Tips from Faculty
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CSM Upgrade to BB9 
One thing to maybe do is standardize the course menu. This could be a starting point for all courses and teachers could still customize the course menu if they wished.
I only included tools I use, so some would add other tools to it. I also have the Help tool on the menu but did not include it on the screenshot which is here:
https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B4o6TSirwP59MDYwYjIxNTAtZmFmNi00NjViLWEwYWUtOTIxYWE1MWQ3NTlj&hl=en
Joel is working on this now so we can test it with copying over the course content…thanks for sharing your screen shot, John.
E-packs
For instructors that use E-packs (publisher provided content with student access codes), these E-packs will migrate over to Blackboard Release 9.1. If you are thinking of adopting E-packs for Bb9.1 they are now called Course Cartridges. For instructors considering moving an E-pack to Bb9.1 you have two options:
1. Perform a standard backup of your course in CE8 and import the .bak package into your Bb9.1 course. The content should migrate over properly. The only problem you will encounter is the student access codes. You will need to work with your publisher to get new student access codes bundled with your text book. CE8 Student Access Codes will not work with BB9.1.
2. The advised option: This would be a good time to adopt a new Course Cartridge for your course. The chances are you course has been used over-and-over several semesters and there are numerous files not being deployed. So this might be a good time to re-design your course and adopt a new Course Cartridge.
Ordering a Course Cartridge
Blackboard has a re-designed web site to request a Course Cartridge at http://www.blackboardextensions.com. The best way to find your Course Cartridge is to use the search box at the top of this page searching for your book or ISSBN. Select Course Cartridge from the drop down field next to the search box.
Great Tool for Instructors Migrating from CE8 to Bb9.1
Marshall University created a really nice CE8 to Learn 9.1 Tools Comparisons & Features chart that goes into details features lost and enhanced with Bb9.1
http://mupfc.marshall.edu/~savillek/Bb9/comparechart.html
Contacts tool.
You can add the contacts tool to the course menu. This allows you to enter your name, e-mail, phone number, office hours, office location, and web site.
You can also add the same information for the CSM Help Desk so students will know how to contact them.
What other contacts would be useful here?
John
Testing Center Numbers for those who have testing center exams, maybe…
Showing students how their work compares with the class.
1. Go to Grade Center
2. Point the context menu for a graded item (test or assignment)
3. Select Edit Column
4. Scroll down till you find “Show Statistics” and then select Yes
5. Then point to Submit
Students will be able to see their grade for this item and also the average and median score for the class.
You must do this for each graded item.
John
The Grade Center now allows students (and you) to know what their grade is throughout the entire course. And you don’t even have to break out a calculator. BB9 does all the heavy lifting for you.
Each time a student completes a graded item it automatically updates the grade.
To enable this capability go to the Grading Center:
1. Point to Create Calculated Column and choose the Total Column option.
2. In the Column Information section Enter a Column Name
3. Optionally you can provide a Grade Center Display Name and Description if you wish
4. Next move to Primary Display and select Letter from the drop down box
5. If you wish you could select percentage from the Secondary Display drop down box. This would give you both the letter grade and percent. (The student will only see the primary display.)
6. You can skip the dates section and move to section 3: Select Columns. Here you select the All Grade Columns.
7. In the next section, Options, select Yes for all three choices: Include this Column in Grade Center Calculations; Show this Column to Students; and Show Statistics (this allows students to compare their grade with the rest of the class.
Then point to submit and you are all done.
Note: you want to make sure you want all grade columns included.
In my courses I have a sample test so I have to go to Assessments and edit the test options for it and select “Hide Results for this Test Completely from Instructor and the Grade Center.” Then I go to the Grade Center and point to the Manage button and choose Column Organization. In the next window I choose the sample test and select the option to hide it. This keeps this column from appearing in the Grade Center.
Assign Textbook Tool
You can use this tool to point to each required or recommended book for you course. And you can have an entry for the paper copy and another entry for the electronic version.
For all of my classes I was able to point to Assign Textbook and choose the “Search for Textbook” option. Then I entered the ISBN and each time it found the book.
