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eClass messaging

Most profs have overflowing email inboxes, making it hard to keep track of student emails.  Two ways that I've heard of dealing with this effectively is to (a) create a class specific email address and (b) have students use the messaging system within the LMS. While messaging will work by default, you may wish to […]

Adding Interactive H5P Content to the York LMS, eClass

H5P modules are fantastic ways to add interactive content to your Moodle (*ahem* I mean "eClass") page.  The LTS folks at York have a page on H5P.  Here's my take on it. To create H5P content on eClass is a little different than on the older version of Moodle. Here's how you do it. Start […]

Moodle "Demo Student"

When designing your content on Moodle (eClass) it's important to test out how it looks and feels from a student perspective. In the Summer of 2020, YorkU's "DemoStudent" was introduced to provide that.  With few exceptions, it shows what the student sees, all without having profs ask a student to log in or to beg […]

Gendered language in Job Ads

[updated 2021 & 2022] We don't hire enough women in Engineering and Computer Science faculties.  It's a peer-reviewed fact. And, yet, hiring committees continue to refuse to use the same rigour and critical thinking in finding a new colleague that they demand in their every-day research.  Where's the evidence that your ad-hoc, "mmmm.... feels good" […]

eClass "Playground" course

UIT has rebadged Moodle as "eClass" and now made the "Playground" feature front and centre for teaching faculty to create areas for us to test ideas without immediately changing an existing course. Access it via the "Create Playground" link on the left of your welcome page: We can now more easily name the playground.  This […]

Tracking completion and making choices

With the move to online I think that it's important to have students track their completion of tasks.  I'm turning on completion tracking on eClass. Some of the material I want students to receive grades for (like answering questions in an interactive video) while other material I want them to simply report that they did […]

Completion tracking on Moodle

I think that online is best done with the student (and prof) being able to track the progress of the student in the most straight-forward manner possible. After a few days between looking at the the course page, and having forgotten where the student left off, it should be really clear to the student where […]

Privacy Smart Watches

So, you're in the market for a "smart" watch that might do things like tell you where you are and what your heart rate is.  There are two issues with most smart watches that make them bad designs: lack on anonymity (privacy) and terrible battery life.  If you don't want to compromise on those two […]

H5P: Interactive content on Moodle

[this is a work in progress... I'll add more preview content and explanations of the usage of H5P material on Moodle.] The learning activities that one can use in Moodle are a little bland, a little 2010-ish.  We can now add "H5P" content and activities, which make content feel a lot more contemporary -- emoticons […]

LPC802 & LPC804 Microcontroller lessons

These are copies of the lessons and labs that I developed for the LPC802 and LPC804 microcontrollers by NXP. These are the "student" versions and contain blanks in certain places on purpose. Course Outline (EECS 3215 Winter 2020) Introduction to the design of embedded systems using both hardware and software. Topics include microcontrollers; their architecture, […]