ID Showcase – Honors 37W and ChatGPT

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A ChatGPT Experiment in Honors 37W

This showcase is an extension of an earlier talk Laurel Westrup gave as part of the Spring 2023 “AI in Action” event. It will focus on a specific use of ChatGPT in a Spring 2023 Honors Collegium Writing II course, “Sampling and Remix: The Aesthetics and Politics of Cultural Appropriation.”

Honors 37W, which focuses on cultural borrowing of many kinds, was an apt forum for discussion of generative artificial intelligence (Gen-AI) and large language models (LLMs) that draw on borrowed sources in order to create text. The instructor re-designed a staple course assignment to provide students an opportunity to try out and reflect on co-writing with a chatbot. The showcase will:

  • Provide context and a rationale for this particular use of ChatGPT
  • Discuss the assignment design
  • Review student responses to the assignment
  • Offer some thoughts on integrating ChatGPT into our courses based on this experiment 

Presenter Bio

Laurel Westrup is a Continuing Lecturer with Writing Programs and the Honors Program and the Coordinator of the Graduate Certificate in Writing Pedagogy (GCWP). She teaches courses across Writing Programs’ curriculum, from first-year composition and Writing II to upper division courses in the Professional Writing Minor, and she also teaches graduate pedagogy courses with the GCWP. She received a UCLA Distinguished Teaching Award in 2023.

ID Showcase – English Composition 2

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English Composition 2 – Approaches to University Writing | Meta-Narrative and the Narrative Self

ENGComp2 Homepage

In this course showcase session, Shane Crosby will share his experiences, the pros and cons, of using a variety of Bruin Learn tools to actively engage undergraduate students in the content of a first-year composition course.

This showcase demonstrates how the instructor uses Bruin Learn to actively engage undergraduate students in a first-year composition course. Several essential Bruin Learn tools and features, such as homepage, modules, assignments, and gradebook, are discussed. The exploration of different tool settings throughout the course design process with the support of the Bruin Learn Center of Excellence is shared.

The tools reviewed include:

  • Home Page
    • Attendance, ebook integration, syllabi, course notification settings
    • eBook integration: They Say, I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing
  • Modules
    • Organization
    • The “getting started” / Course Resource module
    • Lock Until | prerequisites | requirements
    • New feature: dropdown arrow options
    • Creating all assignments from within the Modules(?)
  • Assignments
    • Creating grading rules
  • Grades / Gradebook Settings
    • When to make it available, pros and cons, likes and dislikes
    • Late submission policy considerations
    • Grade posting considerations
    • Advanced feature settings

Presenter Bio

Shane Crosby is a Continuing Lecturer in Writing Programs at UCLA. He completed his BA at UCLA, MA in Special Education at Clark Atlanta University, PhD in Special Education at Georgia State University, and his MFA degree at UC Irvine.

This ID Showcase is a collaboration between the UCLA Teaching and Learning Center and the Bruin Learn Center of Excellence.

ID Showcase – Ally – The Accessibility Tool

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Ally – The Accessibility Tool


Ally works to make course content accessible. It checks for accessibility issues and generates alternative formats, guides instructors on how to improve their course content, and provides institutional-wide reporting on content accessibility.
This showcase presented:

  • What Ally is
  • How students can use the tool to improve the accessibility of documents
  • How faculty can use the Ally tool remediate documents and
  • How the Ally tool can bring higher awareness to the accessibility needs of students with disabilities
  • Examples of using Ally in Bruin Learn to make course materials more accessible

Resources:

  • This Ally showcase session was presented by Travis Lee and Disabilities Computing Program team.
    Questions and Answers collected during the presentation: Instructional Design Showcase Questions
    Presented: Thursday, September 29, 2022

Instructional Design Showcase

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Instructional Design Showcase

The UCLA Teaching and Learning Center instructional designers work with faculty, librarians, software companies, and others to showcase interesting courses and uses of instructional technologies. Through these showcases, we:

  • Celebrate the faculty’s teaching and design efforts in their courses,
  • Share examples of innovative course design to enhance teaching and learning,
  • Address pedagogical approaches and strategies in various courses and disciplines, and
  • Highlight features of the Bruin Learn platform and other technologies. 

The TLC often collaborates closely with the Bruin Learn Center of Excellence and other campus partners to bring these showcases to the UCLA community.