Remember to select Required or Recommended and then click Submit.
If that does not work for you then you can use the “Manual Entry Textbook” option. I had to use this option when entering the electronic version of the book.
Many books now have electronic versions available at sites like coursesmart.com (create a free instructor account at the site and ask your publisher to give you access to their books there so you too can access the complete book electronically) so you may want to have an entry for the paper copy of the book and another entry for the the electronic version.
I added the textbook to my Web Links page and the Course Menu but it may be more logical to put it elsewhere.
To add it to the course menu click the + button in the Course Menu and choose “Add Content Area” Type in Textbook and then select “Available to Users” and then point to Submit.
Then select the link in the course menu and the content area will open and you can choose the Assign Textbook tool and follow the steps above.
When the book changes just go back to this page and delete the current book and use the search option to enter the new data.
John
Messages Tool
This tool allows internal course e-mail for those logged into the course.
It works like the internal e-mail in previous versions of BB except that you can send e-mail with no text in the body of the message. That is you could send an email with just a message in the Subject area. Previously you had to enter something in the body area, too.
Also it is a bit easier to select recipients than in previous versions.
You can only send e-mail to those registered for the course.
John
Only 1 attachment per message (email)
Users can only attach 1 file to each message or email. If you want to attach more than 1 file you would have to send another email.
I don’t know if this is because of the way it is configured here at CSM or not.
You can’t attach any file if you reply to a message or email. This is also true in Discussions: you can attach a file to a new post or thread but you can not attach a file if you reply to a post.
Consequently it might be useful to create a group for each student in the class and when you select the tools for each group deselect all but the file exchange.
That way you and each student can share files and escape the limitations of discussions and messages.
If you use the send mail (external) tool you can add more than one attachment but this tool will not work if the students don’t enter a valid email address and how would they know how to do that or where to go to do it?
And if the student does enter a valid email address they can also decide not to share it with anyone.
So you might just want to turn the send mail tool off so that users get that error message anytime they try to use it.
Thoughts?
John
(Send) Email tool
This BB9 Email tool allows enrolled users to send e-mails to external sites (e.g. Hotmail or Gmail).
This tool may be useful. But your students must check their e-mail addresses to make sure they are still valid. Or they won’t get email sent through this tool.
When you send an e-mail using this tool there is no record of it in BB9. It will send a copy to your e-mail address (e.g. jw@csmd.edu) but there is no record kept inside the course.
And I am sure that I do not want to start conversations using my CSM e-mail. I would prefer to keep them inside BB9 using the Messages tool.
But students may find it useful to send e-mail to each other so I will enable the tool and see how it works out.
Thoughts?
John
If you want to use the send email tool then you must add it to your course. By default only the Messages tool is in courses created or copied to BB9.
John
I recreated the post on my blog site. To view it click Wiljs and it will take you there.
John
The Send email tool is in too many places! If you go to the grade center and click the action button for a student and choose email then you will go to the send email tool. Even if you turn off the send email tool. So to email a struggling student to see if you can help you might want to have 2 windows open: the grade book in one window and you can right click messaged from that window and choose to open in a new tab or window. Now you can find the students in the grade center that need help and use the other window to send them an internal course email.
The Send Email tool should not be in Tools Module for Students on the My Institution Tab.
Instead there should be a link to the Messages tool.
If we don’t change this, then students will be using the Send Email tool and the email will go to our csm email and not the course mail.
John
It appears that the Send Email tool is aimed at schools that provide their students with email addresses. Since we don’t do this, this might be another reason to hide this tool.
Also some schools that use the send email tool say they don’t list their student email addresses due to Ferpa.
John,
I think I’ve discovered that this tool does not work if you turn it off for your course. So, I turned it off in my classes and even when I try to use it from the “MyInstitution” page, it does not come up with any options to send…does this match your (or anyone else’s) experience?
Ah Send Email may be turned off where the live classes are. But I see it on the test server both in the My Institution tab and inside the courses. And it works there.
