Another Browser Hint

In the interest of equal time and browser war fairness (have I been watching too much of the political convention?), today I have an IE problem challenge to report.

Symptom: You're making changes in Blackboard, but the changes don't show up right away. But then out of nowhere, they show up 10 minutes later. So for instance, you give a grade to a student in the Grade Center, but poof... it disappears, then magically shows up later.

Solution: This seems to happen most in IE (Internet Explorer). So please all double-check that you have your IE set as follows.

• From the Tools menu, select Internet Options.
• Locate the Browsing History section and click the Settings button.
• Select the option to “Check for newer versions of stored pages: Every time I visit the webpage.”
• Click OK twice to exit.

Blackboard vs Firefox 3

Firefox 3 is not fully supported by Blackboard at this time. You may receive reports from students that when they turn in an assignment they get an error message. You can suggest that your students use Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox 2 instead. In fact, that's a good suggestion whenever a student has problems with an assignment or test, to tell them to try using a different browser. Each browser has its little quirks and even though Blackboard tries very hard to work around those, sometimes it's just easier to try a different browser.

Here's Blackboard's browser information page. Choose the "Vista 8.0 and Campus Edition 8.0" option.

Help for students logging in to Blackboard

Here is a web page that you can link to for your students to help them log in to Blackboard. This page will be updated if anything changes and will always have the same address, so you can depend on it being there when your students need it.

http://www.cuyamaca.edu/tlc/bb/docs/blackboard_login.asp

TimeDriver

TimeDriver is a web-based tool you can use to let students sign up for time slots in your office hours, or let students pick a time to present their projects. TimeDriver has a video that shows how it works.

You create blocks of time that are available to be scheduled. For example, your office hours are every Monday and Wednesday from 2 - 3 pm. TimeDriver will create a link you can post in Blackboard or on your website, or email to your students. When the student clicks on that link they can sign up for one of the available time slots. If you link it to your Outlook or Google calendar, it will update your calendar as well.

I've set up a TimeDriver for myself. Now you can make appointments to see me without having to hassle with emails and phone calls. Just go to http://my.timedriver.com/XF7FK and give it a try.

Creating Banners for Blackboard

I often get asked "How do I make a banner for my Blackboard course?"

I've been trying to find some resources to help you with that, and here's what I've come up with so far.

Create a banner with PowerPoint 2007 - this is a video of the steps you need to take to create a banner in PowerPoint.

http://cooltext.com/ - you choose one of the starting point designs seen below, then modify the settings to suit your needs. Creates text with background, no imported images allowed.

http://makefreebanners.com/ - this site gives you a choice of 150 background images to which you add your own text.

Gucci Update

We just heard from Henry Eimstad that "Gucci" (the process by which Blackboard and Colleague will talk to each other so that you don't have to request containers and roster uploads every semester) is not going to be working in time to implement it for this semester. Information Systems (IS) will manually create containers and upload rosters for the beginning of the Fall 08 semester.

Rosters are being uploaded now in the order the Upload Request forms were received. According to the Upload Schedule, these upload requests should have been submitted by August 15th. Upload requests submitted by August 15th will likely be completed before Monday morning. Upload requests submitted after August 15th will be done as soon as possible, but it is unrealistic to expect them to be loaded by Monday.

There is hope that "Gucci" will be working for classes that begin later in the semester. I'll keep you posted as I receive more information.

Screencasting: How To Start, Tools and Guidelines

This is an excellent article on screencasting, written by Adam Hay for Smashing Magazine. Screencasting is the process of recording your computer screen and usually includes narration that describes what you are doing on the computer.

Mathway - Math Problem Solver

This article from CNET News talks about a new web service called Mathway.

Mathway is a Web calculator that not only solves math problems for you, but also shows you how it got to the answer with step-by-step directions. It's the kind of service that would have utterly ruined me in middle school if I had wanted to cruise through the stacks of homework without doing any of the actual computations.

Are there any Math teachers out there that want to comment on what this may mean for your students or classes?

Write on Your Screen

Another free program from Microsoft that will be a big help in your face-to-face classes is called ZoomIt. This program lets you zoom in on your computer screen and annotate it. Be sure to read the fine print on this page for instructions on how to use the tool. It will be easier to read once you have ZoomIt installed!

If you install this in a classroom, leave the default keyboard shortcuts as they are unless they interfere with something you teach. This way other teachers who know how to use the program can use it without having to learn new keys.

Here's a little Cheat Sheet for using it.

Resize Images

Before you post images to Blackboard or your website, it's a good idea to resize them first. Most cameras take pictures at a resolution that is higher than what is needed for the web. This can result in file and image sizes that are unnecessarily large, making it difficult for students with slower connections to view your resources.

