Tech Tip Tuesday - Grade Book Column Organization

Grade books can be one of the tricky items to set up in Blackboard.  You have to decide between total points and weighted total, how much everything should be worth.  Make sure it comes out correct in the end.

One thing that may help you wrap your head around what you actually have in the grade book is to organize the columns in a way that works for you.

View this week's Tech Tip Tuesday video tutorial on reorganizing your columns and learn what the 'hide' and 'hide from user' buttons do.

Tech Tip Tuesday - End of Semester Checklist

It's that time of year!

End of semester is upon us.

This week's video tutorial, by Nadine Edwards, is a reminder of the things we need to remember to do at the end of each semester.

• Grade Deadline?
• Grade Book Correct?
• Final Grades Submitted to WebXpress
• When To Turn Your Course Off?

*This time of year is very busy for us all so we will be taking a short hiatus and will return with more tech tips in January!  Have a great holiday season everyone!

Tech Tip Tuesday - SafeAssign Part 2 - SafeAssignments

To continue our series on SafeAssign...we will talk this week about SafeAssignments.

Last week we talked about Direct Submit - which is where instructors can submit papers or groups of papers to SafeAssign for plagiarism checking or just to submit them to the database.  Students do not see a SafeAssign report this way, only instructors do.  Last week's post can be found here.

The other option for submitting items to SafeAssign is by setting up SafeAssignments within your Blackboard course and let the students submit their own work for plagiarism checking.  Each different writing assignment what you wish to use SafeAssign for needs it's own SafeAssignment.

Direct Submit and SafeAssignments are generally not BOTH done, you choose one or the other.

SafeAssignment Pros:

• Students submit the paper themselves
• Both students and instructors see the report to make it a learning experience.
• Becomes a gradable item in the grade book (or just make it worth zero, complete/incomplete)

SafeAssignment Cons: 

• Students opting out of submitting their paper to the Global Reference Database (their paper still get's checked but papers in the future will not be checked against theirs)
• Students only get one chance to submit to SafeAssign unless the instructor manually gives them another chance.  Directions on how to give them another chance can be found here.
• The only way students are able to use SafeAssign is if the course has SafeAssignment submission links set up in it.  If you do not use SafeAssignments then students have no access to use SafeAssign.

Many instructors like to set up SafeAssignments within their course and use it as a learning tool.  Some instructors have students submit to SafeAssign first through the SafeAssignment link, make corrections if necessary BEFORE submitting their paper to the instructor for a grade.  

Other instructors like to have students submit their final paper through a SafeAssignment link as their final gradable paper and take the SafeAssign Report into consideration as part of the paper grade.

To set up a SafeAssignment and review SafeAssign Reports in your course follow this tutorial.

To see what a SafeAssignment looks like in student view click here.

Note: If you have a course that is copied out to you semester after semester and has SafeAssignments already set up in it, SafeAssign in your course needs to be SYNCED every time you get your new course or it will not work.  Directions on how to do that can be found here.

Next Week: Part 3 - Reading and Interpreting A SafeAssign Report

Tech Tip Tuesday - What Does The Grade Center Look Like To Students?

With our upgraded Blackboard and awesome new inline grading feature there are many more ways to give students feedback on their submitted assignments.

Whatever way you choose to do it, it's important to understand what your students will see when they log in to check their grades.  Their view has also changed with the upgrade.

This video tutorial, by Nadine Edwards, shows you, as the instructor, your options for grading and feedback as well as what your students will see when they log into to their grade center.

If you do find that your students are confused by the view change or aren't seeing what you know you put in for their grades, this video, made by Blackboard, might help.  ***Please feel free to put a link to the Blackboard made student video in an announcement if necessary, DO NOT link to this blog.  This information is also found in their student help tab when they log into Blackboard.

Tech Tip Tuesday - Inline Grading in Blackboard

One of the features I was most excited about with our Summer 2013 Blackboard update is something called Inline Grading.

This feature takes a lot of those annoying steps out of grading student papers and now allows you to do them all right within Blackboard.  No longer do you have to download their word documents, mark them up, upload them again..etc.etc.etc.  Inline grading now eases the pain a bit.

This week's Tech Tip video tutorial is all about Inline Grading - what is is and how to use it.  I hope you find it helpful and a time saver!

Tech Tip Tuesday - Download Your Grade Center for Offline Use

Last week we covered how to download written assignments for easy offline grading.  There is also a way to download your grade center for easy offline grading.





The two offline options together can be beneficial in many ways such as:

• In case of inclement weather
• Traveling as a passenger in a car or airplane without internet connection
• On the beach with your favorite beverage :)

Here is this week's video tutorial showing how to download your grade center for offline use.

Note:  You do need to eventually enter these grades into the grade center manually or by uploading.

Tech Tip Tuesday - Download Files for Easy Grading

Most online courses here at Stevenson have students turn in papers and assignments in Word Document form.  This requires the instructor to download the document to view and grade it.

There is a way to do a 'bulk download' which allows the instructor to download all the student papers at once and into one folder for easy grading either offline or maybe on another device such as a tablet.  From here the instructor can grade and mark papers how they are used to doing it.

This quick video tutorial show you how to do that.

I don't want to ruin the surprise but I will say that with the new Blackboard update, that will take place this summer, there are many wonderful changes that will make grading easier.

Stay tuned for more information on that and feel free to sign up for any of the EdTech Events we have scheduled.

Tech Tip Tuesday - Grade Center Tips and Tricks

It's that busy time of year again for most of us with the ending of 8W1 courses, midterms and the beginning of 8W2.  You may have found yourself starring at your Blackboard Grade Center screen more than you hoped these past few days.  This gave me the idea to show you three tips that might help make your Blackboard Grade Center life easier.


Tutorial Covers:

1. Grade Center Short Link

2. Data Mining Test/Quiz Results

3. Grading Color Codes

Here is the short video tutorial.