John
Blackboard on Demand Learning Center 9.1 has many short videos and articles on how to do things. Check it out:
http://ondemand.blackboard.com/
Dates: let me count the ways.
1. You can go to the grading center and enter a due date for each graded event.
Then each time a student goes to Grades they will see that due date.
But there is no link from Grades to graded events so the student will have to leave Grades and go to Tests or whatever to do the event. And seeing the date listed may not mean anything until the student goes to the calendar.
2. You can add an entry in the calendar for each graded event.
It makes sense to take the time to enter the information in the calendar since that is the easiest way to communicate them to the students. Seeing the due date in a calendar is easier to understand than looking at a list of graded events and dates.
I regret to say that you can not link an entry in the calendar to the graded event. Unlike every previous version of BB and WebCT. This they should fix.
Even so I will enter the graded events here.
3. You can make an entry in Announcements and link it to the graded event. This allows the student to see that Graded Quiz 1 is Available and you can specify a date and link it to the quiz so the student can click the link and go to the test.
But seeing a date in a list of all the graded events is not as good as seeing it in the calendar. So I won’t do this.
4. You can add the due date to each test or assignment so that when a student goes to Tests or Assignments the date is there. You would enter the due date in the body of the
Test Information.
But then you would have to change this each semester.
So I just say see the course calendar for the due date. Then I don’t have to change this every semester.
There are plenty of things to do each semester without doing this. I set the exams up so they stay available for 20 years.
5. You can create a task for each graded event. You can’t link a task to a course tool, either, but you can show the graded event, description, the due date, and priority.
Again I will not do this.
So initially I think I will enter the due date in Grading and use the clunky calendar tool to enter show when graded events are due for the course.
I will not use the task tool at all but allow students to use it if they wish.
I will use announcements sparingly, and try to use discussions as the primary communications tool in my courses.
Thoughts?
John
Entering Due Dates in the Grade Center (sigh)
Correction there is no due date for a quiz or test. There is a due date for assignments. Strange, eh?
And if you go to the Grade Center you can click the action button for each column and choose Edit Column it will open and you can enter a due date.
If you take the time to do that then the student when looking at their grades will see each graded item and its due date.
I think this is worth the time it takes although it would be great if you could modify all the dates in one window without opening 30 columns one by one.
Not a something to look forward to each semester.
Thoughts?
Groups
The group tool inside BB9 has many useful features and some that drive you crazy.
You can create the groups scientifically by telling BB how many students will be in each group and how many groups you want or you can allow students to sign up for groups. I have always let the lms make the decisions for me but recently students asked to be able to sign up for groups so I did that this semester.
There were some who don’t sign up (half the class) so I told them the first week I would do it by a certain day and time.
It is a bit of chore to do manually. You have to know who is in a group already, and then you have to keep track of those you put in groups.
I think in Jan I will let bb do it. Although I bet those who signed up for a group will do really well. Since they are all in the same groups. The half that didn’t sign up are all in their groups. I don’t think that is good.
Group discussion: students can not attach a file to a thread (post). To share a file they must either use the File Exchange, Group Blog, or Group Journal.
That pesky send email tool is one of the tools created for each group. You probably don’t want students to use it and I suggest that you turn it off. For some reason you can’t include the Message tool (the internal course email tool) so students who wish to email each other they have to leave their group area and go to Messages.
Each group gets their own wiki and this could be quite useful in some assignments. I created an outline wiki for an assignment and each student can edit the wiki and enter their work and then save it. Any team member can review the entire wiki and see what is done and what is left to do. Can’t add attachments to Wikis, though.
Each group also gets a blog and journal and students can add attachments there.
There is a task tool so teams can create tasks that need to be accomplished. I doubt this will see much use, but we will see.
Each group can have their own chat and chat and whiteboard to discuss their work.
But currently the chat and whiteboard don’t work if you have the latest version of java (Version 6 Update 21). Don’t hold your breath waiting for BB to fix this. They have a long history of refusing to embrace the fact that they depend on Java and other plug-ins. And if they fix it this time, it could break with the next version of Java that comes out (which is about every 6 weeks).
