Extending Deadlines in Turnitin using Blackboard 9

These are instructions for changing due dates and/or accepting late submissions in Turnitin assignments in Blackboard 9:

• Make sure Edit mode is ON (top right of screen)
• Then go to Assignment Dropbox in the left hand panel
• Select dropdown menu next to the Turnitin assignment you want to edit
• Select EDIT
• change due date
• change post date
• then save

However, if you want to just accept late papers and not change the due date:

• in the screen where you can change the due date, select More Options
• scroll down to the option that says Accept Late Submissions? Switch to yes
• and Save

see screenshot below (click to enlarge)

Evaluating your online course design - based on Quality Matters standards

Course objectives
-you should have overall course objectives
-you should have module and/or weekly objectives
-all course objectives must be measurable

Alignment
-all of your assignments should align with the course objectives

Practice exercises
-how will your students practice for exams/quizzes?


Welcome video or note
-expectations of instructor, important policies, introduction to the course...etc
-students are introduced to the structure of the course

Links to 3 types of support
-academic support (library, research databases)
-disability support (disability center)
-technical support (troubleshooting)

Videos
-all videos must have transcripts for blind and/or deaf students

Navigation of the course
-do students know how to get started
-where is most of your content located

Moodle: Viewing all your topic boxes

Press the icon below instead of using the Jump To drop down menu to see all the Topic Boxes

Religious Studies Graduate Orientation Presentation

Click image below to download the presentation on Online Teaching in FIU Religious Studies Dept.

(This was made for a Teaching Assistant Orientation)

Changing Answers to Exams/Quizzes After Students Have Attempted Them

Applicable to Blackboard 9 only

If you realize a question has the wrong answer set up as the correct answer, and students have already taken the quiz/exam, there is still a way to change their grades.

The example below exemplifies a True or False question, in which the correct answer was set to False when it should have been set to True.

Follow screenshots below in order to give the student credit for the question.

Instructions:

1. Go to Grade Center
2. Select the drop down menu on the column of the exam/quiz you need to edit.
3. Select Grade Questions
4. Select the question set where the question is located.
5. Select the number on the rightmost column of the question that needs editing
6. Select Edit for each student that did not receive credit for the correct answer
7. Override the score with the points the answer was worth.

Click Image to Enlarge

Two Ways to Grade Turnitin Assignments in Blackboard 9

One way to grade Turnitin Assignments in Blackboard 9 is through Grade Center> Needs Grading.

There is another way as well. If you prefer grading as if you were inside Turnitin.com, in which you see the Turnitin Inbox, here is how to grade in this view. See screenshots below.

In this view, you can delete papers and submit papers on behalf of students, in addition to grading.


Click on image below to enlarge

Submitting a Quiz on behalf of a Student - Blackboard 9

If your Blackboard 9 online course has multiple choice quizzes or exams that grade themselves, there are some confusing situations that can arise if the student does not submit the exam/quiz/assignment on time.

Use these same instructions for quizzes that get stuck with the "Attempt in Progress" icon:

• For quizzes/exams that grade themselves and show up in the Grade Center with a Green Exclamation Mark, go to Grade Center.
• Click the dropdown menu next to the quiz/exam that Needs Grading.
• Select Attempt that shows the exclamation mark.
• Find the button that says Submit. (It should be under Test Information or near the top of the screen)
• If the Submit button is not showing, select "Save and Exit"

Click Image below to see Larger View of Screen shots

Checklist - First day of your online class on Blackboard 9

In the ideal world, instructors have access to their online course(s) weeks before the semester begins. In reality, many courses are not even set up for instructors and students until the first day of the semester.

I have designed a short checklist that instructors should use to ensure the most important aspects of the course are set up correctly:

Before anything else, acquaint yourself with the syllabus

• In some cases, you may not be the person who designed the syllabus for the online course (especially if you are a teaching assistant). Know the policies, rubrics, assignments, dates, etc.

Content

__ 1. Are all the readings listed in the syllabus uploaded to the course?

__ 2. Do all the links and videos work properly?

__ 3. Are all the written assignments set up as Turnitin assignments?

• Use Turnitin for all written work; it works great to catch plagiarism and the grading is fantastic for leaving comments on your students' work. 
• Sometimes written assignments are set up in the default setting of Blackboard -students either upload their document or type it into a provided text box. Stay away from this kind of set up if you are concerned about plagiarism. You can identify this type of set-up by the icon of the assignment. 

