SoftChalk 4Presented by Scott Howell, Kim Jones, Michele Laaksonen, and Sharon

Salyer

SoftChalk4 is an easy to use,

downloadable program for your

personal computer that:

● looks and acts just like a Word

document

● transforms the document into a

polished, interactive lesson.

Introduction

Softchalk4 provides:● an active learning environment

that connects you with your

students through various

interactive learning activities and

tools

● a community learning experience

through in-text annotations that

make the instructor part of the

conversation

● user-friendly and intuitive

navigation between pages

What teachers say

Helping Students

Instructors can:● Type lessons into the SoftChalk4

window or copy and paste from

Word files.

● Easily add images, hyperlinks,

videos, audio files, and tools.

● Upload lessons to Blackboard.

● A preview tab lets you toggle

between screens to watch the

progression of your lesson-

design process.

Teachers Love SoftChalk

Helping InstructorsS

Instructors have the capability to create new lessons or copy and paste

lessons from word processing programs.

● Creating and saving a new lesson in SoftChalk

o Select “File/New” from the drop-down menus

o Type your lesson content, using the toolbar under the top menu to

customize fonts, add bullet points, align text, insert images, etc.

o Click “File/Save As” to save the lesson to your local computer as an

.html file.

● Previewing a lesson in SoftChalk

o While working on a new lesson, click CTRL+P to preview your work

or click the preview icon on the toolbar.

How to Use SoftChalk4

● Opening a lesson in SoftChalk

o Select “File/Open” from the

drop-down menus

o Browse to your local lesson

and double-click on it to

open

● Previewing a lesson in SoftChalk

o While working on a new

lesson, click CTRL+P to

preview your work or click

the preview icon on the

toolbar.

How to Use SoftChalk4

In addition to creating lessons, instructors have the capability to create

activities such as quizzes, crosswords puzzles, etc. as online content.

● Creating a new quiz

o Select “Insert/QuizPopper” and decide on the quiz type (true/false,

multiple choice, etc.)

o Type your questions into the quiz.

● Removing or modifying a quiz

o Right click on a QuizPopper and select “Remove QuizPopper” to

take it out of your lesson.

o You can also modify the quiz by right-clicking and choosing “Modify

QuizPopper” to make changes.

● Saving a quiz

o Right click on a QuizPopper and select “Save to Library”

How to Use SoftChalk - Adding Activities to

Lessons

SoftChalk has a tremendous amount of information in

the help guide and online● Accessing the Help Guide PDF

o Select “Help/Help Topics/User Guide” and search for the desired

help topic.

● Accessing videos, sample lessons, etc.

o Select “Help Help Topics/Quick Tour Videos, etc. and you will be

guided to the appropriate support tools (Internet connection

required)

o Right click on a QuizPopper and select “Save to Library”

How to use SoftChalk - Getting Help

SoftChalk Meets All of the

Following Best Practices

Utilize students’ preferred method of reading

● “The Internet has created a new reading style. Today we are changing

from a concentrated, sustained, and linear reading style into a more…

fragmented, intuitive, and associative… reading style.” (Swart, 2011, p.

27).

Best Practices # 1

Select tools that facilitate:

1. “organization of the teaching and studying,”

2. “learning and tutoring processes,” and

3. “achievement of learning, the development of learning skills” (Silius

& Tervakari, 2003 qtd in Celik, 2012).

Best Practices # 2

Select tools that meet the following competencies:

1. Technical - allowing content previewing, screenshots, links, encoding and embedding, and mobile capacity

2. Media - supporting multiple media extensions and allowing interactive texts, audio, and video

3. Assessment - Allowing feedback, showing quiz answers, importing questions from external pools, uploading graphics to questions

Best Practices # 3

• Develop lessons where students are “active discoverers and constructors of their own knowledge” (Abbott, 2014)

• Construct online lessons geared to take only 15 minutes (compared to 45-minute traditional classroom lessons) (SoftChalk Create,” n.d.)

Best Practices # 4

• Construct multimedia lessons because “The more [forms of multimedia in a given lesson] the better” (“Softchalk Create,” n.d.)

– Multimedia lessons should include transcriptions of videos, descriptions of images/text, and use HTML over Microsoft Office for greater device/browser compatibility (“Best practices for making online content,” n.d.)

• Serve as a facilitator (i.e., facilitators “need not be present for or participate in every structured learning activity”) (Barr & Tagg, 1995 qtd. in Abbott, 2014)

(continued)

Pros/Cons of SoftChalk

LessonBuilder is used to create interactive

lessons.

LessonBuilder is compatible with Mac and

PC.

LessonBuilder supports various media

formats (audio, video, flash, Shockwave,

and web movies).

Pros and Cons

QuizPopper feature can be utilized to

determine student comprehension on

each page.

SoftChalk offers online training

options, such as webinars and online

workshops.

SoftChalk has both a user guide for

download and email online support.

Pros:

Pros and Cons

Importing PowerPoint slides with animation into

LessonBuilder lose background formatting and

animation.

Imported text and graphics cannot be edited.

No headers, footers, or sidebars are available in

LessonBuilder.

Customized lessons require a more difficult html

program, StyleBuilder.

Cons:

References

References

Abbott, J. (2014). Best practices: Using popular media for active learning: Engaging students outside of the classroom. HETS

Online Journal, 139-153.

Amy Burns Explains How She Uses SoftChalk with Students. AEA K-12 Online. Retrieved from

http://www.aeak12online.org/2013/04/amy-burns-explains-how-she-uses.html

A SoftChalk Love Story. YouTube.com. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie2CRf9Vg08

Baker, A and Sobilo, L. (2008). Reviewing SoftChalk – An Instructional Aid. Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning for

Christians in Higher Education, Vol. 3 no. 1

Best practices for making the content you put online accessible to all

students. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.tstc.edu/harlingenod/accessibilitybestpractices

Celik, S. (2012). Development of usability criteria for e-learning content development software.

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education, 13, 336-345.

References (continued)

References (cont.)

SoftChalk Create. (2014). Retrieved from http://softchalk.com/products/softchalk

SoftChalk create best practices. (n.d.). Retrieved from

https://learn.utsa.edu/SoftChalk/Soft%20Chalk%20Create%20Best%20Practicespdf.pdf

SoftChalk Create. YouTube.com. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSU-g8bVEdY

Swart, D. (2011). The new read. Exploration of new genres in literature. Self-published master’s thesis, Utrecht Graduate School

of Visual Art and Design, The Netherlands.