Prince George's Community College



Obtaining the SoftChalk Software and License

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SoftChalk is a program that allows you to create web pages full of engaging activities, multimedia, and quizzes. To work in SoftChalk, you do not need programming skills, as the interface is very easy to use. The software has engines for games and activities into which you can plug in your content, and you can easily integrate multi-media components into your lessons. In addition, SoftChalk creates a navigational interface that students can immediately understand. You can upload SoftChalk files to Blackboard with a click of a button and integrate their quizzes into the Blackboard Grade Center. If you are interested in providing mobile access to your course materials, SoftChalk is also developing a mobile strategy where learners can access a file through multiple platforms.

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The college provides SoftChalk to its employees for free. Let’s first review how to obtain your copy of Softchalk. First, click on elearning from the Quicklinks menu on the PGCC home page. Click eFaculty resources, then choose Blackboard Tools. Click the SoftChalk link. Here you will find a great deal of information about SoftChalk that you can access later. Let’s scroll down to How Do I Get This Software? Clicking on the link will take you to the PGCC Portal. Sign in, then find the Download Softchalk link under “Home or College Use.” Copy the License Name and License key and put them in a Word doc—you’ll use this information once you’ve downloaded the program. Then choose whichever download is appropriate for the computer on which you are working.

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Once you have downloaded and run the SoftChalk executable file, open SoftChalk and go to the Help menu. Choose Enter License, then cut and paste the license information you got previously from the portal page. Fill out your information, then click OK. You’re now ready to start working in SoftChalk!

Getting Started: Text and Templates

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When you open up the SoftChalk program, you’ll encounter a blank space. Don’t let that intimidate you! Right on the interface are your basic ways to add and modify text—first we’ll add a title, then modify the text. Imagine I’m teaching a module on John Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost. I’ll simply type in Exploring Paradise Lost, then select it. I will use the drop down meaning to make it a header. You can see that you have three header options, and I want to choose Header 1. Then I want to center the title, so I simply click the center text button.

Now I want to add an image underneath the title, so I will click on the Add Image button and find the image on my desktop. As you can see, you have options to alter the image—most useful is adding a border—and you can resize the image if it’s gargantuan. But I find it easier to size my image in another program before uploading it. So I’ll just add the image. I’ll also add a little text.

You can always go back and edit the image if, for example, you think the image is too big or you want to add a border. You can right click and choose Modify Image to return to the menu.

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We will save the file, then review it online. You will always have to save your file before reviewing it online. Let’s look briefly at the way SoftChalk saves your files. If you’ve ever created a website, you know that you have to be very careful about organizing your folders. One of SoftChalk’s features is that it organizes the material for you. When you create an activity in SoftChalk, the program will automatically create a file for that activity. When you add an image, SoftChalk will save a copy in its file folders.

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Now let’s preview our file in the browser by clicking on the preview button.

What we have is not very exciting, just black text and an image on a white background. What a snooze. Let’s jazz it up by adding a style, essentially customizing the SoftChalk course to satisfy your personal aesthetics.

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First, click on Tools and select Style Builder. If you choose the Personal Styles drop down menu, you will see premade templates available for use. In this example, you’ll also see templates I’ve constructed for different projects, which we’ll ignore for now. Let’s choose a template. Since I’m dealing with Lucifer and fallen angels in this lesson, I want something bold, so I’m going with Flames. You get a preview of the template in the window. Let’s save this style as “Paradise Lost.” Now we need to go to Style Properties and choose our new style. Let’s check out our new style.

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Let’s say you’re not crazy about the color of the title text. You want to make the text darker so it will show up better. So let’s click on Style Builder again. Here you will find a number of tabs where you can changes various features of your template. The window grays out the features that you can’t change on this tab, while leaving the editable features in their full splendor. On the first tab, you can edit the banner and the navigation bar. Let’s not mess with that right now. On the second tab, you can edit the content area. Let’s change the the color of the heading text. Once you click Save and Close, you’ll see the changes reflected in your file. I’m going to add a line break to our file—the changes won’t show up in preview mode unless you make a change to your file (other than to the style template). Now the text color will show red when you preview your file.

