Blackboard Learn Grade Center Checkups for Final Grades

The fall semester is winding down and it will soon be time to enter final grades for your courses. If you are using Blackboard Learn to record and/or calculate student grades, the CTLI is offering Blackboard Learn Grade Center checkup drop-in sessions to help you double check the Blackboard Learn Grade Center in your course sites. 

If you want to make sure the Grade Center is set up correctly to calculate a final grade, please feel free to stop by the CTLI offices in Danvers DB387 and Lynn LS313. Team members will be available Monday, December 9th through Thursday, December 12th from 9:00am to 3:00pm (please note that on Tuesday, December 10th, staff will be available until 2:00pm).

As a reference, here are the directions to set up the Blackboard Learn Grade Center to calculate a weighted grade. You can use these directions to also check to make sure the weighted grade column is calculating correctly.

Step 1: Create categories
a. Manage > Categories > Create Category (make sure you have one for each of the %s listed in your grade calculation statement)   

Step 2: Assign percentages in Weighted Total column
a. Click on chevron to the right of the Weighted Total column and select Edit Column Information
b. In the Select Columns section (middle of screen), under Categories to Select, select the categories to the left and send them over to the right
c. Once the categories are over to the right under Selected Categories, enter in the appropriate %s

Step 3: Ensure all columns are associated with appropriate categories
a. Manage > Column Organization (make sure all columns are in the correct categories)
b. On the Column Organization page, you can change any of the column categories by checking off the boxes to the left of the column name and selecting a new category in the Change Category to drop down menu

Here is a great article from Virginia Commonwealth University with some tips on troubleshooting weighted totals.

• Troubleshooting Weighted Totals, https://ts.vcu.edu/askit/teaching-and-learning/blackboard-elearning/courseorganization-management-/facultyleader/control-panel/grade-center/create-calculated-column/weighted-column/troubleshooting-weighted-totals/

If you are using the Total column to calculate a grade, you just want to make sure there is a column in the Grade Center for every gradable item that should be included in the grade. To see the number of points that the grade is calculating on, go to  Manage > Column Organization. You will see the Total column listed with the number of possible points over to the right. That number should match what you think the total points at mid-term should be.

Also, it is important to make sure a 0 has been entered into a column if a student did not complete an assignment or assessment. The default setting is to calculate the Weighted Total or Total columns as a running total which means that columns and categories without grades aren't included in the calculations.

If you are unable to stop by and would like us to look at your Grade Center, please feel free to send us an email at ctli@northshore.edu.

iDevelop – NSCC’s Faculty Professional Development eNewsletter (12/9/2019)

Welcome to iDevelop, a weekly eNewsletter providing faculty with information about professional development opportunities at NSCC. The intent of this eNewsletter is to spotlight the various professional development events for faculty in one convenient location as well as share best practices, resources and tips related to the teaching practice. iDevelop is being brought to you by the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Innovation (CTLI).
  

20 Minute Online Professional Development
This is the last of the sessions for the fall Monday Morning Mentor series (professional development in twenty minute snippets.) The topic for the week of December 9th is How Can I Teach Soft Skills to Better Prepare Students for the Workplace? The presentation is available Monday at 10:00am and is accessible through Sunday of that week. For information on accessing the presentation and supplemental materials, please view the Bulletin or the email version of iDevelop.

More information about this session (including description, topics, and learning goals) is available at https://www.magnapubs.com/online/mentor/how-can-i-teach-soft-skills-to-better-prepare-students-for-the-workplace-15238-1.html.

Looking for transcripts of past Monday Morning Mentor sessions? Please email ctli@northshore.edu with the session title and we can provide you with the transcript and supplementary materials.  

The Monday Morning Mentor series, professional development in twenty minute snippets, will kick off in the spring semester on January 27, 2020 with What is the Best Teaching Advice I Ever Received? More information will be available in an upcoming issue of iDevelop. The complete spring 2020 schedule of Monday Morning Mentor sessions is available at http://nscclets.blogspot.com/2019/12/20-minute-mentor-online-faculty.html. 
  
 Other Professional Development Opportunities

• Faculty Conversations: Small Teaching Online. This fall, the CTLI will host informal faculty conversations around making small changes in your teaching practice that can increase student engagement and learning. The final meeting will be Thursday, December 12th from 2:30pm to 3:30pm. Please save the date in your calendar. An email with additional information about the November session will be sent out in early December.
    

Blackboard Learn Grade Center Checkups for Final Grades
The fall semester is winding down and it will soon be time to enter final grades for your courses. If you are using Blackboard Learn to record and/or calculate student grades, the CTLI is offering Blackboard Learn Grade Center checkup drop-in sessions to help you double check the Blackboard Learn Grade Center in your course sites. If you want to make sure the Grade Center is set up correctly to calculate a final grade, please feel free to stop by the CTLI offices in Danvers DB387 and Lynn LS313. Team members will be available Monday, December 9th through Thursday, December 12th from 9:00am to 3:00pm (please note that on Tuesday, December 10th, staff will be available until 2:00pm).

Share Your Teaching Resources and Professional Development OpportunitiesIf you have any teaching resources that you would like to share with other NSCC faculty or know of any other professional development opportunities that NSCC faculty might be interested in, please feel free to send them to ctli@northshore.edu and we will share them in the upcoming issues of iDevelop.

This will be the last issue of iDevelop for the fall semester. We will publish the first one for the spring semester on January 13, 2020. We hope you have enjoyed this weekly eNewsletter and would love your input. Please let us know if you have any feedback on the format, content, and resources or if there is anything else you would like to see in the eNewsletter.

Thank you,
CTLI

Blackboard Learn Grade Center Tips

As you begin to record your grades you might to think about using the Blackboard Learn Grade Center. It can be a little complicated but all of us here in Instructional Technology and Design are more than happy to sit down with you and create a Grade Center that will work for you.

1. For those of you that already use the Blackboard Learn Grade Center, I wanted to pass along a tip on how to “hide” information on other students if you want to show a student his/her grades in class. Go to the Grade Center and then to the Full Grade Center in your Course Management area. Look for the name of the student who wants to see his/her grade. If you click the chevron to the right of the student’s last name, you can select the option to “Hide Other Rows". This will display only that student’s grades. To return to the normal view of the Full Grade Center, click on the same chevron and select "Show All Rows" or you can visit another place within the course (e.g. Content) and then return to the Full Grade Center and it will be automatically repopulated with other students.  
   
2. Sometimes I get emails in the Blackboard Learn Helpdesk from students saying that they cannot see a comment from the instructor in a particular assignment. In order for any comments to display in the student's My Grades, an instructor needs to have “graded” that assignment.
3. Another email I get is from instructors who do not know what a particular icon in the Full Grade Center means. It can look like a triangle, an exclamation point, or even a shaded circle. If you notice this, you can click the “icon legend” to the bottom right of the Full Grade Center. All the icons are displayed there with their meanings.
4. If you would like to print your Full Grade Center, go to the “Work Off Line” chevron in the upper right top of the Full Grade Center. Click “Download” and then "Submit" (you do not need to change any settings). This will download your Full Grade Center as a spreadsheet that can be opened in Excel and you should be able to access it wherever you typically have files download to.

I hope this helps as you get familiar with the Blackboard Learn Grade Center and, remember, you can always contact bbhelp@northshore.edu to set up an appointment for assistance.