Grading Discussion Board Forums

Navigating from one student to the next has changed a bit when grading a Blackboard Discussion Board forum. In a forum, click on the Grade Discussion Forum button, then click on a student's name to grade them, just as you've always done. The navigation from one student to the next has changed here. See the image below to see how to use these new navigation buttons to go from one student to the next and experiment with them to see how they work.

Help Your Students Login to Blackboard

Some of your students may have trouble getting logged into Blackboard. You have the ability to check to see what username they should be using and you can change their password if needed. Chris Rodgers, my counterpart at Grossmont College, created a video that shows how to do this that you can find on the Online Success website under "Verifying Usernames & Changing Passwords."

Submit a Blackboard Assignment Video

There is a new video for how to submit an assignment in Blackboard that you can link to for your students to view at http://www.gcccd.edu/online/student/blackboard/how-to-submit-a-blackboard-assignment.html. If you linked to this video previously, it is now at a different URL, so please update your courses.

Most of the Blackboard tutorials for students on the Online Success website at http://www.gcccd.edu/online/student/step-4-blackboard.html  have been updated for the new version of Blackboard. Please share these with your students. Only the submit assignment video needs an updated URL, so if you already have links to the other tutorials, they should be okay.

Introduction Video: Why Your Online Course Needs One

I just read an excellent article on why you should create an introduction video for your online course that I wanted to share that with you. You can read it at http://facultyecommons.org/introduction-video/.

The article includes links to a few tools to help make these videos, but all you really need is a webcam. You can watch an introduction video created by our new Spanish instructor for Cuyamaca College's first online Spanish course at http://youtu.be/wCCW33mO32o. Donna Marques recorded this video using her laptop webcam and the new "Record from  Webcam" tool that is now included in every content editor in Blackboard.

You can edit YouTube's automatically generated captions by following the instructions at https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2734705.

Flex Week Workshops

You might be interested in attending some of the workshops listed below during Flex Week. All workshops shown here are in room E-206.

There are two workshops of particular interest to online teachers on Tuesday -- "Are you a Distance Educator or Correspondence Educator?" and  "Great Practices in Online Teaching and Lunch Discussion."

You can learn how to capture video recordings of what's on your computer monitor (such as a PowerPoint or even input from a tablet) along with your voice as you lecture in the classroom so that students can review the material after class. This workshop is on Wednesday at 3pm.

Find out more about these workshops at http://www.cuyamaca.edu/professionaldev/schedule.asp.

	Monday
		6:00 pm to 7:30pm	What’s New in Blackboard?
	Tuesday
		10:00 am to 11:00 am	Are you a Distance Educator or Correspondence Educator?
		11:00 am to 1:00 pm	Great Practices in Online Teaching and Lunch Discussion
		2:30 pm to 4:00 pm	Accessibility
		5:30 pm to 7:00 pm	Blackboard I: Getting Started
		7:00 pm to 8:00 pm	Blackboard II: Course Menu and Adding Items
	Wednesday
		1:00 pm to 2:30 pm	What’s New in Blackboard?
		3:00 pm to 4:30 pm	Capture It Live!
		5:30 pm to 7:00 pm	Blackboard III: Grade Center
		7:00 pm to 8:00 pm	Blackboard IV: Tests and Quizzes
		8:00 pm to 8:30 pm	Use Blackboard to Assess SLOs
	Thursday
		4:00 pm to 5:00 pm	Blackboard V: Assignments and SafeAssignments
	Friday
		11:30 am to 12:30 pm	Open Lab

Another Blackboard Upgrade in August

An email was sent to faculty teaching classes this summer asking whether or not they thought a bug we were experiencing in the discussion board was worth going to a new look and feel for Blackboard. These faculty reported that they preferred that we wait until the Summer Semester is over before doing this update. Today, at the district-wide ITAC meeting, it was confirmed that we will honor your wishes. For more information about what prompted the question in the first place, please watch the video at  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OR9oebPB5TA. I want to thank the faculty that responded for their quick replies and great input. We just want to do what's right for you!

Since we need to upgrade in August, we anticipate going to version SP13. We will install SP13 on our test server on July 1st. We will test it to make sure it works okay during July, then we'll install SP13 on the live server on August 8th.

This upgrade will bring a slew of bug fixes and two new features over what was already new in SP11 which we're on now.

The first change is the new look and feel for Blackboard which is explained in this video: http://ondemand.blackboard.com/r91/movies/bb91_tools_2012_theme.htm. This new look and feel is required to get full functionality restored to the discussion boards.

The second change provides enhanced test options that will accommodate students with disabilities, allow students who could not take a test during the specified time period to take it later, and the ability to show different detail in the test results when students first take the test than after the test has been closed. I think you're going to love these new test options! David Gray of Palomar College did a video showing these new test features that you can view at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36TBDFwYbZs.

As always, we will do our best to make sure plenty of training is offered about these new features, and that the new version is stable so that you can concentrate on your teaching. I will offer two workshops during Flex Week on the new Blackboard features, and this blog is the best place to find the most recent information about Blackboard. If you know anyone who hasn't subscribed to this blog, please have them visit my web page at http://www.cuyamaca.edu/rhonda.bauerlein/ and put their email address in the "Subscribe to Blog" section at the bottom of the page.