Learning Tech

Working on how the web can work for education.

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We've Moved!

We’ve Moved!

We’re no longer posting new content to this site. Please join us at our new-and-improved home at blogs.mccneb.edu/ideas.

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How to Create Email Rules

How to Create Email Rules

Here’s a totally optional tip that may make your life a little simpler by organizing your email inbox.

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Blackboard Quick Tip: Use Course Copy to Move Your Calendars

Blackboard Quick Tip: Use Course Copy to Move Your Calendars

Most of the time, we use Blackboard’s course copy feature to get all the “stuff” from one course over into a blank course. But you can also use it to selectively move some content types.

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How to Find Online Students' Last Date of Participation

How to Find Online Students’ Last Date of Participation

MCC instructors must report a “last date of participation” in conjunction with any failing grades. But how do online instructors determine the last time a student participated? (more…)

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How to Schedule Webinars and Online Meetings with Office 365

How to Schedule Webinars and Online Meetings with Office 365

MCC faculty, staff and students can use their Office365 accounts to host and join desktop conferences. In these online meetings, participants can share their desktops, video chat (with a webcam and audio), audio chat (with audio equipment for online, or over the phone) and chat via text. This can save time, money and resources by replacing the need to drive to in-person meetings.

Here’s how to…

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How to Add a User to Your Blackboard Learn Course

How to Add a User to Your Blackboard Learn Course

MCC Blackboard Support manages all the enrollment “stuff” for Blackboard Learn courses — we make sure all the students and instructors get added, dropped and swapped into the right courses. (more…)

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Blackboard Tip: Calculate Final Grades

Blackboard Tip: Calculate Final Grades

Your “Total (External Grade)” column should reflect your course’s final grade. To make sure it’s accurate at the end of the quarter, make sure to follow either of these two options for calculating zeros in your gradebook.

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Blackboard Tip: Avoid Bringing Last Quarter's Discussion with Course Copy

Blackboard Tip: Avoid Bringing Last Quarter’s Discussion with Course Copy

This tip comes with a bit of a mea culpa: I’ve given out some slightly misleading information about the course copy process and now I want to make sure that I get the record set straight.

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Blackboard Quick Tip: Set Course Duration

By default, Blackboard courses are only open between their first and final meeting dates. But instructors may want to change that to allow students to see final grades and feedback. Here’s how.

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Blackboard Quick Tip: 'Zero Out' Grades for Accurate Final Totals

Blackboard Quick Tip: ‘Zero Out’ Grades for Accurate Final Totals

Remember: Blackboard doesn’t automatically treat ungraded items as zeros, so a “no grade” for an activity doesn’t count against a student. (more…)

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How to Convert Videos with VLC Media

How to Convert Videos with VLC Media

If you’re uploading a speech or other video to your course’s Ensemble dropbox link, you may encounter an error related to the file extension on your video. (more…)

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Blackboard Tip: Prepare for Winter

Blackboard Tip: Prepare for Winter

Here’s our resource roundup for Blackboard quarter preparation. We’ll be sending out resources via email when we inform MCC instructors that their blank winter courses are available, but if you’d like one-on-one help getting ready, email [email protected] or fill out the form below. We also have training scheduled this week and every Friday until Thanksgiving.

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Blackboard Tip: Get Winter Courses Ready with Course Copy

Blackboard Tip: Get Winter Courses Ready with Course Copy

Blackboard’s course copy process is pretty easy, as long as you remember that it works in the opposite way as ANGEL’s — you should “push out” content from the template course to the blank course rather than “pull in” from within the blank course. (more…)

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Blackboard Resource: Preparing Your Course

Blackboard Resource: Preparing Your Course

Criminal justice instructor Greg Meyer put together some great presentations for faculty training. Here’s an overview on setting up your course before the quarter begins.

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Blackboard Q&A: What's the difference between availability and adaptive release?

Blackboard Q&A: What’s the difference between availability and adaptive release?

Availability is an item setting that dictates when students can see something. Adaptive release is a condition (or set of conditions) applied to an item that dictates who can see it (and, to a lesser degree, when they can see it). Make sense? (more…)

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Join Us Fridays in the Sandbox for Blackboard Learn Basics

Join Us Fridays in the Sandbox for Blackboard Learn Basics

Come learn (or brush up on) the Blackboard basics in preparation for the winter quarter. IDS will have two-part sessions (attend both in the series for the full experience) from 2 to 4 p.m. Fridays in the sandbox (FOC 17). Computers provided, but BYOD if you can. (more…)

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Known Issue: Not Able to Open Feedback Attachments

Known Issue: Not Able to Open Feedback Attachments

We’ve seen errors from instructors and students trying to access files (I’ve seen it in PDFs, HTML documents and Excel files) attached to learner feedback on grades. In all of these cases, the student’s submission and grade history were fine, but if the instructor was responding with an attachment, the student couldn’t see it. (more…)

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