Blackboard Learn Upgrade

We will updating to the latest version of Blackboard Learn, Service Packs 10 & 11, beginning on May 9th at 10:00pm Eastern through May 11th at Noon. These updates will provide a more user friendly and modern experience for you as a daily user of the system. Feel confident that the updates to Blackboard Learn were done with educators and students in mind. Nearly 640 institutions, including ones like HCC, as well as over 600 educators and nearly 600 students contributed to the development of this latest release of Blackboard.

Several existing features have been improved and some exciting new features added to make your day more efficient. Here is an overview of tools that you can expect to be using soon:

• New Content Editor: The new Content Editor vastly improves the user experience for formatting text, pasting content from Microsoft Word, and adding content to all areas of Learn. Blackboard has also replaced the old math editor with a new mathML equation editor.
• Assessment Item Analysis: Now you can easily refine your assessments by evaluating the quality of each question and that question’s ability to discriminate between students who understand the material and those who do not. Ineffective questions can easily be identified and then quickly corrected with the Automatic Regrade feature.
• My Blackboard: This feature introduces a new, modern user experience in Blackboard Learn that consolidates critical information from all your Courses and Organizations as well as your school-wide academic network. The new tools in My Blackboard – Profile, Posts, Updates, My Grades, and People – were developed to meet the needs of today’s active learner and enhance student engagement. My Blackboard allows you to easily monitor activity across your courses. You can be confident that your students are up-to-date and engaged in the online learning experience.
• New Global Navigation Menu: Always present in the top right corner, the new navigation menu is the entry point to My Blackboard and also provides one-click access to your Courses, Settings, and Blackboard Help. Additionally, the new menu will tell you how many items in My Blackboard are new or need your attention, so you never miss a thing.

Resources to Help

To ensure you can familiarize yourself with these new features of Blackboard Learn and be ready to integrate them in your instruction. Here are a few valuable resources that you may be interested in reviewing which are offered by Blackboard and CITT:

• CITT Resources – a set of resources from Blackboard and CITT
• Quick Hit Videos – a set of videos on YouTube that introduce all the new features
• On-Demand Learning Center – free access to video tutorials and getting started guides.
• Feature Showcase – review all of the new features.
• Guided Trial – experience a pre-populated course in Blackboard Learn. Check out the latest features as well as tips and tricks for grading and student collaboration.
• Help.Blackboard.com – assistance using the new Blackboard Learn platform, organized by role.
• Educator Cohort – series of online meetings to familiarize educators with new features

FREE Blackboard Webinars for Faculty

The Blackboard Innovative Teaching Series (BITS) is a training initiative to help augment HCC's internal Blackboard faculty training efforts. Harnessing our community of Blackboard users, BITS will share the top strategies and pedagogy for both increasing educator efficiency and improving learning outcomes.

To register go to: http://www.blackboard.com/BITS

Blackboard Service Pack 10 Update

Blackboard is update to Service Pack 10!

Some new features include:

• My Blackboard
• New Global Navigation Menu
• Text and Text-to-Voice Course Notifications
• New Content Editor
• Assessment Item Analysis

Check out what’s coming in the next Service Pack : http://go.blackboard.com/faculty

End of Term Record Keeping

It's that time of year again - finals!

Did you know that you can create detailed user activity reports in MyHCC? You can also download your grade book to save in Excel. Creating both of these reports is an easy way to keep a digital record for yourself and can also be helpful in financial aid reporting.

Follow these tutorials to create your reports:
Creating an End of Term Activity Report

Creating a Grade Center Report

HCC now has NBC Learn for Blackboard!

NBC Learn has archived video content (dating back to the 1920s) that can be used in your MyHCC course. The video collection is updated regularly to include current content being broadcast on NBC news programs.

Interested in using NBC Learn content in your course? Check out this how-to video

Want to see how other faculty are using NBC Learn? View this testimonial from Grand Rapids Community College

Finally, here are some fast facts on the collections

Blackboard Service Pack 8 Upgrade

During the 2012 Winter Break MyHCC/Blackboard will be upgraded to Service Pack 8 (SP8). At first glance, MyHCC/Blackboard will look very different from what you are currently seeing. The interface has been redesigned to make navigation more clear and easier to use. The location of all of Blackboard’s tools and menus, however, are exactly where they are now.