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Now let’s add a title to our Style. Let’s imagine that the PGCC course is: EGL 2010 British Literature from the Anglo-Saxon Period Through the 18th Century.

To add the title, go to Style Properties and go to the Title and Layout tab. Then you can add your title and subtitle.

Again, if you want to make changes to the banner, you have to go to Style Builder. I want the title text to be red, so I click the Banner Text button and choose a red to match the text title in the Content portion. Then save and preview. If you decide that you’ve made a mistake, you have to go back to Style Builder and choose a different color.

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Okay, let’s add one more thing to our template. I want the picture I’ve already added to my first page to appear on the banner. So I go back to Style Builder, navigate to the Banner Tab, and select the Logo check box. Click Choose and find your image. Then click Save and Close. Let’s review the banner. The image is way too big. So what should I do? Well, you may need to futz around with image size when working with the banner. I’m going to open up my original image and resize it in Windows Picture Manager, then try it again.

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You may not be used to working with images, so let’s see how to do some down-and-dirty editing in Picture Manager. Obviously, you could open the image up with Photoshop or GIMP or IrfanView or any other more sophisticated image editing program. But Picture Manager is readily available and adequate for quick fixes.

Right click on your image, then choose Open With Windows Picture Manager. The Resize function is located under Picture. A editing menu appears that allows you to resize to a specific size or a percentage of the original. Let’s just choose 50% and see what happens. Save it under a different file name, then use that image for your banner.

Now I'm going to show you a banner with an image at 50%, at 75%, and then an example of a banner that I did with a horizontal image rather than a vertical image. At 50%, well, now the image is too small and we've lost too much detail. (remember, when you resize images, you may lose too much detail). That’s just the nature of the beast.

I’ve intentionally made the image too small and too blurry to make a point. You may have to mess around with your images to get your banner exactly the way you want it. When you add images to the Content Area of SoftChalk, you can easily edit the size of the image. Not so with the Banner. When I change the image to 75%, it works better. However, I’m still not crazy about the image on the banner, so I’m going to add a predominately horizontal image instead. You should really think about the shape of your images when creating your banner.

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Now let’s return to our content area. I want to add two new headings—Lesson Objectives and Introduction. Notice I’ve made them both Level 2 headings. Then we’ll add a page break (we can always come back later and fill in this information). To add a page break easily, right click and choose page break. Alternately, you can go to the Insert menu and choose Page Break.

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Let’s look at how this affects the look of course online. Notice that you now have a sidebar that displays hyperlinks to the titles you’ve added. Softchalk does this automatically. This provides your students with an easy way to jump to items on your page. You’ll also see that the Navigation Bar has two pages now—this is an easy way for students to navigate between pages. They can also click Next Page at the bottom of the screen to move sequentially through the lesson. Oops! Look at how the yellow links are nearly invisible! Let’s fix that. Do you remember how? That’s right. Go to StyleBuilder and navigate to the Content tab. Then choose a color that your students can actually see!

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You can also edit the Sidebar in the Style Builder if you now think, for example, that all that red would drive your students crazy. How about a nice neutral grey with black letters?

Nah, not so good. Of course, you can fiddle around with the color scheme for hours, if you are so inclined. Just remember that, while SoftChalk gives you a lot of options, you don’t have as much control over layout as you would working in an html editor or writing your own code. There is a tradeoff involved—to get ease of use, you must sacrifice some creative control.

Adding MultiMedia

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SoftChalk allows you to include multi-media elements in your lessons. You can easily link or embed video or audio files, as well as insert audio into certain activities. Naturally, one of the most useful sites for instructors is YouTube.

Let’s add a YouTube video to our SoftChalk file. I’ve found a movie where Sir John Gielgud recites Milton, and I want to avoid torturing my students with my own acting. First, I’ll copy the embed link from YouTube.

