportunities for student feedback Different opinions and strategies about incentives What happens to the results?

UCT self-service model Site Owners or Support Staff can create and assign evaluations to one or more of their Vula sites. The evaluation owner decides: o Who is evaluated (lecturers and tutors) o The questions o Start and end dates o How to encourage students to respond o What to do with the results (subject to Department or Faculty processes or guidelines)

UCT possible teaching models One or more lecturers (aka instructors) o Every student evaluates all lecturers in the evaluation o Students are taught in cohorts: each student chooses his/her lecturer to evaluate Tutors (aka TAs) o Tutors interact with students as a group: students evaluate the support of the tutors in general o Every student evaluates all tutors individually o Each student belongs to one or more tutor groups, and therefore chooses one or more tutors to evaluate

UCT: running an online evaluation 1.Add the Course Evaluations tool to one or more existing Vula course sites 2.Create a new evaluation: a)Choose a template to start from b)Choose start and end dates c)Choose reminder options d)Assign the evaluation to one or more Vula sites e)Identify Lecturers and Tutors to be included in the evaluation f)If necessary, edit the evaluation (add, remove or change questions) 3.While the evaluation is open: a)Look at the response rates, and encourage students to complete the evaluation b)Optionally, extend the closing date if the response rate is insufficient 4.When the evaluation has closed: a)View results (online, PDF, export to Excel) b)Provide feedback to students and/or class reps c)Provide a copy of results to HoD, other staff

UCT evaluation structure About the course About you (About all lectures/tutors) Lecturer 1 questions Lecturer question a Lecturer question b, Lecturer 2 questions Lecturer question a Lecturer question b, Tutor 1 questions Tutor question a Tutor question b, Tutor 2 questions Tutor question a Tutor question b, General questions Lecturer questions repeated for each assigned lecturer [respond to all, select one, select many] Tutor questions repeated for each assigned tutor [respond to all, select one, select many]

UCT: selecting the Lecturers to Evaluate 123

UCT: The Students View

Documents

SMS Q&A Course Evaluations Stephen Marquard [email protected] Centre for Educational Technology, University