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Bb for Dummies

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Blackboard for Dummies - Review Notes

Contents 1 At a Glance 2 Introduction (Good) 3 Part 1: What is Blackboard All About (Big Thumbs Up) 4 Part 2. Easing into Blackboard (A bit much) 5 Part 3: Earning your Blackboard black belt (Also somewhat tedious in detail) 6 Part 4: The Parts of Ten 7 Part 4: Appendices

At a Glance

• I like a lot of the non-technological, pedagogical items in the book, perhaps there is a bit much - are 10 items really better than 3 ? Things like that.
• I would like a Course Control Panel Cheat Sheet
• Bonus : Checklist of Learning Styles (Chapter 11)
• Bonus : Checklist of Blackboard Course Building (Appendix II)

Introduction (Good)

• Introduction
• Comment: Bb is less about the "web" than it is about "content" and "learning."
• Foolish assumption section. You know where to find files on your computer. This is probably not a wrong assumption, but not a foolish one. It is especially foolish to assume that someone else could automatically find files on your computer. And that is something that needs to be worked on when building a course online. Students have to be able to find thing that the professor has put online.
• Getting yourself organized. Organizing your files, organizing your work, organizing your time.

Part 1: What is Blackboard All About (Big Thumbs Up)

• Chapter 1: Your first look at Blackboard (+)
  • Access. Which browsers work best? Which work well. Which don't work at all. Isn't this the big problem of the web ?
  • Logging in
  • Goes right to course. Do not pass the community page.
  • Course menu
  • The Control Panel (Course administration, course materials [content areas], communication tools, assessment tools
  • The edit view (the instructor) versus the display view (the student)

• Chapter 2. The course development process
  • Read the chapter through. This is more of a tutorial than an overview

• Chapter 2.a. Quick start with the fab four - syllabus, online assignments, gradebook setup, online discussion
  • (1) Posting your syllabus, starting with a copy on your computer (probably in word). Note that each institution customizes the initial menu.
  • (2) Give online assignments. What will be new this time is a "plagiarism" function.
  • (3) Setup your gradebook.
  • (4) Discussion topics. Kevin Dunn uses the discussion topics for student to post new material - news items, etc, for which they get bonus points.
  • Sage advice. "Trust your students to be patient with you. Be open and forthright about your novice status in online teaching, and you will enlist student support for each new experiment. In a first semester online, every week qualifies as a new experiment. I remember replying to a student request for grades in the Gradebook in my first semester online: 'Yes, you'll see those grades just as soon as I figure out how to put them there.' Even after mastering the basics of Blackboard, I continue to share experiments with students. In some classes, I build in a menu item called Beta, and that's where I post new efforts, inviting students to give me feedback." Mary Bold, assistant professor of family studies at texas Woman's University.

• Chapter 2.b. The process (review)
  • Before the course starts (design, select tools, setup environment, post materials, pre-assessment)
  • During the course (update, assess, grade)
  • After the course (review, update, migrate)

• Chapter 2.c. Creating a course
  • 1. Create a course (will be created automatically)
  • 2. Enrolling students (will be enrolled automatically)
  • 3. Set up the course environment -- starting with template(s), importing an old course, starting from scratch
  • 4. Post course material
  • 5. Give pre-assessments (Discussion board, Survey Manager, Assignment, Test Manager). This is a double whammy. One is to get their attention, and the other is to actually find out what's in their heads.
  • 6. Choose the proper tools for your course
  • 7. Choose your communication methods (Announcements, Chat, Collaboration, Email(external), Messages (internal)).

• Chapter 2.d. Facilitating a course
  • 1. Assessment
  • 2. Feedback
  • 3. Content updating

• Chapter 2.e. Wrapping things up.
  • 1. Review your course
  • 2. Update the course
  • 3. Migrate the course.

• Bonus.
  • I like the Sage advice item, and maybe we can figure out how to reward teachers who do WebCT (oops! Bb) innovation, make a good use of it, etc, using student evaluations. Faculty members will win a new iPod Touch or iPhone or something really really cool!
  • The iphone would be better because it has a digital camera built in, and getting images would be really good.
  • How does iTunes on windows manage photos from the iPhone ?
  • Increasing engagement.