Thoughts?
Getting rid of students who dropped the class.
Go to Users and Groups in the Control Panel below the course menu and choose Users.
Select the students who dropped the class by checking the box opposite their username and then scroll to the bottom and click Remove Users from Course.
Repeat if you have more than 25 students since you won’t see more than that unless you “edit paging.”
Thoughts?
Add color to the Grading Center
If you go to the Grading Center and choose Manage and then select Grading Color Codes you can add color to it.
1. First thing to do is check the box opposite “Enable Grading Color Codes”
2. Then in section 2 change the color for “Needs Grading” to a primary color of your choice.
In the next section, “Grade Ranges” select “Add Criteria”
Leave the first drop down box “Between” alone
Enter 0 in the first box opposite that and then 59 in the second box.
Next choose bright red as the color
Then select Submit
You return to the Grading Center and now every item that needs grading has that color you chose.
Any student failing the course (if you use the grade and total points column) or who failed a test or other graded item will have bright red boxes to show events they failed and and also in the letter grade and points columns.
You could add criteria for each different grade and give it a different color and then you could see at a glance who had a A, B, C, D or F.
But all that color is a bit overwhelming. Start small and then expand from there.
Thoughts?
John
Problem: When viewing a calculated column the missed quizzes, assignments and discussions columns are not automatically added in the calculated column.
Solution: For columns that remain empty because the student missed the quiz, discussion or assignment, the column will not be added to the calculated column based on the default options.
From what I understand, you can change this option in the Calculated Column options.
1. In the Grade Center, go to the heading for the Calculated Column
2. Click on the Action Link, and select Edit Column Information.
3. Scroll down through the options to number 3 Select Columns.
4. Under Calculate as, Running Total, click on No.
Selecting No includes all items in the calculations, using a value of 0 for an item if there is no grade.
5. Click Submit.
Hi Joel
Thank you for pointing this out!
You are right that this will fix the problem stated. But then it will appear to the student they are failing until they get enough graded items done to start changing their grade.
Since like now (early in the semester) most of the graded events have not occurred each of those columns will get a 0 and so when the student looks at the calculated column it will appear that they are failing even if they have not yet dropped a point.
So you could hide this column from the students and show students other calculated columns that have yes set for running total. Or you could leave it alone and change this the last week or so of the semester.
John
I found on the Internet a possible resolution to the problem with students not being able to open file attachments like PDFs.
http://www.wm.edu/offices/it/academics/blackboard/knownissues/
File “Not Found” Error:
In many cases, faculty and students may have trouble accessing documents or other materials in a transferred course site.
You may get the following error message:
Not Found
Not Found: The specified resource was not found, or you do not have permission to access it.
There are two possible causes for this:
1. The file is in a folder that was copied from an existing Blackboard course site. The problem is that the Copy function in Blackboard is actually just sharing out the files and folders from one site to another. Anyone who does not have permission to both course sites will not have access to the files that reside inside folders copied this way. We are working on a systemwide fix to resolve this issue, but for now, faculty members can simply download the offending file and re-upload it to the new Blackboard course site. This should allow students in the new course to access the file in question.
2. This issue is sometimes caused by the new FILE structure in Blackboard. It can sometimes be resolved by having the faculty member going to CONTROL PANEL > FILES and then clicking on the course id to access the class files for the first time. Once the class files are accessed by the instructor, all enrolled individuals should have access.
I am working on a draft of things to do before each semester aimed mainly at Blackboard.
Start of semester checklist
Here is my list of things to do to get ready.
Update Syllabus
• Course section number
• Verify spring or fall semester
• Text book
• First day of class, drop date, change audit to credit, last day of class
• Course schedule: update due dates
• Class meeting time and location
• Grades: grading schema, point system and assignments
• Office Hours and contact information
• Verify links to see they work
Inside Blackboard:
1. Assignments Tool
Edit each assignment:
1. Assignment Information Section: verify name and instructions (update to answer any questions you had last semester)
2. Assignment Files Section: verify files open and modify as necessary
3. Grading Section: verify points possible
4. Availability Section: verify settings
5. Due Dates Section: update due date
6. Recipients Section: verify setting for all students or groups
Remember to Submit to save settings.