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Within SoftChalk, choose Insert/Widget. Give your widget a name, then paste in the html code from YouTube. Then click OK.

Now let’s save and preview. You must keep in mind that learners must be online for the video to play since the video is being streamed from the YouTube website.

Don’t try to add YouTube videos through the Insert > Media menu. It won’t work. This is confusing, to be sure, but just remember that YouTube requires a widget.

Hyperlink/Audio

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I have found a website that has streaming audio of Paradise Lost, so I want to add a hyperlink to this site so my students can listen to the poem. I could download one of the audio files and insert that file into SoftChalk, but audio files are very big and I don’t want to cause SoftChalk to run slow. Better to link to the site and give your students some instructions on what to do when they get to the linked site.

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To add a hyperlink to text, you can choose the text, right click, then go to Other > Hyperlink. Then you can add your link. You can make an image a hyperlink by right clicking on the image and selecting Insert hyperlink.

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If you have an audio file you want to embed, you can also choose Insert > Media, then choose Audio. Find your file and click. OK. You’ll see that a sound icon appears. Learners will click on the icon to listen to the audio file. Remember, however, that sound files can be very large, so avoid packing your course with multiple big sound files. Embedding all the audio files for Paradise Lost would wreak havoc on your course’s playability—and also swell the size of your SoftChalk course if it’s uploaded into Blackboard or your web account. That’s something to be avoided.

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That little sound button is not, however, very pleasing to look at. Imagine if your lesson were populated by hundreds of ugly little sound buttons. But you aren’t stuck with that format. You can also use an image as a button to launch the audio. I’ve inserted an image that I want to employ as an audio button. Now I add my audio file to the URL or Selected File box and click OK. Then I give some instructions—you should always make sure that your audience knows what to do. They won’t automatically click the image unless you tell them to click the image.

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Finally, you can add other media files through the same menu. For example, if you have taken screen captures with an application like Jing and created a movie, you can upload it here.

Adding Text Poppers

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SoftChalk allows you to create popups that appear when learners roll over a text. These are called “text poppers.” They are great for creating interesting “annotated” texts. In my Milton course, I might use a text popper to create an annotated poem, where the difficult allusions are illustrated by text and images. As you can see, when the highlighted word is scrolled over, image and text appear.

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To create a text popper, select text and either choose Insert > Text Popper or right click and choose Text Popper. I’m going to add a text popper explaining “Miter’d” in the poem. I will use the top box to add the name we’re defining, and the bottom area for our text definition. What is really cool is the ability to add an image. To do so, right click when you are inside the bottom area and choose Image (this functionality is a little hidden, unfortunately). On the popup menu, find and upload your image. Then we’ll save and preview.

Now we’ll see how the text popper appears online. You’ll need to save all activities and preview them in your browser. If your file is pretty big, this may take a while, so be patient. If your file is very big, then go make yourself a cup of coffee. The time it takes to save can be frustrating.

When we roll over the text, our text popper appears. I may want to resize the image in pop-up—it’s pretty big on the page. To do so I’d go back to SoftChalk and right click on “mitre’d” and choose Modify Text Popper.

Next Camus, reverend Sire, went footing slow,

His Mantle hairy, and his Bonnet sedge,

Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge [ 105 ]

Like to that sanguine flower inscrib'd with woe.

Ah! Who hath reft (quoth he) my dearest pledge?

Last came, and last did go,

The Pilot of the Galilean lake,

Two massy Keyes he bore of metals twain,

(The Golden opes, the Iron shuts amain)

He shook his Miter'd locks, and stern bespake,

How well could I have spar'd for thee young swain,…

Camus. Personification of the river Cam, which runs through Cambridge. This personification draws comparisons to Virgil's personification of Mincius, the river that runs through his home town.

sanquine flower. The Hyacinth. Apollo made this flower from the blood of his beloved Hyacinthus, whom he accidentally killed. The story is in Ovid's Metamorphoses 10.214-16.

The Pilot. It is commonly accepted that this refers to St. Peter, to whom Christ gave "the keys of the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 16:19). Peter's first meeting with Jesus is told in Luke 5:2-4.

