 Teaching and Learning

Blackboard's discussion forums can be used for asynchronous discussion and assessment. In addition to this, the Discussion Forum can also be a good asynchronous place for interactive FAQ's, and for students to collaborate and share articles, resources in a centralized location allowing the instructor to participate and assist as needed. This article demonstrates for Instructors how to create a Discussion Forum for these purposes - as a both a 'Student Lounge" and "Ask your Instructor" forum.

Over Memorial Day weekend 2019, Blackboard is being upgraded, and the method by which login occurs is being changed. This article presents the new methods for logging into Blackboard.

In structuring a Blackboard course, Due Dates for assignments and assessments, and additionally, Visibility Dates for folders, items, and other components, are a key part of ensuring proper deployment and notification to students. The "Date Management" tool allows Course Instructors to view and alter these dates in a centralized area. This is especially useful in courses which contain many components containing visibility or due dates.

The Attendance feature on Blackboard helps instructors manually keep track of their students' attendance in a class, and creates a grade center column, allowing for calculation of an attendance grade. The tool itself has many different functions and ways to use it. This article introduces the Attendance tool and showcases how it works and can be accessed, as well as what settings are available within the tool.

This article provides information on Blackboard Annotate (Bb Annotate), which replaces BB "New Box View" in Inline grading for Blackboard Assignments.

Blackboard courses are exported from Colleague approximately 4 weeks prior to the start of the term, however, this is subject to change, and is typically determined and scheduled several months before the projected start of an upcoming term. This article reflects the current export schedule.

Blackboard is updated on a Continuous Delivery Release Schedule. This article explains the frequency of Blackboard updates, as well as provides resources to review the latest release notes and update information.

Chrome devices, including Chromeboxes and Chromebooks, have emerged as an affordable, popular alternative to Windows and Mac computers over the past few years, for faculty and students alike. Here at Saint Peter’s University, all our classrooms are now equipped with Chromebox devices, replacing the VDI system. This training goes over the features of the Chromebox devices in classrooms, how to use them, and best practices.

While there are several different types of classrooms at Saint Peter's University, Degnan Conference (located in Saint Peter's Hall) and Pope Lecture Hall (PLH) uses different controls for presentation purposes with the available technology.  This article demonstrates how to use the control panel to project/display presentation materials to your students.

The Discussion Board allows for asynchronous discussion and collaboration to take place within a Blackboard course. A Discussion Board can be used for Student Lounges, FAQs, as well as graded assignment, assessment and project submissions. This article explains the components of a Discussion Board and demonstrates how to set up forums and grade submissions.

The default Course Entry point (where both students and instructors land after clicking on the course to access it) is "Announcements". The instructor or Course Admin can change the course entry point, and in some cases, may do this accidentally. This article discusses various ways that the course's entry point can be changed, and in case of an issue, how to reset it manually.

This article summarizes the information and resources available to faculty, staff, and students if Saint Peter's University needs to transition to remote operations.

Blackboard Ally is a powerful tool that allows files in a Blackboard course to be downloaded as alternate formats, allowing greater accessibility for students. Ally has developed a stand-alone website which allows individuals to perform this task outside of a course. Anyone at Saint Peter's University can use this tool. This article demonstrates the steps to generate alternative file formats using the Ally File Transformer Website.

As Saint Peter's University is a "Google School", all faculty, staff, and students have access to this suite of tools. Google Docs is a powerful tool, as it allows files to be created and accessed across all platforms, browsers and devices in a single web-based format. However, there are many applications that our community use, in which specific file types need to be utilized, such as Word documents (.DOCX) or PDF files. The focus of this article is how to use Google Docs to produce these.

Rubrics are a grid-based evaluation system that allows for more accurate assessment of pre-defined categories, associated with one or multiple point values. Many faculty use Rubrics in some form or another when assessing. This article shows how this valuable tool can be digitized and applied in the Learning management system to assignments.

