Exploring RSS and Blackboard

After several months away, I want to start blogging again. This is my attempt. I thought that I'd start with my explorations in online teaching and learning. We'll see how it goes.

I went to the Algonquin College Blackboard Tips Sheet to learn how to create surveys in Blackboard.


Ok, so I stumbled across a way to put RSS feeds into a Blackboard shell.

It's a great way to provide up-to-date content. The javascript to create a feed that was on the maricopa.edu website didn't work for me, but I did watch a great little talk by Alan Levine, Brian Lamb and D'Arcy Norman at http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/show/nmc1003/ on using RSS feeds in a course.

Memo to myself: work on those RSS feeds again. Then I can use them to provide links to content repositories, which I am starting to collect.

Here are a few of the more known Learning Object Repositories:

MERLOT - Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching
CAREO - Campus Alberta Repository of Educational Objects
Maricopa Learning Exchange


Oh, and by the way, uploading surveys and managing them in Blackboard is easy. Read thie PDF on the Algonquin tips page linked above.