Miter'd. A miter is a liturgical headress worn by bishops.

Creating a Quiz Popper

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SoftChalk allows you to create quizzes, which can be integrated into Blackboard. The question types are pretty standard—multiple choice, multiple response, true/false, short answer, essay, ordering, and matching. Let’s first look at how to create a multiple choice question.

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Choose Insert > Quiz Popper > Multiple Choice. Adding the question and the choices is pretty straightforward. My only advice is, if you are cutting and pasting content you’ve already written, do not copy directly from Word. Instead, paste the content into Notepad, then cut and paste into SoftChalk. Word contains a great deal of obtrusive code that’s hard to get rid of. So I’m just going to cut and paste my content from Notepad into SoftChalk.

Who wrote that "The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he wrote of Angels & God, and at liberty when of Devils & Hell, is because he was a true Poet and of the Devil's party without knowing it."

William Blake

William Gladstone

William Butler Yeats

William Wordsworth

William the Conqueror

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The SoftChalk engine also gives you the opportunity to provide detailed feedback, offer hints, assign points, and determine how the quiz will appear online. You can also create a “test bank” of sorts by saving questions to your library, then adding them to quiz groups. To save a quiz question—or an image—to the library, you simply right click and choose Save to Library. Under Tools, you can then choose the question you want to add and then insert it into your lesson.

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You can also create Quiz Groups. This bundles individual quiz questions together. To do so, you click on Insert > Quiz Group. This brings up a menu that allows you to create your question from scratch or import your questions from the library. Let’s look at the latter. You simply choose Get Questions from Library, choose your question, then click Insert to Quiz Group. Then you can repeat this process until your Quiz Group is constructed.

Adding Activities

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Perhaps the coolest thing about SoftChalk is its ability to create activities. SoftChalk enables you to create more than a dozen distinct activity types that play on PCs, and a number of activities that will play on mobile devices that do not run Flash. The selection of mobile activities is currently limited, but I anticipate that will change as mobile strategies become more important. Let’s first look at the range of activities in SoftChalk—I’ve built examples of the activities. Once you’ve seen the activities, you can then work on building them yourself.

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Most of the activities are easy to create. For example, all you really need to do to create a crossword puzzle is have a list of words and a list of clues to plug into the engine. The software does the rest for you. You basically do the same for a drag-and-drop activity as well. You just provide the matching pairs. In Seek a Word, you just add words that will be inserted into the puzzle grid. However, there are a handful of activities that are a little more complex, so we’ll examine how to put those together.

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Let’s take a look at the Hot Spot activity. The Hot Spot basically displays a pop-up with text or text within a text box whenever the user rolls over a particular spot on the computer screen. To create a Hot Spot activity, choose Insert >Activity > Hot Spot. Then choose an image—this activity is image based. I want to do a Hot Spot where students can click on a level in the hierarchy of angels and see a definition of the corresponding angelic beings. First, notice that this activity can be either set as a quiz or as exploration. I just want learners to engage interactively with the material, so I leave it as “explore.” You will “paint” the Hot Spot area with the color that appears on the screen. The easiest way to do this is to choose the pencil, then mark the area you want. If you make a mistake, you can use the eraser or start over by clicking Clear. For square geometric areas, you may want to use the Polygon tool, where you left-click to create a point that attaches to the next point and creates the Hot Spot. Now add your text.

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Let’s review our activity. Notice that our text takes up almost the whole text box. You have to be aware of your size limitations in this activity. Each of the different shapes has a different amount of text that can be displayed. The large text box can display the most, but unfortunately that option puts the text far away from the actual hot spot, which is very detrimental to its functionality (the association between the image part and the text is not well reinforced, in my opinion). When you’re done, click Next. You are now ready to create another HotSpot with a new color.