This article demonstrates how to create a weighted total column in Blackboard

The article demonstrates the steps for instructors to create and update a Grade Schema in a course

The following article provides documentation to use the Digital Humanities Lab, which is located on the Basement Fl. of the O'Toole Library.

This article details the steps each user needs to perform the first time they log into each Bloomberg computer in Dinneen G08.

Google Assignments is a tool that allows Instructors to create, maintain and manage assignments in Google, and make them available to students via Blackboard. This article demonstrates how to add Google Assignments to your Blackboard course, and identifies resources for using this tool.

The results of Tests conducted through Blackboard are accessible to students, as long as this has been enabled by the course's instructor. This article shows a demonstration of how to view results of a graded exam/test/quiz on Blackboard, and the steps to take to access this information.

Blackboard's Discussion Boards are widely used in courses as part of assessment and assignments. This step-by-step article explains how participants in Blackboard courses with Discussion Boards can locate postings they have made in that course.

Blackboard Avatars allow you to share an image that will be visible to your professors, students and classmates in your courses' discussion boards and other collaboration areas. This article will guide you through how to upload an avatar as a profile image on Blackboard.

Airtame allows you to connect a laptop to the front display of many Standard or Hyflex classrooms. It is compatible with Windows and Mac laptops, and is a great way to seamlessly display a laptop computer's contents onto your classroom's front display, without needing to use any plugs or adapters. This training shows how to connect to Airtame in a classroom.

If you have created a test, quiz, or exam using Blackboard Tests, there is no direct way to export this to a readable format outside of Blackboard. This article will demonstrate steps to create a PDF file of your Blackboard Test using Google Chrome, that can be shared outside of Blackboard.

Using Blackboard Tests, faculty can assess students by creating quizzes, exams or tests that can utilize a variety of question types, include a timer, allow visibility control options, allow additional per-student accommodations to be made, and provide students with feedback and results in a manner that is controlled by the faculty member. This modular tutorial will cover the steps for setting up, deploying and grading a Test on Blackboard.

When grading assignments and discussions on Blackboard, Rubrics can be incorporated and used to guide grading. This article guides an Instructor on how to use a Rubric when performing inline grading in Blackboard, and assumes that the Instructor has already created a rubric on Blackboard to be used (for more information on this, please see "How to Create a Rubric on Blackboard")

Blackboard's Name Pronunciation feature allows all users (Students, faculty or staff) to type out and record audio of how they would prefer their displayed name to be pronounced, which appears alongside their Blackboard Avatar on Discussion Forum postings, Groups, Class rosters, and in Grading areas. This article provides steps for users to enable this feature, and shows where it displays for both faculty and for students.

The Grading Schema on Blackboard is a feature that converts the numerical values of graded assignments/assessments into letters, based on a map. This also can be used to allow faculty to enter in letter grades and have them calculate a numerical value based on a designated range set up in the schema. This training will explain how to set up, configure, and apply a grading schema in a Blackboard course.

There are several different types of classroom setups at Saint Peter's University. This article contains videos that identify features of each classroom type, as well as demonstrate how to use the control panels in each classroom type to project/display your class materials to your students.

Within each Blackboard course, an instructor or course administrator can use reporting tools to retrieve data including which students accessed during specific timeframes and when; which course content was accessed, how many times it was accessed, and how long students spent logged in to the course. This article provides a tutorial on how to access and generate two of the most common Blackboard Course reports and how to analyze the results.

Google Drive is a place where you can store, retrieve, organize, and share files. It’s in the cloud, so it can be accessed anywhere and anytime, from any computer or mobile device, by using your Saint Peter’s email address and password to log in. This training will cover the basics of Drive - how to access it, how to upload files, how to download files, how to create folders and organize files, and how to share files with others.

