Less is More, except when it isn't?

Michelle Kleehammer
1/18/2010 - 2:22pm
Scholar
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Hi everyone.  I'm wondering about others' experiences using online teaching tools.  I'm teaching a class this term on US Colonial History.  In the past, I have used a course website - one that I created myself through my basic knowledge of HTML and programs like Dreamweaver.  The students give me great feedback on the website - they like that the syllabus, assignments, and readings (usually pdf documents) are easily accessible and all in one place.  I like the website too - it gives me total control over the course content, changing around some reading assignment here and there to respond to their interests, etc.

My concern is that this term I have been toying around with the Compass / Blackboard site for the course provided by the university.  It has some cool and useful features that I think would be nice additions to my usual course website - mainly a blog and other interactive posting boards.

My question is this - is it too confusing / not streamlined enough to expect students to use two separate websites for one class?

Thanks for any suggestons or insights!
Michelle

Cathy Davidson
Cathy Davidson2 years 3 weeks ago

Two too

Hi, Michelle,  I really dislike the design of Blackboard but, yes, it has features that my Wordpress site doesn't so, sigh, my "This Is Your Brain on the Internet" ends up being 90% hosted on my attractive Wordpress site but then my students go to Blackboard for pdf's and we use it to contact students and for a few other functions.  Not great, but that's the way it is.  Good luck with your course!

ajgulyas
Aaron Gulyas2 years 2 weeks ago

A partial solution

Hi Michelle,

I've only done this once, experimentally, but it seemed to work okay.  I created a course website with Wordpress/Scholarpress and loaded in my content.  I then created (in Blackboard) menu buttons which linked directly to my site.  So-- if a student clicked the "syllabus" button in blackboard, that page on my site popped up in the Blackboard frame.  This gave me much more control over design and content while being a largely seamless experience for students.  I'm going to be trying it again in a future term when I've had more time to play with it.

mkleehammer
Michelle Kleehammer1 year 50 weeks ago

belated thank you

Thanks for the ideas and experiences.  Just to follow up, I did end up using my blackboard site only for the blog feature, and my own website for the rest of the course.  I thought I could also use Blackboard for sending students their grades, but I haven't had success sending comments along with those grades, so I abandoned that feature.  Does anyone know a trick for this, btw?

After working out a little confusion at the beginning of the term, everyone seems fine with the two websites.  I'll elicit feedback from my students later in the term so I'll know better how/if it's working smoothly.

Thanks!