For an overview of the new features in Service Pack 8, check out this video

For print tutorials on the changes coming with Service Pack 8, click through the resources on this page.

Finally, CITT is hosting live previews of Blackboard's Service Pack 8 upgrade on all campuses. These previews will be held Friday, November 30th and Friday, December 7th. Service Pack 8's new features and mechanics will be highlighted. To join us for a session, please register

Turning PowerPoint into an Interactive PDF

Contributed by Don Modesto
EAP Faculty - Ybor Campus

PROBLEM
To distribute Powerpoints to students:

1. allowing them to fill in blanks
2. without allowing them to edit the Powerpoint file (to prevent confusion re: which is the teacher’s and which are students’ revisions)
3. that they can print efficiently
4. ie, four slides to a page so as not to waste paper (I was appalled once to see a student had printed a 30-slide Powerpoint one slide to a page)

SOLUTION
Google turned up PDFill (http://www.pdfill.com/). Downloaded, PDFill puts an option in your Powerpoint Print dialogue allowing you to “print” to a PDF file (which can then be uploaded to Blackboard.) In your Powerpoint presentation, you select Print and then choose PDFill, as below:

After that, you configure for the layout, color, etc.:

When you tell it to “print,” PDFill converts your Powerpoint into a PDF file. I’ve used it several times now, and it works as described.

ANNOTATE THE PDF
When students download and open the pdf file, they will have to click the Add Text icon in the tool bar in order to add text to the page. The implementation is a little clumsy, but it works. As below, there are several formatting choices on the floating Add Text toolbar.

POWERPOINT SHOW FORMAT
I have previously distributed Powerpoints as “Powerpoint Shows” (Save as, Save as type: Powerpoint Show) which open immediately to a full screen presentation with no opportunity to edit or, alas, print. This is fine should you choose to distribute your entire Powerpoint. I no longer do this. I save my lesson in a students’ version and then replace critical terms with blanks to encourage active learning and then, as above, save and distribute it as a PDF.

Blackboard Mobile Learn

The Blackboard Mobile™ Learn platform takes interactive teaching and learning mobile, giving students and educators access to their courses, content and organizations on a variety of devices including iOS®, Android™, BlackBerry®, and webOS® smartphones.

With Blackboard Mobile, you'll have access to the following features:

• Push Notifications
• Announcements
• Grades
• Discussions
• Content
• Blogs
• Journals
• Rosters
• Tasks

**WARNING: There is also a Mobile Test feature. Please DO NOT allow students to take exams via their mobile device.**

You can learn more about Blackboard Mobile here: http://www.blackboard.com/Platforms/Mobile/Products/Mobile-Learn/Features.aspx

MyHCC Resources Added to MyHCC Dashboard

If you logged into MyHCC today, you may have noticed a new module on your MyHCC dashboard. This module, titled MyHCC Tutorials, provides MyHCC "how-to" instructions and videos.

Remember, you can also always access these MyHCC resources, plus many more, from the CITT website:
CITT home > Tutorials and Trainings > MyHCC

Safe Assign is Here!

SafeAssign compares submitted assignments against a set of academic papers to identify areas of overlap between the submitted assignment and existing works. Safe Assign is used to prevent plagiarism and to create opportunities to help students identify how to properly attribute sources rather than paraphrase. SafeAssign is effective as both a deterrent and an educational tool.

After a paper has been processed, a report will be available detailing the percentage of text in the submitted paper that matches existing sources. It also shows the suspected sources of each section of the submitted paper that returns a match. Instructors can delete matching sources from the report and process it again. This may be useful if the paper is a continuation of a previously submitted work by the same student. Because SafeAssign identifies all matching blocks of text, it is important to read the report carefully and investigate whether or not the block of text is properly attributed.

Want to start using Safe Assign in your classes? Click the link for a step-by-step tutorial on activating Safe Assign and setting up Safe Assignments: http://citt.hccfl.edu/files/Bb_SafeAssign.pdf

Tutorial: How to Hide the Previous Semester's Courses in Blackboard

Want to hide courses that are no longer active/available?