A ChatGPT Experiment in Honors 37W (Sampling and Remix: The Aesthetics and Politics of Cultural Appropriation)

This showcase focuses on a specific use of ChatGPT in a Spring 2023 Honors Collegium Writing II course. Through the presentation, the instructor shares how students tried out and reflected on co-writing with a chatbot. The instructor also provides context and a rationale for this particular use of ChatGPT. More…

ENGComp2 Homepage

English Composition 2 – Approaches to University Writing | Meta-Narrative and the Narrative Self

This showcase demonstrates how the instructor uses Bruin Learn to actively engage undergraduate students in a first-year composition course. This showcase demonstrates how the instructor uses Bruin Learn to actively engage undergraduate students in a first-year composition course. Several essential Bruin Learn tools and features, such as homepage, modules, assignments, and gradebook, are discussed. More…

Using Slack to Build an Equitable and Diverse Learning Community in Education

This showcase demonstrates how the instructor uses Slack in undergraduate courses to engage and welcome students, streamline communication, and conduct formative assessments. Several possible pedagogical uses of Slack will be shared and discussed, including: community building; shared course FAQs; TA communication; making students’ thinking accessible to their peers; “Slack Hands” (a strategy for more inclusive participation); and collaborative study guide for quizzes. More…

Scandinavian Studies 60 – Introduction to Nordic Cinema

This showcase demonstrates how the instructor transforms students’ in-person learning experience to asynchronous online. By adopting different learning strategies and approaches, the instructor introduces blogging, podcasting, and peer review to students to encourage their participation and fosters an active learning environment. The informal discussions that increased in the podcasting activities allow students to engage deeply with the content and also interact more with their peers. Several features of Bruin Learn, such as modules, discussion, pages, have also been used and designed to welcome students in this asynchronous Nordic Cinema class. More…

SCAND 60 course screenshot
CLUSTER M71A course screenshot

Engaging STEM Students with Perusall – Cluster M71 and Soc Gen M144

This showcase demonstrates how the instructor selected and integrated Perusall as one of the engagement solutions in two different Biology and Society courses. The two courses are different in many ways, one is a large general education course, and the other is an upper division elective in the Human Biology and Society major, but both are benefited from using Perusal to encourage collaborative learning and enhance students’ critical thinking. More…

Islamic Studies M20 – Introduction to Islam

This showcase demonstrates how the instructor and TAs have applied different design approaches to build the Introduction to Islam course in Bruin Learn and adopted a few educational technology tools to bring an immersive learning environment to students. More…

Islamic Studies M20 course sceeenshot

Hypothesis – A Social Annotation Tool

This showcase demonstrates the set-up, ideas, and pedagogical strategies of using Hypothesis, a social annotation tool, for different subjects and modalities. UCLA Professor of Urban Planning, Adam Millard-Ball will informally discuss how he implements Hypothesis for social reading assignments in his courses. More…

Public Health Nursing Bruin Learn page

Nursing 171 – Public Health Nursing

This showcase demonstrates how Prof. Wiley uses several features and tools in Bruin Learn and digital portfolios in support of the competency-based curriculum design in N171 – Public Health Nursing. More…

Mathematics 32A – Calculus of Several Variables

This showcase demonstrates how Prof. Richard Wong uses Bruin Learn and other educational technology tools to establish an interactive and collaborative teaching and learning environment for MATH 32A – Calculus of Several Variables. More…

Math 32A Bruin Learn page
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Geography 5 – People and Earth’s Ecosystems

This showcase demonstrates how Prof. Kyle Cavanaugh uses UCLA’s Bruin Learn course template and CidiLab’s Design Tools to redesign his Geography 5 course, including organizing the syllabus and module pages. More…

iClicker & iClicker Cloud – Students’ Response System and Polling Tool

The iClicker & iClicker Cloud showcase provided a quick product overview and examples of how instructors use iClicker before, during, and after class. More …

Ally – The Accessibility Tool

The Ally service in Bruin Learn checks for accessibility issues and generates alternative formats, guides instructors on how to improve their course content, and provides institutional-wide reporting on content accessibility. More …

Leganto – Course Reading List

The UCLA Library uses the Leganto platform to help faculty manage Course Reading List in Bruin Learn. Course reading lists allow UCLA instructors to incorporate up-to-date links to Library resources and easily compile other freely available online resources into their courses. More …

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German 1 – Elementary German

