Instructor To-DO Checklist
Before the quarter
Step 1: Make inactive course sites unavailable.
Go into the control panel/customization/properties
Step 2: Determine if you need a new Blackboard course site
Your Blackboard course sites can be reused. Keep in mind that the course ID’s (e.g. TEDUC350) in Blackboard cannot be modified, but the title of your course can be! If you are teaching a brand new course or if you need the course ID changed on your course, you will need to submit a Blackboard Request form. Before you submit the form, you will need to determine if you want to combine multiple sections into one course site or have a course site to maintain for each section of the same course. Please indicate on your New Course Request if you would like to have one site or multiple sites for each section.
If you want to reuse your existing course site, you must perform a “bulk delete” to remove any prior students and any old content from the site.
Bulk Delete (formally referred to as Recycle) allows you to delete users and material from your course site in order to prepare the course site to be used over again for a new quarter. The Bulk Delete deletes selected course content and data from a course so that the Course ID and default settings can be reused. Information deleted during this operation cannot be recovered. Bulk Deleting a course removes all students and their records, such as grades, discussion board posts, and assessment attempts. Teaching assistants, graders, and builders are not deleted from the Course. Note: Consider archiving the Course first so that it can be restored to its exact state before a bulk delete.
How to perform a bulk delete (click here)
1. It is a good idea to Archive before you Bulk Delete. In other words, create a backup of your course site before you begin deleting portions of it.
2. In the Control Panel of your course site, click the Packages and Utilities menu item.
3. Click on Bulk Delete.
4. On the Bulk Delete screen, put a check next to the parts of your blackboard course that you would like to delete.
5. Type the word “Delete” (with a capital D) in the confirmation textbox, and click the Submit button.
Archive allows you to create a backup copy of your Blackboard course site. All of the materials, settings and data within your course site, including student files and data, are backed up to a .zip file. If the need should arise to recover course material or student data, you can bring the Archive File to the Teaching and Learning Center to have your course site restored to the state that it was in at the time the archive file was created.
How to archive a course (click here)
To Create an Archive of Your Course
1. In the Control Panel of your course site, click the Packages and Utilities menu item.
2. Click on Export/Archive Course
3. Click on the Archive button.
4. Check the box to Include Grade Center History.
5. Click the Submit button.
6. You should see a message that appears in a green bar near the top of the page, which says, “Success: This action has been queued. An email will be sent when the process is complete.”
7. Switch away from Blackboard, for the moment, and access your email account. You should receive an email from “System Administrator” that says “The operation has completed. The file may be downloaded from the Control Panel. “ Depending on the size of your course, it may be several minutes before this email arrives.
8. Switch back to Blackboard. In the Control Panel of your course site, under the Packages and Utilities menu item, click on Export/Archive Course to refresh this page. You should now see a link to the Archive File listed on the Export/Archive Course page. Please Note: You want to SAVE the archive file, not open it. The instructions for saving can vary slightly among different browsers. These instructions are for Mozilla Firefox.
9. Right-Click on the link for the Archive File and choose Save Link As from the shortcut menu. A dialogue box should appear, allowing you to choose the location to save yoru file.
Also, you need to determine if you want to combine multiple sections into one course site or have a course site to maintain for each section of the same course. Please indicate on your New Course Request if you would like to have one site or multiple sites for each section.
Note: Consider archiving the Course first so that it can be restored to its exact state before a bulk delete.
Step 3: Add staff (e.g. co-instructors) to your course (optional)
Another common task when setting up new courses is adding another faculty member to your course as an instructor. Additional staff may include Teaching Assistants, Graders, Course Builders, Co-Instructors. Keep in mind that guest and observer access is not allowed on BB because of FERPA regulations. To have someone added to your course site, please provide the staff/faculty person’s name, NetID and the type of access that they need (just student view or more control over course content) in an email to athelp@uw.edu.
Step 4: Log into Blackboard
Check that you can access your newly created course shell via Blackboard. Login and make sure that your course is listed under the “my courses” area. Once in, make sure you have “edit” access and can begin to build your site!
Step 5: Add content to your course
A new course shell starts out empty. You may build your course from scratch or import course content from a previous quarter course you have already developed. You may use content from another instructor’s course but permission from that instructor is required! To request to have content from another course site copied over to a new one, please use the “Blackboard Requests" link in the left navigation menu on the Blackboard webpage.
Step 6: Notify your students and check the access code and enrollment dates!
Make sure you have gone in and set/reset your access code and enrollment dates for the quarter (control panel/customization/enrollment options). Now that your course site is ready to go, it is time to notify your current students and give them your access code! You can obtain a class email list on MyUW. Students need to go in and enroll in your course in Bb and during that process, they will be asked for the access code for your course. The access codes are required to meet FERPA regulations. Refer students to the "getting started" section under the student support tab on this webpage to assist them in creating accounts, enrolling and using Blackboard.
