Hypothesis for Blackboard Instructor Training
Social annotation is the activity of reading and thinking together. With hypothesis for Blackboard, instructors can ensure that their students are understanding the readings by annotating digital content socially. Imagine a group of your students opening a PDF or a webpage and being able to work together to make meaning of the reading, sharing their responses and ideas about the text or images, and annotating within the margins of the digitally assigned content.
Enroll in one or more engaging workshops that will introduce you to the power of hypothesis-driven learning in your courses. Discover exciting strategies for leveraging collaborative annotation, fostering student interaction, and ultimately enhancing your students’ academic achievements.
Thursday, August 24
9-10 a.m.
Professional Week Fall 2023: Roundtable Discussion: The Value of Social Annotation for Teaching and Learning
Join us for an enlightening conversation on how MC’s Hypothesis power users are utilizing digital social annotation to create a positive impact. This workshop aims to assist faculty members in identifying and exploring new ways to leverage the capabilities of Hypothesis.
During this session, the Hypothesis team will guide participants in exploring how collaborative annotation with Hypothesis can be effectively incorporated into their specific disciplines and teaching objectives.
Upon completion, participants will be able to:
- Gain a deeper understanding of how they can leverage collaborative annotation to enhance student success in their courses.
- Delve into how the faculty at Montgomery College has successfully integrated social annotation into their courses.
- Examine the advantages of utilizing social annotation as a teaching tool.
Thursday, August 24
5-6 p.m.
Professional Week Fall 2023: Empowering Students with Social Annotation
Adding hypothesis as an external tool to readings in Blackboard supports student success by placing active discussion on course readings, enabling students and instructors to add comments and start conversations in the margins of digital texts. This workshop is an excellent opportunity to learn about the potential of social annotation as a learning tool and discuss creative ways to increase engagement in your courses.
Attend this session to get everything you need to begin your implementation of hypothesis assignments. Create engaging and interactive reading assignments in Blackboard or expand your knowledge with the new ability to access Blackboard files and create student groups.
Upon completion, participants will be able to:
• Describe how to get started with hypothesis and feel comfortable creating a graded assignment.
• Create assignments that require students to read socially and make annotations or replies to other contributors.
• Gather some fun ideas for expanding the use of collaborative annotation to improve student success.
Friday, August 25
3:15-4 p.m.
Annotate Your Syllabus
Asking your class to annotate the syllabus allows you to introduce students to social annotation in a low-stakes way. Even better, you’re providing them with an opportunity to engage with the syllabus, share ideas, and ask questions about the course in a way that sets the tone for engagement throughout the term. In this workshop, participants will acquire ideas and guidance for creating a collaborative syllabus annotation assignment. During the workshop, participants will not only receive a comprehensive list of pedagogical best practices for collaborative annotation but will also actively engage in practical demonstrations of how to apply these principles using hypothesis with course readings in Blackboard.
Upon completion, participants will be able to:
- Create an assignment to annotate the syllabus as a low-stakes assignment to start the semester using hypothesis.
- Begin incorporating collaborative annotation into a course to improve student success.
Friday, September 1
1:30-2:15 p.m.
Leveraging Social Annotation in the Age of AI
The emergence of cutting-edge technologies, like ChatGPT, has sparked a critical conversation throughout the education industry. In this workshop, the Hypothesis team will show you how to leverage social annotation to encourage authentic, process-oriented engagement with your course materials. They will also share best practices for using social annotation with AI writing tools and demonstrate how to set up Hypothesis-enabled readings in Blackboard.
Upon completion, participants will be able to:
- Discuss how to work with ChatGPT output
- Walk away with concrete assignments to implement in your courses right away.
Monday, September 11
3-3:45 p.m.
Introduction to Hypothesis in Blackboard
In this workshop, we will share how instructors are using annotation-powered reading to help students develop foundational academic skills like deep reading and persuasive writing. In addition to sharing pedagogical best practices for social annotation, we will demonstrate how Hypothesis is used with course readings in Blackboard. Participants will gain a clear understanding of how to start incorporating social annotation into their courses to improve student outcomes.
By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:
- Explain the concept and benefits of social annotation through collaborative learning.
- Become familiar with the functionalities and features of the Hypothesis annotation tool.
- Create a hypothesis assignment in Blackboard.
- Begin annotating web pages, PDFs, and other online content effectively.
- Create clear, concise instructions to foster a constructive and positive annotation experience for students that meet unit or course objectives.
Tuesday, September 12
12:15-1 p.m.
Annotation and AI Starter Assignments
This workshop is ideal for instructors who are interested in using social annotation in their courses but aren’t exactly sure how to provide guidance to students. Participants will review ideas for annotation starter assignments and provide you with ready-to-use instructions for a variety of disciplines and modalities. It doesn’t matter if you’re teaching humanities, business, STEM, or the health professions, or if you’re teaching face-to-face or online — you’ll get strategies from this workshop that you can add immediately to an assignment in your course. In addition to sharing pedagogical best practices for collaborative annotation, participants will experience how hypothesis can be used with course readings in Blackboard.
By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:
- Create an assignment to annotate as a low-stakes assignment
- Begin incorporating collaborative annotation into a course to improve student success.
- Use ChatGPT to allow students to review and examine key course ideas in a critical way by analyzing the output.
Wednesday, September 13
12:15-1 p.m.
Using Hypothesis with Small Groups
When teaching a large class, it can be challenging to engage every student and ensure that no one feels invisible. Using Hypothesis for social annotation in small groups can help you make more meaningful and collaborative connections with your students. One of our most frequent requests is for the ability to segment large classes. This workshop focuses on the options for using hypothesis in small groups, and it will cover how social annotation can be used to create a more collaborative learning environment.
By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:
- Explain different use cases for using the Hypothesis small groups feature in their Blackboard course site.
- Create a Hypothesis-enabled reading in their Blackboard course site with small groups enabled.
Friday, September 15
3:15-4 p.m.
Grading and Feedback for Social Annotation
While there are multiple options for grading in Hypothesis, the importance of incentivizing participation cannot be overstated. To help spark interest in annotation, instructors need to provide clear guidelines that reward high-quality contributions. Social annotation lends the ideal format for assessing and promoting continuous learning, so join this session to gather ideas and tools to take your grading and feedback practices to the next level.
By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:
- Identify foundational components in creating either an analytic or holistic rubric for annotation, as well as establishing a framework for effective feedback.
Tuesday, September 19
6-7 p.m.
ELITE after Dark: Introduction to Social Annotation with Hypothesis
Introduction to Social Annotation with Hypothesis Gloria Barron None In this workshop, we will share how instructors are using annotation-powered reading to help students develop foundational academic skills like deep reading and persuasive writing. In addition to sharing pedagogical best practices for social annotation, we will demonstrate how Hypothesis is used with course readings in Blackboard. Participants will gain a clear understanding of how to start incorporating social annotation into their courses to improve student outcomes.By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:
- Explain the concept and benefits of social annotation through collaborative learning.
- List and describe the functionalities and features of the Hypothesis annotation tool.
- Create a hypothesis assignment in Blackboard.
- Begin annotating web pages, PDFs, and other online content effectively.
- Create clear, concise instructions to foster a constructive and positive annotation experience for students that meet unit or course objectives.
For more information about social annotation with hypothesis for Blackboard, send an email to: gloria.barron@montgomerycollege.edu