Part 2. Easing into Blackboard (A bit much)

• Chapter 3. Got Learners ? (Getting people into your course)
  • Create user is not an option. Users are "enrolled" in the course.
  • Enrolling users will be common. The big difference here is "role," not "roll," management. Except for students, who are added automatically, the process is to add a user and then assign them a role.
    • Course Builder (nee: designer, but with no access to gradebook or course statistics)
    • Grader (access to user management and assessment. a "limited" TA)
    • Guest (limited to announcements, content areas, staff information, and selected areas)
    • Instructor (automatic, full access)
    • Student (automatic)
    • Teaching Assistant (full access equivalent to the instructor)
  • Managing Groups. Groups are collaboration groups
    • Discussion Board (Instructor must create the discussion board for the group :( )
    • Virtual Classroom [Chat]
    • File Exchange
    • Email

• Chapter 4. Making the course your own
  • Dealing with the course menu (via the control panel)
    • Note. Menu may contain content area, tool link, course link, or external link.
    • Note. Text menu items are accessible, buttons are not accessible (and ugly to boot :) )
  • Surfing the sea of tools. Would probably be better titled "How to swim with the sharks without getting eaten alive. " The list itself is 4 pages long.

• Chapter 5. Building your class materials (25 pages)
  • Note. I suspect this is going to be one of the areas of greatest culture shock. The process is very familiar, but the content model is quite different. WebCT is web-like - "pages, images, html". Blackboard is not. Blackboard does not have a "manage files" area.
  • Happy Content
    • .doc files
    • .ppt files
    • .pdf files, which are easy to print, but not easy to edit
  • Not so happy Content
    • .html (a web page is not a page but a collection of objects)
  • Unhappy Content
  • Overall process is
    • Putting content into a Content Area.
    • Using the Item options
    • Modifying content
    • Editing from Display View
    • Organizing Content
    • Determining content availability
  • The visual text editor
    • Yet another text editor.
    • The big question is how well does it cut and past from windows?
    • Can images be pasted into it? Dragged into it?
  • Uploading files
    • .doc files are easy
    • .html files are not, since images are not part of the file
  • Adding WWW links is easier
  • Organizing is a bit more straight forward
  • Folders are a possible tool.
  • Learning Unit. Authors suggest a learning unit for "about this course." "Use the Learning Unit option to introduce learners ot the way you set up your Blackboard course. Each item you include in the learning unit can describe the contents of each of the menu items in your course."
  • Managing assess. Release and selective release.
  • Comment: This is the most tedious chapter. It takes much more time to read about how to add content than to actually add it.

• Chapter 6. Connecting with learners (34 pages)
  • Comments
    • Notes: This chapter is primarily about (online) communication strategies - how to use announcements, email, messages, discussion boards, collaboration (chat and virtual classroom).
    • Annoyance. Why do people elevate nouns to more abstract level. E.g. Bb's demo system used the tab "Learn" for "Courses," they use "Collaboration" rather than "Chat room", etc.
    • Sage Advice. "Virtual High School requires all its course instructors to answer (online) questions within a 24 hour period; they taught me to do it. I follow this to the letter, and I can see the results. I've also seen the confusion that occurs when an instructor does not; I am convinced that this regular contact is essential. For students new to navigating Blackboard, consistent help is what keeps them from feeling lost [or left out or left behind]."
  • Making announcements.
    • Do students have the option of getting updates outside of WebCT (Bb)?
  • Contact Information
    • Post your profile
    • Include your photograph, perhaps with "natural" setting, rather than a formal portrait.
    • Add multiple profiles, for TA's, guest lecturers, your department chair :)
  • Conducting online asynchronous discussions.
    • Note. "Conducting online discussions is an essential component of any course with an online presence. It's perhaps the essential component of any course - period!"
    • Well. It depends :)
    • Nitty gritty of discussions
  • Conducting online synchronous sessions.
    • Introduction to Blackboard's Virtual Lecture Hall
    • I don't see a microphone
  • Email is now outbound
  • Messages are on server
  • Note. We cannot overestimate the learning curve for students new to online education.
  • Alas. No rubrics were included

Part 3: Earning your Blackboard black belt (Also somewhat tedious in detail)

• Chapter 7: Getting the most from Blackboard
  • 1. Calendar
  • 2. Assignment (dropbox) - Add Task
  • 3. Digital Dropbox may be added independently
    • • Give a dummy assignment
  • 4. Glossary manager

• Chapter 8: Assessing learner progress.
  • Why assessment?
    • Grades
    • Reflection
    • Self-assessment
  • Creating and Deploying Test
    • Think of a take home quiz as homework.
    • Quizzes are also study guides.
  • Constructing questions and question sets
    • A dozen or so question types
  • Sharing questions among Blackboard courses
    • Can this be done with whole surveys
  • Assignment Manager

• Chapter 9: Course implementation
  • The gradebook
  • Items
  • Categories (Groups of Items - quiz, problem set, discussion, etc)
  • Grades (score, letter, percenteage, text, complete/incomplete)
  • Automatic weighing of grades by categories or by items
  • Download, Upload by item
  • Performance dashboard
  • Course statistics
  • Tracking views (for specific items)

• Chapter 10: Course management
  • May be done automatically, by institutional policy
  • Recycling courses

Part 4: The Parts of Ten

• Chapter 11: Ten super-important "think abouts" for building your course (6 pp)

'The Chinese believe that the number eight brings good luck, and a little luck never hurt someone who's building a course in blackboard. Lo and behold, we choose to give you eight (pretend that it's ten) extremely important questions in this chapter.'

