Faculty Enrichment - Online Resources Everyone can Use!

This session reviews the online resource center, My Faculty Center (http://www.facultysupport.com/my-faculty-center.php), used by the School of Nursing at Washburn University for their faculty enrichment. In this hands-on session, see what tools can benefit your organization including the Learning Experience Designer, Teaching & Learning Skills Checklist, D2L Skills Checklist, Technology Skills & Interest Checklist, and Scholarship Skills Checklist

It Does Make a Difference! Applying Interactive Design Principles to the Online Learning Experience

Shifting from teaching in the classroom to teaching online is huge! New strategies, techniques, and tools need to be applied to be effective in this interactive medium. As educators, we understand the need to learn about teaching and learning best practices, but we may have never considered the need to learn about the best practices related to working with an interactive medium. This session provides practical advice for applying interaction design principles to the online classroom. It does make a difference! Students in courses designed based on these principles find the courses better organized, more dynamic and engaging, and more satisfying

Streamline Quality Matters Review with Standardized Templates

When an instructor is confronted with developing an online course based on Quality Matters it can daunting! The Quality Matters rubric is developed from an instructional designer’s perspective with underlying concepts unfamiliar to some faculty members. The School of Nursing at Washburn University is in the process of rolling out a fully online program for RN-to-BSN students. A strategic decision was made to design the courses to meet Quality Matters standards. An analysis of each Quality Matters benchmark showed that many of the features could be “canned” or developed for reuse. The reusable tools are a Course Template for D2L, a Syllabus Template, and a Student Resource Center. About 37% of the QM benchmarks can be achieved using these standard objects. This presentation covers the details and the logic behind these standardized and reusable elements

Congenital Zika virus infection as a silent pathology with loss of neurogenic output in the fetal brain

Zika virus (ZIKV) is a flavivirus with teratogenic effects on fetal brain, but the spectrum of ZIKV-induced brain injury is unknown, particularly when ultrasound imaging is normal. In a pregnant pigtail macaque (Macaca nemestrina) model of ZIKV infection, we demonstrate that ZIKV-induced injury to fetal brain is substantial, even in the absence of microcephaly, and may be challenging to detect in a clinical setting. A common and subtle injury pattern was identified, including (i) periventricular T2-hyperintense foci and loss of fetal noncortical brain volume, (ii) injury to the ependymal epithelium with underlying gliosis and (iii) loss of late fetal neuronal progenitor cells in the subventricular zone (temporal cortex) and subgranular zone (dentate gyrus, hippocampus) with dysmorphic granule neuron patterning. Attenuation of fetal neurogenic output demonstrates potentially considerable teratogenic effects of congenital ZIKV infection even without microcephaly. Our findings suggest that all children exposed to ZIKV in utero should receive long-term monitoring for neurocognitive deficits, regardless of head size at birth

Training-induced neural plasticity in golf novices

Previous neuroimaging studies in the field of motor learning have shown that learning a new skill induces specific changes of neural gray and white matter in human brain areas necessary to control the practiced task. Former longitudinal studies investigating motor skill learning have used strict training protocols with little ecological validity rather than physical leisure activities, although there are several retrospective and cross-sectional studies suggesting neuroprotective effects of physical leisure activities. In the present longitudinal MRI study, we used voxel-based morphometry to investigate training-induced gray matter changes in golf novices between the age of 40 and 60 years, an age period when an active life style is assumed to counteract cognitive decline. As a main result, we demonstrate that 40 h of golf practice, performed as a leisure activity with highly individual training protocols, are associated with gray matter increases in a task-relevant cortical network encompassing sensorimotor regions and areas belonging to the dorsal stream.Anew and striking result is the relationship between training intensity (time needed to complete the 40 training hours) and structural changes observed in the parieto-occipital junction. Thus, we demonstrate that a physical leisure activity induces training-dependent changes in gray matter and assume that a strict and controlled training protocol is not mandatory for training-induced adaptations of gray matter

Winners of 2019 SIDLIT Awards

The co-chair of the 2019 SIDLIT Awards Committee, Dr. Linda Merillat, introduces the year’s winners: Dr. Jeni McRay (Outstanding Online Course Award), Dr. Daniel Stramara (Outstanding Teacher Award), Brian Dye (Outstanding Technical Support Award), and Dr. Rebecca Gould (Jonathan Bacon Leadership Award). The award winners were nominated by their colleagues, and the awards went through a competitive process