This article describes how to use Hybrid Flexible classroom technology

Blackboard's SafeAssign Plagiarism checker can be used to check for Plagiarism on student's assignment submissions, if enabled, and the student completes these submissions through the LMS. In cases where Plagiarism is suspected, and the SafeAssign service is not enabled in an assignment, or the student fails to use the LMS to submit a digital copy, the Instructing Faculty may use the DirectSubmit service to check the file for possible plagiarism.

The McGraw-Hill Connect Building Block was discontinued as of December 30, 2021. In December 2021, a new connection was set up with McGraw-Hill to replace this using an LTIA tool. Following January 1, 2022, faculty who use McGraw-Hill Connect in their courses will access it from a different area of their blackboard course than they used to. This article includes step by step instructions on how to set up the new connection and how to contact McGraw-Hill.

There are two different options that can be used to set up a classroom display: Mirroring and Extending. This article defines what these are, and provides steps on how to check and set this for a classroom. The article includes both a demonstration video and step-by-step instructions.

This article provides steps into adjusting student with multiple registration records

This article demonstrates how instructors can personalize their My Course list in Blackboard

If you plan on using Microsoft files with advanced features like embedded audio, or SPSS files in your classroom, you will need to open them within Apporto for them to display and work properly. This article describes how to use the Apporto Full Desktop to access Audio PowerPoints and other advanced Microsoft files (as well as SPSS files) in classrooms and labs using Chromeboxes.

There are occasionally situations in which a course section on Colleague is "cancelled" for the purpose of modifying the course's name or ID. In these situations, extra steps need to be taken to ensure that the corresponding Blackboard shell is modified (instead of a new Blackboard shell being created), and that the enrollment data is re-mapped so it will flow to this existing Blackboard shell. This article explains the steps that need to be taken to ensure that this occurs properly.

This article demonstrates the steps to refresh a LIVE Excel sheet

Saint Peter’s University utilizes a variety of instructional tools in its distance learning courses, and those tools may also be used in non-distance learning courses. This guide will help locate support for these tools.

The article will demonstrate how to set up test feedback in Blackboard

Blackboard courses make frequent use of Assignments, which require students to submit files or text to their instructor for grading. This article identifies the elements of Assignments, steps students will need to take to submit assignments, and troubleshooting information relating to Blackboard Assignment submissions.

The Blackboard Text Editor, or Visual Text Box Editor (VTBE) is typically the “Description” field where instructors will add information about a course element they have created. This is also used when instructors provide feedback to students when grading, and where messages to the class or individual students are composed. This field contains many options and features which will be identified in this article.

For online classes, it is recommended that Faculty utilize virtual "office hours" during which students are encouraged to reach out and ask questions about their course or assignments. This article demonstrates several methods and tools that can be used for faculty to conduct office hours virtually, in addition to best practices.

This article will provide guidance and best practices for suggestions on how to prepare your classes in advance of a disruption, and procedures you can follow to ensure you are still able to reach and teach your students if any shutdown or incident prevents your class from assembling on campus.

This article provides information on TutorMe, and how to contact TutorMe Support for concerns or issues.

On June 1, 2023, Blackboard issued a release (v3900.67.0) which contains an update to the look and feel of the area within an Assignment Submission on Blackboard for students. This article explores the new layout of this functionality.

This article demonstrates the steps in uploading a document through SafeAssign in Blackboard

This article demonstrates how students can add YouTube videos on Blackboard

This article describes how to operate the control panels (otherwise known as Room Automation) in the different types of classrooms you'll find at the University.

Google Meet has a Recording feature which allows faculty to record their sessions, and share these recordings with their students. This article demonstrates several ways that Faculty can use Google Meet to create a "Lecture Capture" in Google Meet by recording a presentation, then sharing the recording with their students.

This article contains information on how Course Instructors and Administrators can generate and retrieve course evaluation reporting data using Watermark Course Evaluations and Surveys.

This article resolves a common issue that occurs when a Blackboard user attempts to access a Blackboard course in a windowed screen (the menu is contracted), providing details about how to expand the left navigational menu.