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Information Technology Services at The University of Iowa

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New features in the latest version of ICON

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What's New in ICON?

In addition to an improved an interface throughout ICON, the latest installment of ICON includes the enhancements and capabilities not available in version 8.1:

Calendar Tool

  • Users can share events with other users, groups, sections, or courses.
  • Users can access public calendars.
  • The Calendar tool can integrate with Quizzes, Discussions, Content, Surveys, and Course Offering information.
  • You can import and export events in iCal and CSV formats.
  • You can customize display options.
  • You can create and edit repeating events.
  • You can search public and private events.

Chat Tool

  • You no longer need to refresh the page to get new messages.
  • You can change whether messages display from newest to oldest or vice versa.
  • You can have the Chat tool show only new messages instead of all messages in a session.
  • You can search for a chat by title, description and type (personal or general).
  • The improved interface improves navigation.

Checklist Tool

  • Instructors can edit multiple checklist items simultaneously.

Classlist Tool

  • You can control which tabs Classlist displays on the Classlist page. Choose one tab with all roles or separate tabs.
  • You can search by role, flagged users, online status, locked accounts, and last login date.
  • You can print a list of all the users on any one of the tabs in Classlist.
  • You can print a list of selected users.
  • You can select multiple users to create group emails or send pages.
  • From the Classlist, you can now view users' blogs and group enrollments.
  • You can track progress for users in Checklists and Surveys.
  • You can track progress for one course and one tool at a time.
  • You can print a report for a user for multiple tools.

Note: Groups is now a separate tool (see below).

Content Tool

  • Users can now expand and collapse modules and sub-modules in the content map. The system remembers the map's state for each user.
  • Instructors can display any webpage to students when they access the Content tool (e.g., the page could present a syllabus, highlight specific content, or outline weekly tasks).
  • Interaction with SCORM content has been improved to be easier for users and provide better support for resuming activities and navigating within SCORMs.
  • Instructors can view student feedback on content topics.
  • The system tracks which topics each learner has accessed and how long they spend on each topic and makes these statistics available to instructors.
  • Instructors can edit multiple topics and modules simultaneously.

Discussions Tool

  • Discussion topics can linked to the grades tool.
  • Instructors can specify how topic scores are calculated, and they can control when scores are released to the gradebook and displayed to students.
  • Instructors can link competency activities to discussion topics and use rubrics to evaluate students.
  • Participants can rate messages on a scale from one to five stars, view average message ratings, and use average ratings to sort and filter messages.
  • Instructors can see aggregate ratings for forums, topics and users.
  • Instructors can lock discussion forums and topics, allowing participants to continue to access a topic while preventing them from posting new messages or modifying existing ones.
  • Topics and forums can be locked manually or be made available in a certain date range.
  • Participants can view the full text of all messages on a single page.
  • Instructors can move and copy messages between topics.
  • The My Courses widget on the My Home page shows the number of unread discussion messages for each course a user is enrolled in (for all users).

Dropbox Tool

  • Instructors can create dropbox folders for groups, allowing them to view files submitted by group members in a single location.
  • Instructors can evaluate a group as a whole using a grade item or a rubric associated with a competency activity.
  • Students can submit files directly from their personal locker or a group locker.
  • Instructors can preview how a folder looks from a student's perspective, submit a file, assess the preview submission, and view feedback.
  • Instructors can edit multiple dropbox folders and categories simultaneously.

Gradebook Tool

  • Spreadsheet-style interface allows instructors to enter grades for all students and all grade items from a single page.
  • The gradebook creates new grade items based on columns in imported files &emdash; no need to create gradebook items before importing.
  • Instructors can create competency activities based on grade items. Grade item activities can be evaluated automatically based on a student's grade value or manually using a rubric.
  • Instructors can use a step-by-step wizard to configure the grade book.
  • Instructors can edit multiple grade items or categories simultaneously.
  • Instructors can email students directly from the grade book.
  • The student view of the grade book has been redesigned.
  • Instructors have additional options for what students see when viewing their grades.

Groups Tool

  • Instructors can create shared lockers, dropbox folders, and discussion topics for groups.
  • Workspace creation is integrated into the group setup page.
  • A new student view provides a central place for students to see their groups, to contact group members, to access discussions, lockers, and dropbox folders, and sign up for self-enrollment in groups, depending on the group type.
  • When a group is configured for automatic enrollment, instructors can (optionally) automatically enroll new participants who join the course after the group is created.

Homepage Management

  • Org units (courses) can be forced to use a specific homepage.
  • Homepages can be shared among org units (courses).

HTML Editor

  • The HTML Edit is no longer a pop-up.
  • Spellchecking displays errors inline rather than in a separate window.
  • You can click and drag to resize the editing field.
  • The HTML Editor is more accessible, with new key commands.

Locker Tool

  • Instructors can create shared lockers for groups.
  • Users can now create folders and subfolders to keep their files organized, and can move files between different folders.
  • Users can edit properties of multiple files simultaneously.
  • Users can delete multiple files and folders simultaneously.
  • Users can select one or more files to download as a compressed zip file.
  • Users can search for files across all folders in a locker using a range of advanced search options.

Widget Management

  • There are more ways to customize widgets.
  • The My Courses widget shows updates to all courses a user is enrolled in, including unread discussion messages, ungraded quiz attempts, and Dropbox submissions.
16 July 2008

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