Assessments

__ 4. Do the dates and deadlines make sense in Blackboard? Do they match the syllabus?

• Remember, you are teaching the course for the semester; if you think your students should have more or less time for certain assignments/exams, you can extend deadlines.

__ 5. Are the quizzes and exams set up with the time limit listed on the syllabus?

• If the syllabus lists 15 minutes for each quiz and Blackboard is set up for 10 minutes or an hour, that is a problem. These inconsistencies need to be resolved ASAP.

__6. How many attempts are listed for each quiz and each exam? 

• Mistakes happen. Make sure the number of attempts a student has for each assessment is correct. 

__7. Is the feedback setting for each quiz and exam set up correctly?

• If students have multiple attempts for a quiz, it is not a good idea to have the feedback in Blackboard provide the students with the correct answers on their first attempt.

 

__ 8. Is Respondus Lockdown Browser set up for your quizzes and exams?

• For more info on Lockdown Browser and how to set it up for tests, read my previous post HERE

Respondus Lockdown Browser- Preventing Cheating

The Respondus Lockdown is a neat feature in Blackboard (both CE 8 and Learn 9). It is a security measure that deters students from looking up answers. Exams opened in lockdown browser will not allow the student to open or close any other windows or programs while the exam is being taken This feature makes cheating more inconvenient to the student. It is still possible for students to look up answers in other ways, but at least it will make browsing the internet/personal files for the answers a bit more challenging.

In Blackboard CE 8, the lockdown browser feature is programmable through the Edit Properties of each assessment. Here are the steps to enabling the Lockdown Browser for a particular assessment (quizzes and tests):

Step 1 - Click image to enlarge

Step 2 - Click image to enlarge

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In Blackboard Learn 9, the lockdown browser feature is enabled through a different path. Follow screenshots below.

Step 1 - Click image to enlarge

 Step 2- Click image to enlarge

 Step 3 - Click image to enlarge

Audio Recording - Writing your script

For this entry, I will emphasize lectures for the Humanities.

So, you need to add some audio to your Powerpoint presentations? WRITE A SCRIPT.

Some individuals have the ability to write down a few bullet points and produce an awesome voice over for their Powerpoints; however, others do not have this talent.

Here are the main components your audio lecture should have:



Components:

-Introduction: what will this lecture cover?

• Briefly reference the topics you will discuss and what the learning objectives of this lecture will be.
• Example: Hello class. This lecture will cover the early life of the Prophet Muhammad and how the religion of Islam came to prominence in the Arabian peninsula in the 7th century CE. I will also cover the historical context from out of which Muhammad arises, in order to give you a solid understanding of the cultural and political norms of the time period. At the end of this lecture, you will have a better grasp of who Muhammad was and how he founded the religion of Islam.

-Dates of Important Events

• Is your lecture missing dates? It is very important you place the events and people you are lecturing on in an historical context. Your listener needs to be able to connect your subject matter with a timeline of historical events. 
• When you mention a historical period, make sure you connect what other events were happening around the same time. It makes learning more effective.
• For example: The Buddha is said to have lived in India during the 6th century BCE. This was also the time period that Socrates was philosophizing in Athens.

-Names of important individuals and books

• Enrich your lecture by referencing important authors, political figures, and religious figures of the epoch you are lecturing on. Remember, your subject does not exist in a vacuum. 
• Reference authors that have researched the topic you are engaging. Provide these supplementary readings to your students for further research.

-Vocabulary words

• If you are lecturing on non-English words, make sure you provide the grammatical spelling of  each word, as well as the phonetic pronunciation of each word in your powerpoint presentation.
• If you are not sure how to phonetically pronounce a word, look it up in Wikipedia. They always start their pages with a phonetic pronunciation of the word they are defining.
• Define the words clearly.

-Specific examples

• Use specific examples when you are explaining a concept. You can always make references to particular wars, diseases, cultural events, personal experiences, religions, rituals, etc.
• Don't let your lecture be mostly characterized by generic words and general explanations. Students will stop listening to your lectures early on if they feel they are being fed obvious and general facts.

-Conversational Tone

• Don't sound like you are reading from a piece of paper. Pretend you are talking in front of a class full of students.
• Do not read off the Powerpoints. Your students can read; they do not need you to read to them.