Then, follow these quick and painless steps: http://citt.hccfl.edu/files/bb_hidecourse.pdf.

Hiding the course does not compromise the course's content. You can re-show courses at any time.

Helpful Blackboard Tips

Don’t forget that by the first day of class, all courses need to be made available to students. Access the Course Availability tutorial at http://citt.hccfl.edu/files/bb_availability.pdf

Test Students do not copy over to your new course sections. To add a test student to each of your courses, access http://citt.hccfl.edu/files/Bb_TestStudent.pdf

Are you making the transition from Campus Cruiser to Blackboard? These can help!

• PDF: http://citt.hccfl.edu/tutorials/CC_Bb.pdf
• Recorded Webinar: http://hillsborough.adobeconnect.com/p39pwkzpych/

MyHCC (Blackboard): New Messages Indicator is Here!!!!

The messaging feature in MyHCC (Blackboard) has been updated and improved. There is now an indicator to let you know you have messages! When you enter the system and click on the Blackboard Courses tab you should see a notification of any unread messages within the course.

Using Announcements to Enhance Student Communication

Blackboard's Announcement Tool can help you direct your students' attention to specific course items. This PDF Tutorial uncovers how effective Announcements can enhance course communication.

Click Here to Download the Announcement Tutorial.

What's New in Blackboard

Curious about what's new in Blackboard? Check out these videos:

• Customizing the Navigation Panel (2:17 min)
• Interactive Tools (2:22 min)
• Adding and Submitting Assignments (2:30 min)

Learn More About Blackboard Training

Want to learn more about the Blackboard training courses? View this brief video for an overview.

Other features of Blackboard training include the following:

• All training courses include tips, strategies, and best practices for facilitating successful distance learning courses
• Beginning Fall 2011, all courses, on ground and online, will receive a Blackboard course shell
• beginning Spring 2012, Blackboard will replace Campus Cruiser for web enhanced and hybrid course delivery

Blackboard Learn 9.1 is Here!

HCC’s new learning management system, Blackboard Learn 9.1, deploys College-wide in August, 2011.

CITT Faculty Professional Development and the Blackboard Implementation Training Committee are pleased to announce comprehensive training to prepare faculty to facilitate all levels of distance learning course offerings including including web-enhanced, hybrid, and fully online courses. Training courses include:

• Tier 1 Training: For all faculty who teach using the Blackboard LMS; designed for those who teach pre-designed web-enhanced, hybrid, or online courses (20 hrs)*
• Tier 2 Training: For all faculty who design and develop web-enhanced, hybrid, and online courses (20 hrs)* Upon completion of Tier 2 training, a Blackboard course shell will be made available to begin developing your Fall 2011 courses.
• Tier 3 Training: Optional training of advanced Blackboard functions and multimedia (available Fall, 2011)

*A pilot test of the training revealed that actual time for course completion is 12 – 15 hrs. Training completers receive 20 hours of professional development per course.

Don't Delay - Register Today
Training begins March 1st. To register here for Blackboard training.

**If you are teaching web-enhanced, hybrid, or online courses this Fall, please register for training right away. If you are not using the LMS until Spring, 2012, please do not register until May.

Blackboard Learn Implementation Tentative Timeline:

Blackboard Learn Implementation Tentative Timeline:

• Nov. – December 2010 – Faculty Identify Courses to Migrate
• Nov. 2010 – Update Online@HCC environment from CE 6.2.3 to CE 8
• Nov. 2010 – March 2011 – Datatel/BB integration (OIT)
• Dec- Jan 2011 – Courses Migrated to BB Learn 9.1
• Feb. – July 2011 – Faculty Training
• Feb. - Early August 2011 – Faculty Complete Courses in BB Learn
• May 2011 – BB Learn Summer Pilot
• Fall 2011 – BB Learn Implemented College wide

Also, beginning Friday, November 26th through Sunday, November 28th 2010, the Online@HCC environment will be unavailable due to a planned system upgrade to CE version 8. This upgrade is required in order to prepare the Online@HCC database to migrate courses to Blackboard Learn 9.1 over Winter break in December and early January in preparation for a Blackboard Learn 9.1 implementation in early May of 2011.