Jacob Spradlin M.Ed. spradlin@shsu.edu
Assistant Director of Training and Development
Before you give your students access to your course, go through it with Edit Mode off and/or use the Student View button to make sure all your content and tools are accessible and easy to find.
Note: Use your course’s navigation menu because students can’t navigate via the Control Panel.
A few things you should be looking for are:
- When a student enters the course do they know where to go and what to do?
- Are the items in the Nav Menu clear? For instance, ‘Content’ means anything to a new student. It would make more sense to them if it was more specific, like ‘Course Materials’ or ‘Modules’
- Are all the tools you want the students to use linked from the Nav Menu or a Content Area? An easy way to check is by looking at the Nav Menu in Edit View.
- Can all the Tests and Assignments be taken and submitted?
- Do links to other places on the web work? (YouTube videos can be pulled down in a blink of an eye and web content can disappear at any time).
Other things to check while in Edit Mode:
- Links to hidden tests and assignments are not broken. Its good practice to re-deploy all your tests (if you’ve copied the course) to ensure that the links are correctly attached to the Grade Center.
- The Grade Center columns are correctly displayed to students (hidden or revealed) and the weighting and points possible are correct.
- Be sure due dates on items in your course are correct (these can now be changed easily by dragging and dropping with the Calendar feature in My Blackboard.
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