ITTC Online Magazine

Below are the instructions (from ITS) to merge several sections of your Bb 8 course shells into one course shell:

Dear Colleagues,

You are receiving this message because we have identified a course or section in Banner that you teach as either dual/merged or cross-listed.

IT and ITTC have been actively engaged in making several improvements to the Blackboard Learning Management System (LMS).  As you are aware from recent communications, a new Blackboard LMS platform will roll out for the Spring of 2010.  This new platform is called “Blackboard Learn”.  Blackboard Learn will provide many new features and enhancements, as well as resolving many technical and functional issues of the current Blackboard environment.  One of the features will be the native capability to merge multiple course shells into a single shell.  In the interim period as we are preparing to move to the new platform, we have made a change in the enrollment process in which we need assistance from some of you.  Because we now auto-enroll students and faculty in courses/sections based on information in Banner, the capability to merge courses in the traditional method is no longer viable.  If you teach a course that is merged with multiple courses, this message applies to you. So for instance, if you teach ACCT4113001 and ACCT5113001, and you traditionally combine these courses and call the course Tax Accounting II, this message applies to you.  

Please follow the steps below in order to merge courses and/or sections into a single course shell in Blackboard.

• We have created a new course merge utility that can/will merge courses and/or sections.  Faculty wishing to merge their courses/sections in Blackboard into one course shell can use the utility at the following URL: https://apps.astate.edu/blackboard.
• Once you log into the site using your ASU email address, you will see all of the courses for which you are listed in Banner as the instructor of record.  If a course or section is not listed, then you need to contact your department chairperson to make the assignment in Banner.
• Select the courses that are to be merged into a single course shell, and click on the single arrow to move them to the selected courses box on the right.
• Once the courses are listed as desired in the selected course window, give the course shell a name in the “New BB shell” text box and click merge.  This is the name that the course will appear as in Blackboard.
• The page will update and display the courses that have been merged.
• Once this process is complete, the new merged course shell will be created in the next update window. (7AM, 12Noon, 5PM, 12Midnight)

Thank you for your assistance with this matter.  If you need any help with this process, please contact the IT Helpdesk at 870.972.3933 or by email at helpdesk@astate.edu.

I’ve been using this tool for over a year now and it has saved me so much time!  Henry introduced me to it about a year ago and he said have you ever heard of Xobni?  It sounded kind of strange to me but then he explained that it was just inbox spelled backwards. Ahh,makes sense! 

Xobni is a tool that works inside of Microsoft Outlook.  It allows you to search for things so quickly.  Suppose you are in a scramble to get to your next meeting and you need the file that Bob sent you but you can’t remember when he sent it.  Now you go to search for his name in Outlook but Bob has to email you all the time so you have hundreds of emails from him.  With Xobni you will get a return like this just by typing in Bob’s name. 

It shows you every conversation you have had with this person and if you hover over those conversations it will show you a selection from that email so that you do not have to open every single one.  In a seperate section it will also show you every attachment that has been sent!  So easy and convenient. 

I just downloaded a new version of Xobni today and found that it will now link a person’s email address to Partners such as Facebook and LinkedIn.  It’s pretty cool.  I just wanted to share.

Here is a link to the website if you are interested in trying it out.  http://www.xobni.com/learnmore/.  Come back and comment to let me know if you would like to see more tips like this.

The dawn of new semester brings a sense of excitement, but this can quickly turn to anxiety for you and your students if you do not get your online class started off on the right foot. We would like to offer you some tips in making sure that you and your students are not overwhelmed by the obstacles of online education.

First off, you need to establish communication guidelines. Not only will this help you to manage phone calls and emails from your students, but it will help to establish a bond of trust between both parties. It is important to let them know when you will be available to answer questions and when they can expect to receive grades for the homework that they turn in. This helps to ease tension in the event of stressful situations. For example, if a student has a problem at 10pm on Thursday night and you only respond on Tuesday and Thursdays they may spend their entire weekend stressing over the situation and/or emailing you 50 times in the next three days when this entire situation could have been avoided if they had known that you would be sending out responses on Tuesday mornings.

Then, once you establish these communication guidelines do your very best to stick to them. This just strengthens their trust in you as their instructor. Look at it from the perspective of the student, you give them deadlines for their assignments and expect them to respond in the designated time. If they do not, you grade them accordingly. They do the same to you but instead of it being a letter grade it becomes your reputation. Of course we are all human, so if something comes up and you cannot meet your pre-established guidelines just let them know by sending out a class- wide email or by posting an announcement in your Blackboard course. The more you communicate with them, the more successful you will be in the online education arena.

Another way of forming rapport between you and your students is through personalized Blackboard homepages. Not only can you set one of these up but so can your students. We recommend that if you request this from them, that you do the same by setting up a page about you. You can create your profile by clicking on Control Panel and then on Staff Information. Similarly students can do this by clicking on tools and then on Homepage. Not only does this help to strengthen the connection between parties but it may also deter deceptive identities.
Let us know if we can help you in any way and enjoy your semester!