What is Blackboard

Navigating Blackboard

Frequently Asked Questions

Instructional Tutorial Documents

Instructional Tutorial Videos

Tips & Tricks

Maintenance

Additional Resources from Blackboard

— Top of Page — What is Blackboard?

Blackboard is the course management software used at Missouri S&T. It provides faculty with a palette of tools they can use for presenting course content online. Blackboard includes components for communication with students, managing course grade books, creating and administering tests, and many other instructional purposes. It's easy for both students and course designers to use and allows instructors to give their students secure, password-controlled access to course materials from virtually any computer with an internet connection.

Some of Blackboard's tools include:

• Class mailing lists (all students, all instructors, all users, selected users)
• Threaded discussion boards
• Real-time online chat
• Shared course calendar
• Content areas for posting documents, files, or web links
• Electronic grade book
• Rule-based access to course materials
• Easy creation of online quizzes, test, and surveys
• Digital dropbox for submission and return to online assignments
• Ability to create separate workgroups with their own file exchange and communications tool

— Top of Page — Navigating Blackboard

• Basics
• Students
• Instructors

— Top of Page — Frequently Asked Questions:

• Students
• Instructors
• General Troubleshooting

— Top of Page — Instructional Tutorial Documents:

— Top of Page — Instructional Tutorial Videos:

• How to Login
• How to Use the Assignment Tool
• How to Enroll a Teaching Assistant
• How to Combine Sections
• How to Add Multiple Files
• How to Set Course Availability
• How to Send Email
• How to Add a Syllabus
• How to Add Announcements

— Top of Page — Tips & Tricks

10 Best Practices for Using Blackboard

Seminar Series

Student Orientation Presentation (PowerPoint)

How to Effectively Use Blackboard (PowerPoint) -- This presentation was delivered at our first ever Teaching and Learning Technology Conference in April 2008 by Dr. Dan Cernusca, Instructional Design Specialist

— Top of Page — Maintenance 

Blackboard Maintenance Procedures

— Top of Page — Additional Resources from Blackboard

Here are some additional resources available at Blackboard's web site that may be of interest.  These resources are published by Blackboard and some of the features described may vary slightly with Missouri S&T's implementation of Blackboard.  The Quick-Start Guides below address a number of issues that instructors have encountered with using Blackboard for their courses.

Blackboard Quick-Start Guides (.PDF documents)

• Collaboration -- Strategies for encouraging group work within a course.  Blackboard has a number of tools available to students to assist them on group projects.
• Creating Course Content -- How to get started by adding custom content and pre-existing content to your Blackboard course.
• Keeping Students Informed -- Communication between instructors and students is extremely important!  Make sure your students know how you will be communicating with them and how they can stay informed of important issues with respect to your course.
• Measuring Student Performance -- Blackboard has a number of tools available to help you assess your students' comprehension of the material you are trying to teach them.  Establish a grading policy for your students so they know how and when they can expect feedback regarding their performance in your course.
• Organizing Your Course -- Arrange the material for your course so that students can easily find the course materials they need to be successful in your course.  You also might want to arrange the tools available to your students in Blackboard so they are presented with the course materials the tools are designed to support.
• Presenting Content -- Use Learning Objects and Adaptive Release to control how you present course material to your students.
• Universal Design -- Course material should be compliant with accessibility standards for the web. Missouri S&T Disability Support Services can provide more specific information on how to ensure content is made accessible to students with a disability. 

Quick Tutorial Viewlets (short videos)

Blackboard has created a large number of short video tutorials to help instructors start creating content and managing their course.  These viewlets, as they are called by Blackboard, cover such topics as Assignments, Adaptive Release, Role-based Information Delivery, and much, much more.  Missouri S&T has not implemented all of the options that Blackboard is capable of delivering (e.g. Blackboard is capable of serving as an institution's primary web portal.  This is, in fact, what UMSL has done with Blackboard), but these viewlets should still be a useful reference for instructors who want to brush up on the basics.

Blackboard Academic Suite Manuals (User Guides)

• Students
• Instructors