wpcampus - sheridan ccit case study

Kiera Howe - @Xxowe Shanta R. Nathwani - @ShantaDotCa 1

CCIT @ SHERIDANA Case Study

By Kiera Howe & Shanta R. Nathwani

Kiera Howe - @Xxowe Shanta R. Nathwani - @ShantaDotCa

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Agenda• About Us• About our students• What we teach them• The tools we give them (aka. What they know)• The tools we use (aka. What they don’t know…yet)


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Find UsKiera

Tweet Me:@XXowe

My Web Site:http://kierahowe.com

ShantaTweet Me:

@ShantaDotCa

My Web Site:http://shanta.ca

http://twitter.com/xxowe


http://kierahowe.com/

http://twitter.com/shantadotca


http://shanta.ca/


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#HiRoy

http://hiroy.club/

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About Shanta• Instructor, Sheridan College &

Mohawk College• Web Design and Capstone

Project• WordPress 1 & 2

• Bachelor of Commerce in Info Tech Mgmt., Ryerson University

• Serial WordCamper. Went to 7 in 2014 & 2015, 5 in 2016, including Mumbai. Including Co-organizer, WordCamp Hamilton, 2015-6

• Lead Dudette – Thanks @modmatt

owe - @Xxowe Shanta R. Nathwani - @ShantaDotCa

http://sheridancollege.ca/

http://mohawkcollege.ca/

https://twitter.com/modmatt

https://twitter.com/modmatt

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About Kiera• Instructor, developer, business

owner, serial tinkerer, and Chief Geek

• Instructor, Sheridan College teaching Web Design

• Custom software development for a variety of clients

owe - @Xxowe Shanta R. Nathwani - @ShantaDotCa

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Our Students

• Joint program with University of Toronto at Mississauga: Institute of Culture, Communication, Information and Technology and Sheridan College

• Training them to be translators, not necessarily the developers



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What we teach themAt Sheridan:• Principles of Design• Web Design• Graphic Design• Game Design• Photography and Video

At UTM:• Business• Technical


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The Web StreamIntro Course (CCT260) : • HTML & CSS. Assumes no prior knowledge of coding

Intermediate (CCT360):• Intro to WordPress and PHP• Content Architecture• Web Design (Child Themes, Responsive Web Design, Standards)

Advanced (CCT460):• Creating Widgets, themes and plugins in WordPress• Custom Post Types• Building a theme from scratch using _s (aka Underscores)

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Now for the really cool stuff!



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Our Students’Tools• The forum using BBPress and BuddyPress• The allocation of accounts • The tester


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BBPress and Buddy Press


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Our student processWe have a web server, administered by our IT department at Sheridan. Standard setup with CPanel/Apache/MySQL/PHP

1. We get a list of web users created by our IT department. These are created, either, with or without WordPress on them. They are added to the Interface via a custom plugin.

2. A student signs up for a forum user using BuddyPress specifying what class they are in. Once confirmed, they are assigned a user from the pool

3. The student retrieves the temporary password from the “forums” WordPress site and uses it to sign onto Cpanel.

4. Student updates their password and contact email on CPanel and proceeds to do standard web functionality via CPanel.


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Account Allocation


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Lab TesterProblem: • Students needed an easier way to get feedback about their

HTML/CSS without always having to ask the instructor

The Solution:• Build an interface onto WordPress to allow the student to test their

code as well as requirements for the assignment/lab• Everything should be tested for HTML/CSS as well as the

requirements

The Process:• Take in a url from the web interface. • Test the HTML and CSS to confirm the rules of the languages were

followed.• Test the that the requirements for the assignment were completed


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Our (The Instructors) Tools

• Administration of classes and user accounts• Lab tester and marking• Wayback machine

All of this is done from a student account. No admin privileges are required/used


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Account AllocationWe are given a accounts by our IT Department. They look like:

ccit2100

Corresponds to a web space which looks like this:

http://phoenix.sheridanc.on.ca/~ccit2100


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Grading/TestingProblem:• The instructors need a way to mass test our students

assignments/labs to speed up the process of marking

The Solution:• Give the instructors an easy interface that integrates with the

LMS (D2L – Slate)• Use the export and import functions on the LMS to bring

submissions over to the custom interface and return the feedback to the LMS

The Process:• Submissions are exported from the LMS into a zip file• All submissions are tested using custom testing code, reusing

much of the tester code • All the submissions are listed with an interface that the

instructor can view the tester feedback and enter feeback, including grades of their own.

• All information is then zipped up and reimported into the LMS


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The Wayback MachineProblem:• Students cheat on their assignments and we need a

history of changes for more evedence

The Solution:• Changes to files on student directories should be

recorded so that there is a way to trace most of the versions of the student files

The Process:• A scheduled task runs twice a day using the

WordPress cron system. • When It runs, it iterates through a list of users

registered and checks their file system for files that are newer then the last time it ran.

• Stores the files elsewhere on the file system with an interface for accessing them.


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Future ExpansionWe are building a SAAS model for schools who want a similar solution. Preparing to test in August. With this new server comes a full administrator access, which means we can add:• We don’t need to get a list of user accounts from the IT Department. We will

allocate new users as required.• Integrate our own LMS • Allow students to submit straight from the tester.• Automated testing on the due date, without instructor interaction• Automated updates to student WordPress installs• Make it available to THE WORLD!


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Questions?Kiera

Tweet Me:@XXowe

My Web Site:http://kierahowe.com

ShantaTweet Me:

@ShantaDotCa

My Web Site:http://shanta.ca



http://kierahowe.com/



http://shanta.ca/