Blackboard

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What is Blackboard?
Blackboard is a course management application designed to enhance teaching and learning. The Blackboard course management e-learning system enables instructors to build and customize course offerings.  In addition, students enrolled with Blackboard become engaged in an interactive learning environment.
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What are the benefits of using Blackboard?
  • Enhance students' critical thinking skills using interactive tools
  • Leverage student participation, communication, and collaboration
  • Create powerful learning content using a variety of Web-based tools
  • Encourage student interaction, small- group work, and peer knowledge sharing
  • Evaluate a student's progress using a rich set of evaluation and assessment capabilities
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Accessing Blackboard is easy...
  1. Copy and paste the URL http://blackboard.astate.edu/ into your browser or go directly to the Faculty and Staff webpage from the AState main homepage and click on the Blackboard link and select version 8**
  2. Login using your assigned ASU email address and password
  3. Welcome to the exciting world of Blackboard version 8
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What do I do now?

Short video training sessions are available on the CLT homepage (http://www.clt.astate.edu/). We can help by making suggestions and helping you manage your courses so that you can provide the best learning environment possible for you and your students.

If you would like hands on training, visit our website for training sessions that we offer year round.

You should already be enrolled in the Blackboard Summer Institute training course shell. It is a course shell with additional training materials including some recorded sessions on how to use Bb8 along with other tips and tricks. If you are not enrolled but would like to be email us at clt@astate.edu or give us a call.

**All new faculty are automatically set up with Blackboard 8 when they get an Astate email account. 
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Arkansas State University is in the process of transitioning from version 6 to version 8 of the Blackboard Learning System.  The move is scheduled to be finished by the end of 2009, and until then, ASU will continue to run both versions.

There are currently very few classes on Blackboard 8. Unless you, as the instructor, have specifically indicated that your class is being held in version 8, your students should still sign in with Blackboard 6. The student Blackboard link gives them this option.

The URL to Blackboard 8 is slightly different than the URL for Blackboard 6, as you can see below:

Bb 6 URL- http://blackboard6.astate.edu/
Bb 8 URL- http://blackboard.astate.edu/

Just copy and past the above URLs or you can log in with the following links:

Sign in with Blackboard Release 6
(sign in with your Digital ID: Firstname.Lastname)

Sign in with Blackboard Release 8
(sign in with your email address: Firstname.Lastname@astate.edu)

This summer we held two Blackboard Summer Institute training sessions. During that time we created a course shell with training materials including some recorded sessions on how to use Bb8 along with other tips and tricks. If you would like to use the materials in this course let us know and we will grant you access.