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Todd Slater

CEITL @ Zane State College

Tips, tools and events from the Center for Excellence and Innovation in Teaching and Learning.

I'm the Faculty Development Coordinator at Zane State College. I run the CEITL. I'm like a department unto myself.

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Blackboard 9.1 SP6 Timed Test Bug

If you have ever given a timed test in Blackboard, you probably know that an attempt that exceeds the time limit is indicated by a green box with an exclamation point. Service Pack 6 has introduced the option to auto-submit tests when the time expires as well as a new bug, described below.

The relevant settings for this test are: timed, yes; force completion, off; auto-submit, off.

As the student works on the test, the timer is displayed at the top of the page. When time expires, a pop-up message appears. As long as auto-submit is off, the student has the option of either submitting the test (by clicking OK) or continuing the test in excess of the allotted time (by clicking Cancel). Any additional time spent taking the test after clicking Cancel will be recorded by Blackboard and shown in the attempt details. Note that the student is prohibited from answering questions and then clicking OK; once the pop-up dialog appears, it must be dismissed before the test will take additional input. 
Bb9-timed-02_2
Even if the student clicks OK to submit the test when the time expires, Blackboard will consider the attempt to have exceeded the time limit. The instructor will see the green box for the attempt in the grade center. When looking at the details of the attempt, Blackboard will report that it took 30 minutes out of 30 minutes, for example. This can be confusing because we would expect to see that the attempt took longer than the time allowed. This is the bug. To correct this, the instructor will have to view the attempt and submit it. Be sure to look at the test information to verify whether the student actually exceeded the time limit.
Bb9-timed-04
Note that if the student does not click OK right away to submit the test, the timer continues to run. You should make students aware of this.
Recall that the recommendation is to turn off force-completion for tests (yes, even for timed tests). If you absolutely do not want students to exceed the time limit on a test, you should turn on the auto-submit feature.

Blackboard's calculated average column may cause hair loss

In your Blackboard gradebook you probably want to show students their current grade as a percentage. By default your course starts with a Total column, which tallies the number of points the student has earned. Since a score like 128 might not be meaningful to students, you'll probably want to convert that total score to a percent. This will show students their current percentage based on work attempted, since it's a running total by default.

You can change the Total column to display a percentage instead of a score by clicking the chevrons next to the column title and selecting Edit Column Information. In the first section, change Primary Display to Percentage.

If you want to see students' totals as both points earned (score) and percentage, you can create another Total column. Set one to display as score and the other as a percentage. To create another total column, hover your mouse pointer over the blue Create Calculated Column button at the top of the page and select Total Column.

An observant person probably noticed that there was an Average Column option hiding under the Create Calculated Column button. You may be asking yourself, "Why don't I just create an Average Column? After all, I want students to see their average."

Well, the Average column isn't what you might think; it's really an average of percentages. Let's look at the math for a comparison. Let's assume the following scores: 8/10, 10/10, 22/25, and 81/100.

Bb9-average-vs-total

The behavior of the default Total column is to add the number of points earned (121) and divide by the number of points possible (145), yielding 83%. My guess is that this is what most of you want.

The behavior of the Average column is to first convert each score to a percentage, and then average the percentages. In this example, the result is 87%. As you can see, this student's performance on the items with lower points possible really boosted the grade.

I would avoid the calculated Average column. If you want a column that says Average, just rename a plain old Total column to Average and display it as a percentage.

A note about hidden columns in Blackboard's grade center

If you hide a column in the grade center, it isn't necessarily hidden from students. To hide a grade center column from students, you need to edit the column (click the chevrons to the right of the column title) and in section three, Options, tick No next to Show this Column to Students.

If you have hidden a column in the grade center and students still see it, you need to make the column visible again by hovering your mouse pointer over the blue Manage button at the top of the page and selecting Column Organization. Then, tick the box next to the column you want to show again, hover your mouse pointer over the gray Show/Hide button at the top of the list, and click Show Selected Columns. After submitting that page, you can either delete the column or edit it to hide it from students before hiding it in the grade center as well.

10 Reasons to Ban Pens and Pencils in the Class | MindShift

According to a recent MSNBC article, 69% of high school currently ban cell phones. But you’d be hard-pressed to find a school anywhere that has enacted a blanket ban on pens and pencils. Here are 10 reasons to reconsider the widespread acceptance of these distracting and potentially dangerous implements.
via mindshift.kqed.org

It's true, there's nothing new under the sun! Click through to read the 10 reasons to ban pens and pencils.

The Why and How of Using Facebook For Educators – No Need to be Friends At All!

If you are one of those out there that believe that Facebook has no place in the classroom, then, well maybe this post isn’t for you. But please first take a look at just a few reasons why you should reconsider:

  1. The fact is, the majority of your students and their parents are probably already on Facebook
  2. Even when schools have a policy against being “friends” online, there are tools you can use that won’t violate policy
  3. Despite what you may hear, there are strong privacy settings options that you can set up so only those that you want can access your information
  4. We have an obligation as educators to model appropriate online behavior and learn right along our students
via theedublogger.com

Here's a very detailed how-to for using Facebook to connect with students.

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