2. Assessments Tool
• Update due dates in assessment tool
• Update questions/add new questions as needed
• Update points possible in assessment tool and individual questions if needed
• For each test: open in Test Options and verify:
1. Test Information Section
• Name
• Description (update to answer any questions you had last semester)
• Open test in New Window
2. Test Availability Section
• Make the Link Available
• Multiple Attempts: if yes how many times (remember to go to grade center to select how to grade multiple attempts
• Force Completion (if used)
• Set Timer (if used)
• Display After + Display Until (if used)
• Password (if used)
3. Due Date Section update Due Date
4. Self-assessment Options Section verify setting to include this test in grade center or hide results
5. Test Feedback Section verify type of feedback displayed upon completion
6. Test Presentation Section: verify settings
Remember to submit to save settings
3. Grade Center Section
• Under Manage button:
• Verify (manage) grading schema (may not copy over from previous semester)
• Verify (manage) grading color codes (consider adding criteria for less than 59% so you can quickly identify students in trouble)
• Verify (manage) categories to see if all graded events are there and in correct category
• Verify (manage) grading periods (if you use this)
• Verify (manage) smart views for categories and performance
• Update calculation and formulas if assignments, assessment or others added or removed.
• Manage Column Organization: Check show/hide to make items visible or invisible to students and you, verify: due dates, points possible and modify the order of the columns if necessary
For each graded column enter Edit Column view and confirm:
• Under 1. Column Information:
• Verify Column name
• Enter description to explain column to student
• Verify primary and secondary display
• For assessments that students can take more than once verify setting in “Score attempts using”
• Verify points possible
• Under 2. Dates update Due Date
• Under 3. Options confirm setting for:
• Include this Column in Grade Center Calculations
• Show this Column to Students
• Show Statistics (average and median) for this column to Students in My Grades (this allows students to compare their results with the class)
4. Discussions Tool
• Create a new welcome message to students and invite them to respond and introduce themselves.
• Review all messages for ideas to improve the course this semester
• Delete messages from previous semester
• Edit each forum checking:
• Available?
• Allow anonymous posts where appropriate
• Allow author to delete own posts where appropriate
• Allow author to edit own published posts where appropriate
• Allow post tagging
• Allow users to reply with quote where appropriate
• Allow file attachments where appropriate
• Allow members to create new threads
• Allow members to subscribe to forum or threads (email tool must be on)
• Include body of post or link to post
• Allow members to rate posts
• Uncheck force moderation of posts where appropriate
• Check grading in forum where appropriate
• For each graded forum go to Grades and update due date
5. Course content (Learning Modules) Tool
• Check all links to make sure they all work.
• Revise content to answer questions from previous semester
6. Check Dashboard
See if all modules (especially grade book) are there. If not try to add grade book and if fail create new module page and add all modules to it. Then delete old dashboard and rename new dashboard and position on course menu.
7. Course Content page (syllabus, getting started and link to learning modules):
Update syllabus and verify links work
8. Calendar Tool
Update the entries for this semester
9. Textbook Tool
Update as necessary
10. Contacts Tool
Update as necessary
11. Groups Tool
Create signup sheets for a group for each student, select file exchange as tool so students have a place to save their files during semester
12. Announcements Tool
Update the dates for each announcement
13. Course menu
Revise as necessary, reveal link to syllabus for this semester
Control Panel Settings to Check
Guest and Observer Access
Check settings to allow or deny access
Properties (Customization)
1. Name and Description: verify description
4. Set Course Duration: select days for date of enrollment and enter number
Remember to Submit to save changes
Style (Customization)
Verify settings and choose Course Entry Point
Tool Availability (Customization)
Turn off tools not used and verify tools visible to guests and observers.
Remember to Submit to save changes
Then view Tools from the course menu link to confirm what tools the student will see.
Evaluation Section
Update Early Warning Section as necessary
Thoughts?
John