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Center for Creative Instruction

Continue your journey.  We’ll help.

We support you!  Providing faculty and staff with teaching and technology help is what we do.  Please explore our site for tools and resources to help you in your professional development.  If you find you still have questions, contact us at cci@potsdam.edu to open a support ticket.  We’ll do our best to respond promptly and even schedule a follow-up meeting with you if needed.  If you’re interested in collaborative discussion, join the Creative Instructors Community team and post your thoughts and questions in the Professional Development and Brightspace channels (watch Joining a Microsoft Teams with a code – 01:16, code n9v5whd).

Come by each week and check out our Featured section.  We’ll post on important CCI news and highlight new functionality available on your favorite program or app. (Week 9 – 03/18/24)

*Want a reminder, sign-up and we’ll send you a Featured email each Monday.

Over the years Microsoft has enhanced the Edge browser with fantastic features and functionality. If you’re not using Edge, watch this short video to find out what you’re missing. From a built-in screen reader to a PDF annotation tool, you’ll be surprised at what you can do!

AI in Edge
Want to learn more about the “Chat GPT” functionality within the Microsoft Edge browser? Watch Ultimate Guide to Bing AI – 12:13 for a comprehensive tour of its awesome AI features. By the way, watch Top 10 features in Edge – 12:15 for a few more browser features you might like (Edge Drop/ Web OCR/Citation).

Posted on Week 8

Record in PowerPoint
With the recent additions, recording a video in Stream might be your best M365 option (see week 7). That said, if you’re recording a presentation, using the recording capabilities of PowerPoint might be the thing to do. Watch How to use the NEW PowerPoint slide recording feature – 04:05.

More PowerPoint Recording Features
While our M365 environment provides many fantastic tools, we don’t currently have a dedicated video editing app. Since PowerPoint records each slide separately (before exporting to video), recording a long presentation in PowerPoint is often the best option. If you make a mistake on a slide, you can re-record that slide and not have to record the entire presentation.
 
In addition to using the record feature to record the entire slide (with or without a webcam feed), you can instead record and embed video within a slide (watch Microsoft PowerPoint Recording Tips – 13:26 or PowerPoint for Mac - Record Your Presentations – 08:51). That video can be presented in Teams (watch Best Way to Present a Video in Teams Meeting – 01:35) or can be exported to video.

Posted on Week 7

Record in Stream
If you haven’t looked at Stream in a while, it’s time to check it out! Microsoft has been busy recreating the App in the SharePoint environment (Stream was originally a stand-alone site), and the recently updated features and functionality are great. Watch How to use Microsoft Stream | 8 new features – 12:04.

Coming Soon – Embedded Forms in Stream Videos
Not since we had Knowmia have we had the option of embedding a poll within a video. This Stream feature will soon be available to the campus (watch 6 Microsoft Forms new features for 2024 – 08:13).

More Recording Options
Visit the Record in M365 website for more ways to create video recordings using our campus tools (see More Resources on the CCI website). You’ll find resources like How to record a slide show in PowerPoint – 02:00 and How to use PowerPoint Cameo – 05:20.

Ed Tech Day 
After a 4-year hiatus, the Educational Technology Day returns to Ithaca College. You can attend this free in-person conference on Thursday, March 21, 2024. The conference will consist of a vendor showcase with 50+ regional and national technology vendors, college showcase, and dozens of seminars running from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on the Ithaca College campus. For more information, visit the conference website or you can register on the Ed Tech Day event site. 

Posted on Week 6

Brightspace – Special Access
When one of your students need alternate dates for an Assignment or Quiz, you can use the “Manage Special Access” feature (watch Brightspace - How To Set Up Special Access – 01:37).

Paper Please
If you’d like to see written instructions for “Special Access,” login to Brightspace and visit the How To Set Up Special Access page in the Brightspace Toolbox.

Posted on Week 5

Engage Participants in Teams
When running your online meeting, Teams provides a host of features that help you enhance engagement with your students or meeting participants. The Become the Best Microsoft Teams Meeting Host – 13:36 video covers many of those features and tools.

