Presentation delivered at BbWorld in Orlando, 15th July 2010. Explores the possibilities offered by Blackboard's course module page feature in 9.0, some of the pitfalls of this early implementation and ways round that.

1. Bring portal module into the classroom Of Course You Can but keep your wits about youDr Malcolm MurrayDurham University

2. Overview Why deploy Modules in Courses? Exploring the current implementation Common “Gotchas” Building Blocks the Answer? Looking Forward

3. Origins Why bring Modules to a Course?

4. In the beginning Most Blackboard courses looked like this: Bb Version Spotter? 6.2.3.6but then you knew that didn’t you

5. Other sites are building communities

6. Blackboard’s Community System

7. What could Modules do for courses?

8. What couldn’t Modules do for courses?

9. What could Modules do for courses? Increase Engagement Support dynamic content Highlight recent changes Facilitate (and acknowledge) Student contributions

10. Having a Go Using the built in Module Types

11. Modules to deploy in Courses

13. HTML modules

14. Images

16. Don’t get tripped up! Gotchas when deploying modules in Courses

18. Fabien

19. Fabrice

20. Mary

21. Mungo

23. Student votes in both polls

24. Another student votes in one

25. Polls created in the Scottish Course So far so good...

26. Add Scottish poll to French course Any guesses?

27. French students can vote too!

28. Deploy the module on a Portal Tab Any guesses?(a different user)

29. Finally back to either course...

30. Picking up the Tab Why do we see this strange module behaviour in courses?

31. Portal Perspective - Control Create a module Set access rights and an admin Deploy on a tab – possibly as default content Move it from the default bottom left position User can configure the module (e.g. number of channel items) using the cog wheel icon Admin uses the Module Administrator button

32. Doesn’t really fit with Course Logic Instructors in charge Content largely not re-used May change frequently May want students to edit too

33. Boxing Clever Using Building Blocks to do more

34. Rotating Images Module This module overcomes two problems: Lack of Course/Group information in the Context Exposing Management within the Course

35. Editing Options

36. Space for Pedagogy!

37. Controlling Student Access

38. Rotating Images Module Not perfect: Single Instance Adding another Module creates a clone Can’t change the Title Management “challenges” existing UI paradigm

39. What might be better Allow staff (and students?) to create Modules in a Course Display an extra button in the module when the current user can edit it Allow developers to define custom modules that only appear in Courses/Organisations

40. Summing Up Almost there!

41. Conclusion Adding a Module Page feature to courses is a great start Scope to change the way students interact Existing Module tools drawn from portal paradigm Can be used with care Only Sys Admins (Portal Admins) can create modules Need one custom module for each course or problems result Course Modules probably shouldn’t be discoverable Can use building blocks as an interim solution Worthy of further development!

42. Please provide feedback for this session by emailingBbWorldFeedback@blackboard.com. The title of this session is: Of Course You Can! You can contact the author at malcolm.murray@durham.ac.uk