Use the News in your Online Course

Keep your courses relevant to what is happening in the world. Your students will be able to keep up with current events, as well as make connections between the subject matter and reality.

You can incorporate news articles into your courses in the following ways:

1. Post the news coverage topic that you want the class to engage in the discussion forum each week. Have the students provide feedback by citing legitimate academic sources to back up their response.

2. Allow each student to post their own weekly news coverage topic in the discussion forum and have them reply to at least three of their classmates' posts.

3. Make one of the course assignments about contemporary events related to the subject matter.

4. Post a list of news article links the students should read each week and make short pop quizzes related to those links. You may average their pop quiz grades and use it as part of their overall participation grade.

5. Post a list of links to news videos on the same story by different news stations. Have each student write an analysis of how each station portrays the story (differences in words used, facts, images, facial expressions of speakers, questions asked, etc.).

Choosing Activities for Your Moodle 1.9 Course

Taken from Moodle tutorials offered through FIU  (ecampus.fiu.edu)

The information below will help you choose the right Moodle activity for a particular learning outcome.

 

Assignments (Assignments are graded)

• Upload a Single File - Use for any type of assignment where student works with electronic file: Writing, Desktop Publishing, Graphics, Audio, Video, Chart, Spreadsheet, Coding, etc.
• Advanced Uploading of Files - Same as above, except allows multiple files and/or multiple exchanges of a file. Choosing Single or Advanced Uploadif you want to mark up and give back a draft submission to the students.
• Offline Assignment - Use for anything you want the student to do and submit outside of Moodle, including manual assignment submissions, class presentations, etc.
• Online Text - Any type of online writing assignment. Allows repeat submissions and inline comments by teacher.

Chat

• Live, synchronous discussion.
• Best used for short, scheduled sessions, including office hours, study sessions, peer tutoring, or specific topic discusssion.

Fundamental Tools for Blackboard 9 Learning System

Taken from FIU Online (online.fiu.edu)

1)           Introductory Video:  This can be a brief (1 minute or so) recording of you.  FIU Online can facilitate this recording.  You can contact your instructional designer to discuss the process for producing this video.

2)           Discussion board: This is a place to post discussion topics for student response and interaction.  Weekly topics can help keep them engaged with the subject matter.  Both Moodle and Blackboard have discussion board capability.

3)           Turnitin.com (if you are assigning papers): Turnitin is the leading originality checking and plagiarism prevention service.  FIU has a license with Turnitin.com so there is no fee for using this tool.  Links to Turnitin.com are available in both Moodle and Blackboard. 

Other Interesting Tools:

Depending on the course content and learning outcomes, the tools listed below are available and are excellent for enhancing a student’s understanding of course material.

A)           Adobe Connect Pro: Allows faculty and students to have live online meetings. The meeting room enables attendees to share computer screens or files, as well as to chat, broadcast live audio and video, and take part in other interactive online activities. For more information click here.

Powerpoint Presentation Help

Download the following handout to find out what makes an effective Powerpoint presentation.

Click the picture below to download

Engage Students through Media

Teaching online allows you to reach your students through many avenues that would be too time consuming in the classroom.

Make sure to include all or, at least most, of the following types of media/learning modules in your online class:

• Photos
• Create photo albums using Flickr, Photobucket, or Picasa
• Pictures of historical figures, places, events, rituals, etc., can draw the student closer to the course material
• Documentaries
• There are lots of free documentaries, movies, and videos out in the internet. Don't worry about copyright, as long as you are not profiting from screening the movies/documentaries, then you should be covered by the Fair Use doctrine in the US Copyright Law.
• Powerpoints
• Do not overload your powerpoint slides with paragraphs.
• Recorded Lectures - audio and/or visual of professor lecturing 

Brief Tutorial of Blackboard Learn 9

Below is a powerpoint presentation on using Blackboard 9 from the instructor's point of view. It is a lot more useful than the 900 page manual the official Blackboard website has distributed.

Click picture below to view the powerpoint presentation

Use this Rubric to Assess your Online Course

I attended a Quality Matters (QM) presentation at the FIU Online Conference 2011 in Miami a few months ago. Here is how they approach evaluating online courses qualitatively.

Use the QM rubric to evaluate your own course. Does your course meet 72 out of 85 points with this rubric?

For more information on Quality Matters’ services, you can visit their website here.

NOTE:This is the short version of the Quality Matters Rubric. Click on the image below to see a larger view of the rubric.