Collaboration tools

There are several collaboration tools that exist within Blackboard.

Some are Blackboard Tools and others are 3rd party tools that we've purchased which work inside of Blackboard.

Here is a summary of the tools based on interests that faculty have shared with us:

Summary of collaboration tools in Blackboard

If you are interested in . . . .	Recommended Tool
Creating groups so that students can e-mail, share files with, and have discussions with the other members of the group AND you specify who is in the group .. .	Blackboard' Group Page feature
Creating groups so that students can e-mail, share files with, and have discussions with the other members of the group AND you want students to be randomly assigned to groups ..	Florida State's Advanced Group Management Tool (Specific directions provided by Florida State)
Creating Wiki's (shared workspace) where student's can build a website together	Learning Object's Wiki Tool (which runs inside of Blackboard)
Student Portfolio's where students build their portfolio and you can either share the portfolio's amongst the students or only allow the student and yourself to see the portfolio	Learning Object's Wiki Tool (which runs inside of Blackboard) For specific directions on using Wiki's for Portfolio's click here
Student Journals or Blogs	Learning Object's Blog Tool (which runs inside of Blackboard)

Creating Groups

Before you create a wiki site, you have to decide whether you want to manually add students to the wiki site or create Groups via Blackboard's Group feature

If you want to select the students within the wiki Site and not use the group feature, you can go directly to our wiki help site

If you use Blackboard's Group feature, your students will be able to communicate with the groups area of Blackboard in addition to using the wiki page. Communication Tools Include: E-Mail, Discussion Board, Virtual Collaboration & File Exchange.

There are two ways to create groups:

1. You can create a Group where you define who the members are via the "Manage Groups" option in your Control Panel
2. You can Randomly Generate a group via the "Advanced Group Management" tool located in your Control Panel

To use the Manage Groups Option:

1. Click on Manage Groups
2. Choose Add Group
3. Fill in the template, including Name and Description and select which options you would like the group to have .
   
   *** Student's can delete each other's files in the Group File Exchange, it is important to let the student's know they should keep backups of their files ***
   
4. Click Submit then OK
5. Repeat this process to create additional Groups

To add students to a group:

1. From the Manage groups screen, click the Modify button next to the group that you'd like to add students to
   
2. Choose Add Users to Group
   
3. Click Search to see all of the students in your class or type in the name of the student you'd like to add to the group. Check off the student's you would like to add and click submit. You cannot move to the next page without click submit, you must submit page by page.
   
4. If you have several students to add to a group, we recommend the following:
   1. Click Search
   2. Scroll down and click the last page # next to Results so that you can work backwards, meaning, you're going to start at the end of the list and work your way back
   3. Check off all the students on the last page that you want to add to the group, then click Submit.
   4. Then click on the 2nd to last page and choose all of those students and click submit, etc.
   5. The reason for this recommendation is if you start on page 1, once students are added to the group, it will move the students from page 2 to page 1 and you may become confused because the page keeps changing.
      
5. Once you have created groups, your students can access them from the Communication Menu.
   
   
   We recommend you modify your course menu and add the Group Page item to your menu so that it's easier for the student's to navigate your course
   
   1. From your Control Panel look under Course Options & Choose: Manage Course Menu
   2. Choose Add Tool Link
   3. Change the Type to Groups
   4. Click Submit then OK
   5. It will add Groups to the bottom of your menu, to move up the option, you will need to scroll down and change the number next to the groups option to a lower number.

 

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