Why did you choose to use Blackboard?

To communicate with students from a central location rather than fill their email boxes every time something occurs to me; to include websites and links to resources that would otherwise be scattered throughout a semester’s worth of notes; to allow students to keep track of their own progress with their grades, to download assignments that were missed, to peek at quizzes that were missed; and in a particularly note-intensive class--to provide a skeletal outline of what was important about that lecture. I use one of the content areas to respond to student feedback about the course, which I ask for 3 or 4 times per semester.

How have you integrated the technology into your teaching? How is your use of the technology innovative or different?

I use it as a resource outside of the lectures. It’s a clearinghouse that offers students one-stop question answering and feedback opportunities. After any and many references to certain materials in class, I just say: this will be on Blackboard under such and such area.’

I’m not sure how innovative it is to try not to annoy students with “crying wolf important!” emails and to give them more of a sense of control over what goes on in a course.

What parts of Blackboard have worked the best for you? What hasn't worked?

All of it, especially for large classes with 10 of the students missing class at any given time due to a tragedy or wedding or illness who then ultimately need to get back up to speed.

Trying to launch items from dial-up at home. It is staggeringly slow.

How has Blackboard changed the way you teach and manage a classroom? And how has it improved your students' ability to communicate and learn?

Enhanced communication is probably the biggest perk I’ve noticed as it simplifies and organizes what messages went to whom about what. And also classroom management; I wouldn’t even want to purchase the gradebook that could keep track of 15 different grades for 90 people, let alone use it.

As a new professor, I need to hear from students more than someone who has been teaching for a few years. So I periodically request feedback from the students. The feedback requests vary from an open-ended plea for contact and feedback “What do you like about lecture, what would you like to see more of, less of, what questions do you have about the course, etc.” to specific questions “You just finished project X and received feedback on it, what did you like about the project, what was the most difficult phase, how would you tackle the project differently next time, etc.”

I allow them to remain anonymous and always give them at least 10 minutes to write down what’s on their mind. Then, I take a deep breath and read them all at home, think about what they are saying, and come up with responses, solutions, changes. I then type a response to the main themes and pose solutions to common problems on Blackboard and mention this posting in the following class period, e.g. “Thank you for taking time to give me feedback; I’ve responded to your ideas on Bb.” This “responsiveness with a distance” keeps the swirling dervish of one student’s negative experience from spiraling into a feeding frenzy with the whole class.

Yes, I do make changes based on their feedback. One new class last semester mentioned the need for more order to the notes I had on the document camera--which may seem obvious to use outline-style headings, but I never had shared notes with a class before; they also asked for use of multimedia when possible, so I made a concerted effort to find a video or internet example of key concepts; they’ve asked for more discussion built-in to lecture time, which I added with caution in order to help them feel connected but to keep the class on track as well.

Other times, when I don’t make changes, I try to explain the purpose of assignments more clearly or offer my office hours again to reach the people who are lost.