More on Teams
Please visit the Teams section of Tech Tools for a comprehensive list of training videos. The Teams section is organized to help you quickly find the topic you need, and the video titles are named to specifically express what you’ll learn by watching the video.

Posted on Week 4

Data Reports using AI
You’ve downloaded the data from your MS Form. Now what? If you’re not an EXCEL expert, you might think it will be hard to analyze the data or generate reports. Learn about the incredible AI features in EXCEL that will do all the heavy lifting in creating valuable charts, tables, and graphs from your data (watch Excel AI - data analysis made easy – 08:12).

Analyze Data with AI

As campus users, offices, and departments take advantage of MS Forms for data collection, effectively using M365 tools to analyze the data becomes more important. The following list of videos covers some tools within MS forms and other tools within Excel to “visualize” your data.

Posted on Week 3

Notification Flow for Forms
When someone fills out your MS Form, you want your group, office, or department to be notified. While the “Get email notification of each response” feature of MS Forms works for you, other members won’t get the email. Power Automate to the rescue! Learn how easy it is to create a notification flow for your forms (watch Notify a User when a Team (Group) Form is Submitted – 04:02).

Group/Department/Office Forms
If you are working in a department or office, creating a “group” form (one associated with a Team) is likely best. Team members need access to gathered data and using a “group” form ensures that the group will always have access (not true if the form was created on a departing/exiting individual’s account). That said, when you use group forms, there are a few things to consider. The “Get email notification of each response” feature in MS Forms doesn’t work, and when creating a Flow, the form can’t be selected for actions from drop-down lists (you have to manually add the form). Please watch the following videos for more information on group forms and flows.

Posted on Week 2

Outlook Scheduling Poll
Outlook offers you an easy way to schedule your next meeting! Use the “Scheduling Poll” feature to offer times to meeting attendees (works for on and off campus participants). This feature can even show you when campus participants are busy, so you can select times that are more likely to work. So much better than the back and forth of scheduling by email, take advantage of this great M365 tool (watch How to Use Scheduling Polls in Microsoft Outlook – 08:11).

More on Scheduling Poll
You can also use the Scheduling Poll in the Outlook calendar (watch Schedule Like a Pro from 09:50-12:30) to start the poll process. If an emails sparks the need for a face-to face discussion, you can reply to an email with a poll (watch Create a Meeting with Reply All in Outlook – 00:57). With the email open, add a Scheduling Poll if needed.

Bookings with Me in Outlook
Do you need students to sign up for office hours? Advising? Coaching? Projects? Outlook now allows you to offer appointment times others can book to meet with you. By sharing your personal Bookings with Me webpage, a student or colleague needing to meet with you can schedule an in-person or virtual meeting linked to your Outlook calendar. You control the times and availability, and the scheduled meeting is automatically added to both calendars! Watch Bookings with Me in Outlook – 02:53 for a complete overview of this great new feature.

Posted on Week 1

Meet App in Teams
Where is that meeting recording? With all the different types of Teams meetings, it can be difficult to remember where to go to find the recorded video. The new “Meet” app has got you covered (watch Meet in Teams – 02:04). Not only will it provide quick access to recent meetings, it also provides shortcuts to your upcoming meetings. Quick, easy, and useful, add Meet to Teams today!

Ed Tech Day 
After a 4-year hiatus, the Educational Technology Day returns to Ithaca College. You can attend this free in-person conference on Thursday, March 21, 2024. The conference will consist of a vendor showcase with 50+ regional and national technology vendors, college showcase, and dozens of seminars running from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on the Ithaca College campus. For more information, visit the conference website or you can register on the Ed Tech Day event site. 

Brightspace- Find How-to guides and resources on Brightspace (used to deliver course content and instruction).

Record in M365: Find a complete guide to recording in Teams, Stream, and PowerPoint and sharing with OneDrive.

Base Camp- Find step-by-step guidance on what to learn first if you’re just starting to use technology.

Accessibility- Find resources and tools to help you create accessible content and courses.

Professional Development Form- Select a PD session (from a list of offerings) for your department’s next meet.

Mission & Goals

The mission and goals of each administrative unit have been compiled into one document. View Mission & Goals (PDF).