Dear Colleagues,
It's finals week. Yeah! Almost done. Reminder: grades are due in UAOnline on Wednesday, December 20. I'll be out on sick leave for shoulder surgery starting December 15 and may or may not answer your emails – I am not sure how I'll feel.
Blackboard Learn update on December 22
There is a planned update of Blackboard Learn scheduled on December 22. There are not big changes in Blackboard itself – mostly bug fixes. However, some of the add-ons are changing. Blackboard will be unavailable from 5 am to 3 pm on Friday December 22.
I have loved the online assignment grading option in Blackboard and shared it with many faculty. It's called Crocodoc and it has been replaced by Box. There is a tradeoff: less functionality in the annotations on the document (bad), but more file types are now viewable online (good). There's a bit more to it than that, but you get the idea.
Two versions of Blackboard Collaborate this spring
Blackboard's new version of Collaborate, Collaborate Ultra, will be available in the updated version of Blackboard Learn, along with our current version. They are very different. I plan to use Ultra in the Tech 490 class.
Here are some Collaborate Ultra resources:
End of semester reflection
It's always good at the end of the semester to make a few notes to yourself about how your classes went. Note what worked really well and what you might want to revise next time.
Learn to teach online
I will be teaching Tech 490 The Design and Delivery of Online Classes this spring. Register in UAOnline and use your tuition waiver.
Best wishes for the holidays,
Lee