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When you’re done, your image will be covered with different colored areas. Be aware that the colors don’t show up on the image. They are merely to show you clearly where the existing Hot Spots are. You’ll also have noticed that the text in my image is too small to read. That’s because the amount of space for your image is determined by SoftChalk, and the space won’t expand to fit your image size. My original image was too big. This can be frustrating—I would have to live with the fuzziness, create a new image, or find another image that was closer to SoftChalk’s default size. Text is always a problem when messing with picture size and resolution, so I’d recommend that you stick with images that don’t contain text.

Cherubim

Cherubim are guardians of Paradise, bearers of God’s throne, and winged creatures of fire. They are frequent ornaments in the temple.

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Of all the activity types in SoftChalk, I maybe like Labeling the best. It is simple, yet elegant, and it clearly benefits the student. Students drag the labels and drop them into place. If they choose wrong, the labels won’t “stick” and they bounce back. That’s a pretty effective feedback mechanism.

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Let’s build a Labeling activity. So choose Insert > Activity > Labeling. Then navigate to the image you want to use. Then add a label—we’ll add one here as an example. Click Add to List, then choose Place Labels. You can grab on to the handle and to the label itself to move the label to the proper position. You can also make some changes to the appearance of the label or change the default instructions. Then you click Save and Close.

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Now let’s review the activity we’ve started to build. As you can see, the label is disassociated from its placeholder, requiring the student to drag and drop the label into the proper place.

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SoftChalk also allows you to create a slideshow within the SoftChalk file. Let’s look at a Beauty and the Beast slideshow as an example. The nice thing about the slide show, compared to activity types we’ve seen, is the amount of space available for your image.

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So let’s put a Slideshow activity together. Choose Insert > Activity > Slideshow to get to the activity creation engine. You then have to click New to add a slide. You then find and choose your image, as well as add text (this is important if you are trying to be 508 compliant and offer full accessibility, even though it won’t show directly on the slideshow). Then you can add an audio file, although that is not necessary. Then you keep adding slides until your slideshow is complete.

The

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Once you have all your slides created, you can easily change their order in the sequence. You can also choose to have students open a new browser window for the activity, rather than having it appear on the page in all its glory. I prefer to display my activities inline—I’m neither a fan of links instead of images nor of requiring additional clicks to get somewhere on a page. At least you have that option.

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Let’s put together a Tabbed Info activity. First, let’s see what the activity does. As you can see, it organizes an interactive table, with text tabs that learners roll over with a mouse to see an illustration and explanatory text.

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So let’s choose Insert > Tabbed Info. Then you give the tab a name, add an image, then add text. It’s helpful to have visualized your activity on paper before you get to the engine—this activity engine is not as intuitive as others. You don’t have to include text and image for each tab—you could create an activity that just offers, for example, the definitions of words (with only text) or illustrations (just images). Then decide where you want the tab located—top and left are the most common, but you can place your tabs at the right or at the bottom of the table.

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Let’s take a look at one last activity type, the Timeline. This activity has a lot of parts—the range of dates at the bottom, the actual event signified by a dot and a brief text, and an image that will appear when a learner clicks on a particular event. The timeline is scrollable, so you can include quite a range without exhausting your space.

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First, choose Insert>Activity>Timeline, then give your timeline a descriptive name. Then you have to choose your time interval—again it’s better to have your general timeline sketched out before you begin to create it in SoftChalk. The intervals can range from short—1 year—to long (500 years). You can also arrange them in the space according to the order they were listed, where the items are simply arranged in a series of equidistant points. I’m not sure how that would be useful for a timeline, so we’ll choose 50 years. Now we’ll add an entry. You have a lot of information to add here: the date you want to appear, with an option to provide a beginning and end date; the name of the event (under Description), and a brief summary text. You can also add an image—which I encourage you to do. It makes the timeline come alive! Then you keep adding events to fill out your timeline.

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Naturally, you can return to the engine to modify the timeline by rightclicking on the activity placeholder and choosing Modify Activity. One thing you’ll notice is that the option for ordering methods is grayed out. You can’t suddenly shift the ordering methods—the method you initially choose is the one you are stuck with.

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