As instructors continue to familiarize themselves with Blackboard Learn, ITaP technologists offer the following tips and resources to help manage course content.

Managing a course – When setting up a course, instructors should first create a master course (you will need to log in with your Purdue career account) before transferring material to the “live,” Banner-generated course accessible to students. A master course is a content development area used to build and prepare course material. Once the master course is created and content added, the instructional content should be copied into the Banner course. Resources to assist with copying a course may be found here.

Before students can access content in the “live” courses, instructors must make a simple setting change to make the courses available.

At the end of the semester, instructors who wish to preserve changes made to their Banner-generated course or to keep their master course updated can use these instructions.

Using Student View – In Blackboard Learn, Student View is listed as a tab on the menu area. Clicking the tool creates a demo account, which allows instructors to see the course as a student, try out quizzes or view grades. To use Student View the demo account must remain activated.

Pasting content from Microsoft Word – Course content text that is copied and pasted from Microsoft Word may be problematic. Using the “Paste from Word” mashup tool helps resolve the issue.

To avoid additional problems when entering course content, verify that the text editor is enabled under Personal Settings. The text editor regulates the input and format of text, equations and multimedia files.

Creating a non-academic course – To create a non-credit, non-academic course in Blackboard Learn in which fees are charged to participants, the instructor should contact Purdue Extended Campus at pec@purdue.edu or 765-494-2975 to initiate enrollment services and Learn setup.

For non-credit, non-academic courses in which no fees are charged, instructors may contact ITaP’s teaching and learning unit at tlt-consulting@lists.purdue.edu or 765-494-9186.

Adding extra participants or collaborators to an academic, for-credit course – West Lafayette campus instructors may wish to include non-enrolled students, faculty, subject-matter experts, alumni or others in an academic course to enrich the learning experience or critique course content. Often, this is governed by academic policies. Instructors should contact Lesa Beals (lbeals@purdue.edu, 765-494-6164) or Cheryl Arroyo (cheryla@purdue.edu, 765-494-7228) in the Office of the Registrar to begin the process.

Emptying the recycle bin – Content deleted from a course goes to the Blackboard Learn recycle bin, located under the Content Collection tab. Clicking on the recycle bin allows the user to free up storage space by selecting individual items to permanently delete. To delete everything in the folder, click “Empty Recycle Bin.” 

Blackboard Users Group – Instructors can get further help with Blackboard Learn through the Blackboard Users Group (BUG). The group’s next meeting will be from 1:30-2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 29, in Stewart Center, Room 313. Users may attend in person or connect online via Adobe Connect. Discussion topics may be submitted prior to the meeting in Hotseat.

This semester, BUG meetings also are scheduled for March 4 and April 16. Please visit the ITaP training calendar to register for these and other events. During this semester’s three BUG sessions, ITaP educational technologists will demonstrate some of the features of Blackboard Learn 9.1 and offer information on Learn-related topics. The complete agenda for each BUG meeting will be available a few days before the meeting date on the BUG wiki. Previous BUG meetings are available for viewing.

Writer: Jonathan Hines, technology writer, ITaP, 765-496-7998, hines18@purdue.edu

Sources: Connie Bilyeu, project manager, ITaP Academic Technologies, 765-494-6119, cbilyeu@purdue.edu

Suzanne Ahlersmeyer, instructional designer, ITaP Academic Technologies, 765-496-7403, smahlers@purdue.edu

Last updated: Jan. 23, 2013

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