Category: Learning management systems

  • Learning to Learn Online: An Open Educational Resource (OER) for Students and Instructors

    Learning to Learn Online: An Open Educational Resource (OER) for Students and Instructors

    For months now, members of the CIEL have been shouldering questions about how to help students be effective online learners. Now, thanks to some student authors and the power of Pressbooks, the world of higher education is privy to a timely resource that provides tips for students (and instructors!) as they continue to transition to…

  • NEW – VIULearn quizzes now save automatically!

    NEW – VIULearn quizzes now save automatically!

    As of October 19, 2018, you no longer need to manually save your answers when taking a quiz! As you complete each question on a quiz, your responses will now be automatically saved. Below, we’ve put images showing the old version (with the save button) next to what it will look like when a question…

  • Join us for the New Faculty Orientation to Teaching!

    Join us for the New Faculty Orientation to Teaching!

    Join us!  Meet with VIU colleagues, learn more about the students we have at VIU, and connect with the staff who are ready to help with your teaching questions. The event is built around lively discussions with other new (and “almost new”) faculty about what the hallmarks of successful student engagement are, and what tools…

  • Cleaning Up VIULearn: New Process for VIU as of July 2018

    Cleaning Up VIULearn: New Process for VIU as of July 2018

    New Process for VIULearn Course Cleanup Status: Currently we have over 40,000 courses dating back to Intersession 2012 when we began using D2L’s Brightspace software (branded VIULearn). Many of these courses were never used or are not used anymore. The accumulation of old courses can make managing VIULearn challenging and creates a messy view for faculty. Rationale: It…

  • Final Daylight Details: Updating VIU’s Digital Learning Environment to a New Responsive Design Interface

    Final Daylight Details: Updating VIU’s Digital Learning Environment to a New Responsive Design Interface

      It’s been six months since Vancouver Island University (VIU) flipped the switch to Daylight (D2L’s new responsive design interface for their learning environment, Brightspace) on April 30, 2017 – and our story stays the same – all is well! Seriously, making the switch has resulted in many benefits for both students and faculty members.…

  • D2L FUSION Conference: Key Take-Aways for Higher Ed

    D2L FUSION Conference: Key Take-Aways for Higher Ed

    D2L’s annual FUSION conference (Reach Every Learner) for its customers was held July 19-20 in Las Vegas. This is a summary of the key take-aways for higher education faculty and support staff with a focus on Brightspace (D2L’s learning environment). Much of this info is also found on this Summer 17 release page: https://www.d2l.com/products-releases/summer-2017/ Daylight – Responsive…

  • ‘Daylight’ Has Come and Gone: VIU’s Experience Moving to D2L’s New Responsive Design Interface

    ‘Daylight’ Has Come and Gone: VIU’s Experience Moving to D2L’s New Responsive Design Interface

    On April 30, Vancouver Island University switched its learning environment, called VIULearn, to the “Daylight Experience” from D2L. Daylight is a change in the look and feel (colours, buttons, icons, text), but it really updates the learning environment to one that is designed to be responsive/resizable to varied screen sizes and mobile devices. Daylight is…

  • Enhancements to VIULearn: My Home, Course Home and Nav Bar (April 30)

    On April 30, VIULearn will undergo a  change in terms of look and feel as we upgrade to a new version called Daylight. We are also going to slide in a few enhancements to the My Home, Course Home and the Navigation Bar to take advantage of this update. Here is what is happening. My Home…

  • Maxwell Stevenson joins the Centre as new Associate Director

    Maxwell Stevenson joins the Centre as new Associate Director

    The Centre for Innovation and Excellence in Learning welcomes Maxwell Stevenson to the new role of Associate Director. Maxwell hails from Victoria where he grew up and attended the University of Victoria. After his undergraduate degree he headed to England to do his Masters in Architectural History and his PhD exploring the role of the…

  • What’s New in VIULearn? (Summer 2016)

    This summer, there have been changes to the names of some of the tools you use in VIULearn. For instance, “Dropbox” for submitting assignments has been creating some confusion with the internet storage service “Dropbox”. Additionally, there have been a variety of improvements to navigation for you and your learners. These changes rolled out on…

  • What’s New in VIULearn this Month? (March-April 2016)

    Every month, VIULearn is updated by our software provider D2L. Most of the time you won’t even notice the changes, because they are behind-the-scenes improvements. An example of a behind-the-scenes improvement was an improvement to the Import / Export / Copy Components tool that allowed bigger courses to be copied faster. Sometimes, there are improvements…

  • Exciting Ways to Use the New “Not” Release Conditions

    You may have seen my previous blog post where I talked briefly about the new “not” release conditions. If you were wondering what these conditions could be used for, I’m here to give you a few ideas to get you started. What Do You Mean by “Not” Release Conditions? Ever since VIU first adopted VIULearn…