This showcase demonstrates how Prof. Magdalena Tarnawska Senel successfully applied Universal Design for Learning principles in the course design and created several student “Action & Expression” activities in Bruin Learn. More …

Digital Humanities 101 – Introduction to Digital Humanities

Prof. Ashley Sanders covers a variety of digital tools and approaches to organize, explore, understand, present, and tell stories with data in her DH101 course. More …

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Digital Humanities 150 – Pirates of the Mediterranean through Text Analysis

Prof. Ashley Sanders uses text analysis to study the fascinating history of Pirates of the Mediterranean in DH150. She also uses Leganto, the Library’s Course Reading List tool. More …

Liberating Structure: Scaffolding Digital Project Integration with Bruin Learn

Presenters shared the experience of course development and re-design that includes curated content collections, methods of inquiry, and digital project work, using an innovative curriculum template in Bruin Learn. More …

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Sociology 1 – Introductory Sociology

Prof. Jessica Collet integrated various course design solutions in Sociology 1 to provide students with different types of interactions with course materials, lectures, and chances to communicate with peers. More …

Statistics 100A – Introduction to Probability

Prof. Juana Sanchez implemented various pedagogical strategies to increase communication opportunities and engage students in her Statistics 100A course. More …

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Instructional Design

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Instructional Design

What is Instructional Design?

Simply put, instructional design is the creation of instructional materials. Though this field goes beyond simply creating teaching materials, it carefully considers how students learn and what materials and methods will most effectively help individuals achieve their academic goals. The principles of instructional design consider how educational tools should be designed, created and delivered to any learning group, from grade school students to adult employees across all industry sectors. (From Purdue Online)

UCLA Online Teaching and Learning’s instructional design team provides campus faculty and academic leaders with the experience, knowledge, and support to incorporate educational technologies into courses. This can take the form of individual consultations, public workshops, and other sessions in promoting and advising on the use of existing, experimental, and new technologies.

Consulting with an instructional designer (ID) might save you a lot of work and time in creating your course or program. An ID can advise and assist you with these considerations and more. For online instructional design support, please reach out to us at contact@online.ucla.edu or submit the form using the button below. Both the email and the form are sent to the same location, so use either method and we will get back to you as soon as we can!

Ask Us About Instructional Design

Help With Instructional Design

Moving online requires a fresh mindset. Here are some starting points to help you imagine and prepare for a new way of teaching.

You will need to set up a clearly organized online course site, with a consistent sequence of resources, learning activities, and assignments in each section, week, or topic.

Be prepared to calendarize regular times to go into your course site and quickly browse through posts, work completion, and materials. When the course is underway, you and your TA should plan to come into your course site at least once a day to curate and maintain the course site.

Set and maintain some boundaries for yourself. State explicitly:

  • your guaranteed email turn-around time,
  • when you are available and when you won’t be responding to messages, and
  • a set of Help Tips that triage students to the right people or resources, depending on the issue.

Communication: How will students receive course content, news, deadlines, and announcements? Everything needs to be communicated in writing and/or by video:

  • instructor videos (formal lectures, informal messages),
  • text (announcements, instructions, prompts, rubrics, feedback), and
  • images, graphics, visuals.

Encourage your students to communicate clearly, be organized, self-disciplined, and successful. When you model those qualities, they will lean into the experience too.  Note that student success or failure in remote and online courses is not your personal responsibility, but you can create the conditions for satisfactory and, indeed, outstanding achievement online.

Student interaction and collaboration: Successful remote and online courses are characterized by carefully structured group work, active learning and student engagement in activities and projects that rely on group work, self- and peer assessment.

How much time will it take?  Planning and creating an online course requires a lot of upfront time. However, time spent on careful design and production will save you time when you prepare to offer the course a second time and beyond. Designing a durable, fully online course from scratch can take anywhere from 3-12 months, depending on your prioritization and commitment, and the resources and support available to you.  We recommend you start early!  As you look ahead consider too the course launch date and the course approval deadlines.  Work backwards to plan a work timeline (approvals, design and production goals).

Support & resources: Time equals money, so will you need time release? Will you require a student to help you – perhaps a GSR who knows the learning management system and can assist with collecting resources, course site “build” and testing?  Other costs may include studio time, equipment, software, and graphic design.

At UCLA you have at your disposal instructional designers, media production specialists, educational technologists, Writing Program support and consulting services, and outstanding Library colleagues and resources. Seek out a colleague in your department who can support you and offer feedback on your design and course site.

Resources