• • who are these learners, anyway?
  • learning goals, objectives, and bears -- oh, my!
  • setting your sights on good communication
  • identifying learning styles (and some strategies to address them) ... visual, aural, read, write, tactile,
  • what do they already know
  • what are your learning goals and objectives
  • how is your course organized (and the importance of organization and the TOC)
  • how accessible are you to your learners (communication processes)

Comment: These are questions each student could benefit by also answering. I love the 1-minute write approach.

• Chapter 12: Ten Strategies for organizing an outstanding course in Blackboard

This chapter focuses on the syllabus and using it as a course organization tool.

• • plan
  • brain dump
  • organize, structure, and develop
  • plan for adjustments
  • re-become the plan

Comment: This basically is boiled down to the syllabus, and syllabus tweaking, supported by a 2 page checklist. Course Plan Check List

Comment: There could be a section of mid-course course corrections. How is it going? How is this bunch of students reacting ? Again, the one minute write strategy could come into play for feedback and communication.

• Chapter 13: Ten ways to keep learners involved by using Blackboard communication features

This mainly focuses on the discussion and chat tools. Fine, but quizzes, surgeys, assignments, etc are also communication tools.

I've always liked chem031's "pre-lecture" quiz, which serves as a great prompt for "are there any questions about the readings." If they haven't done the reading, it's hard to have questions about it. The quiz is a great prompt tool.

Ditto homework, one minute writes, etc.

There's a short discussion on rubric's to grade discussion forum postings, but it's pretty thin. This could be improved with a rubric pool ... especially one based on a communication process model.

There is a simple "elements of discussion style" guide, however, that should be promoted ... almost elements of web style. Elements of Web Style

• Chapter 14: Ten ways to assess learning
  • Create online tests for frequent self-assessment [or low-stakes quizzes, or quizzes as homework]
  • Post assignments to the discussion forums, especially useful if the assignments are unique
  • Use a virtual classroom or chat for "oral exams"
  • Set up learner groups for projects
  • Use a rubric for discussion forum postings
  • [Use a rubic for everything]
  • Have learners come up with test questions
  • Use adaptive release to structure your course
  • Require learners to submit assignments in progressive sections
  • Gather "muddiest point" or "one-minute" papes wit messaging or email [or surveys or quizzes]
  • Collect long-term reflections with journals

Comment: Nothing big here.

• Chapter 15: Ten questions to ask you Blackboard system administrator
  • How do I generate a blackboard course [automatic]
  • How do learners gain acces to my blackboard course [automatic]
  • What is the policy regarding access to my blackboard course? [Good question]
  • How far in advance will learners have access to my course [Good question]
  • How do my learners change their e-mail addresses in the blackboard system [Probably via webmail]
  • How long after the semester ends will learners have access to my course [Good question]
  • Can I use one blackboard course for multiple sections of the same course [Hmmm]
  • What happens to my blackboard course at the end of the semester [Good question]
  • Does my blackboard course have a maximum size [Probably, but how is this set]
  • If I leave this institution, can I take my blackboard course with me. [Good question]

• Chapter 16: Ten things to look forward to in Blackboard Learning System 7.1
  • What's new :)

Part 4: Appendices

• Appendix A: Real-Life Issues in Teaching with technology
  • Who owns your stuff?
  • Copyright Issues
  • Online Privacy Rights
  • Academic honesty

These are all policy issues, often clouded.

• Appendix B: AN overview of the Blackboard content system
  • Managing files and content (Webfolder, WebDAV)
  • Using versioning to keep track of files
  • Putting e-portfolios to good use
  • Tracking activity progress with work flow
  • Using collaborative, web-enabled file storge
  • Catalogin learning objects
  • Searching for shared files, folders, and e-portfolios
  • Gaining library know how though e-reserves. each course has it's own unique folder

• Appendix C: A Blackboard Course-building checklist
  • A three page check-list. Course-Building Checklist

• Appendix D: Additional Resources on the Web

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