Microsoft has a free tool for Windows XP users to resize pictures.

Online Orientation Extraordinaire

Check out what Florida Community College at Jacksonville put together for a student online orientation: http://www.markbasse.com/redcar/index.html

Pretty impressive, huh?

The Times They Are A-Changin'

Come gather 'round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You'll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you
Is worth savin'
Then you better start swimmin'
Or you'll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin'.

Bob Dylan

That song just popped into my head as I was thinking about how to tell you about all the changes coming down the pike for how we work with Blackboard.

Henry Eimstead and Brian Nath held a meeting at the district today about how Blackboard and Colleague will talk to each other so that you don't have to request containers and roster uploads every semester.

This process which Brian calls "Gucci" will automatically create Blackboard containers for every section that is listed in Colleague. It will also add students to these containers automatically.

Key points:

1. All of this may or may not happen for the Fall 2008 semester. If all goes well, this will happen by August 20. If not, we simply fall back to the way things have always been done.
   
2. For now, faculty should request all roster uploads and create container requests using the forms on GCCCD Online just as they normally would. These forms should be submitted by August 15.
   
3. All the following items will happen only IF "Gucci" happens by August 20.
   
4. All containers will be initially created with CONTROL PANEL > SETTINGS > COURSE AVAILABILITY set to No. This is so that the instructor has control over when the container is ready to be viewed by students. When you're ready for students to see your course, set this to Yes.
   
5. All containers will be built using a template. Each college can set their own template. This template sets things like the default items in the course menu, how the menu looks, and any content we want to be in every course. Chris and I got some good templates from the onsite Blackboard training we had in May, so we're going to start with something basic until we can confer with faculty on what works best. We can always change it to meet faculty's needs.
   
6. Course containers that have already been requested and built by faculty will be automatically transferred to the "Gucci" generated containers. It's magic, what can I say?
   
7. The section owns the content. What this means is that if Kari Wergeland was in Colleague to teach section 4633 LIR-110 in the Fall, then for any reason was unable to teach the section and section 4633 was reassigned to Jeri Resto to teach it, then Kari Wergeland would be removed as the instructor of the container and Jeri Resto would be the new instructor for that container. All content that Kari had created prior to being removed as the instructor would be intact in the container that Jeri Resto is now teaching with. We were told by the Blackboard consultants that this is just how Blackboard works. There's no changing it.
   
8. So that brings us to the next key point. With this new system it's a good idea to have a development container. That is, a container in which you create your course, and keep updated, which you then copy to the new container that is created for you each semester by "Gucci." When requesting these development containers using the GCCCD Online site, please use the following information to fill out the form.
   
   Example for a container used to develop courses:
   • College: Cuyamaca
   • Semester: Fall 2008
   • Section: 0000
   • Course: ENGL
   • Number: 110
   • Description: College Composition
   • Special Instructions: this container is for development purposes
   
   Instructors will be able to change the Course Name after the container is created if they choose.
   
9. Merging of sections. By Spring 09 semester there will be a tool called the "Course Merge Tool" that instructors can use to merge several sections into one container. With this tool, rosters will still be automatically updated.
   
   For Fall 08, the alternative is to merge them manually in which case, only one of the sections will get rosters automatically updated. Or, you can try to get by for one semester with separate sections.
   
   Classes which are "Cross-listed and Equal" such as ACCT 101 and MATH 101, taught in the same room, at the same time with the same teacher will be automatically merged starting this Fall. This does not include BOT-101A and BOT-101B. I'm not clear on the details why, but that's what they said. Updated 8/11/08 - a single container will be created for every section listed in Colleague. Merging will be as described in the above paragraph. In other words, faculty can combine sections, but they will only get on-going add-drop updates for the section that other sections are being combined into.

Whew. I think that's all of it. There was a lot covered and still a lot that is unknown, but progress is definitely being made!

Submitting an Assignment

Today I finished up the video on Submitting an Assignment. This video can be used by any instructor to show their students how to submit an assignment. Just link to the video from within your Blackboard course.

Creating an Assignment

I made a Captivate movie today to show how to create an assignment in Blackboard. The movie is posted to the Faculty Resources page under Build Your Course, or you can link directly to it. I'll be following that up in the next couple of days with a video on how students submit an assignment and then how to grade an assignment.

I like working in Captivate because it allows me to start off by just clicking on all the spots I need to click on, then I can add notes that I will use record to add narration later. These notes can then be used to create the closed captioning. It's a work flow that works for me and the way I like to work. I love using Camtasia for recording quick instructions, where I don't need to worry much about stumbling over my words now and then, or about adding closed captioning. Ultimately, both products are good and I'm glad I have both available to create videos for our campus.