Accordion Example Blackboard Ultra: What's New? Assessments Content Course Settings Gradebook Grading Auto-submitted Indicator in Attempt Logs New Auto-submitted Indicator in Attempt Logs Understanding the context of student submissions is helpful when grading or responding to student issues on assignments and tests. Now the Attempt Log indicates whether a submission is manual or automatic. Automatic submissions occur in one of two circumstances: The Due Date is set and Prohibit late submissions is selected. The submission is auto-submitted at the due date. A time limit is set and the setting to automatically save and submit work is selected. The submission is auto-submitted when the timer expires. You can access the Attempt Log for a student from the ellipsis menu (...) on the submission page or on the Grades Tab of the Student Overview page. Duplicate Questions in Assessments, Forms, and Question Banks New Duplicate Questions in Assessments, Forms, and Question Banks Building questions is time consuming, so any way to streamline the process is valuable! This update allows you to duplicate an existing question to create a similar question more quickly. Once duplicated, you can edit the question text, answer options, and points. To duplicate a question, click the ellipsis menu (...) next to the point value and select Duplicate. Default Question Points Value Changed from 10 to 1 New Default Question Points Value Changed from 10 to 1 Manually adjusting the point value for questions can be time-consuming, irritating, and error prone. Based on feedback from faculty, Blackboard has changed the default point value for questions from 10 to 1, as institutions reported that it was much more common for a question to be worth 1 point than 10 points. Moving forward, any newly created questions will have a default point value of 1. Existing questions will not be changed. Likert Answer Options Expanded to Include 4 and 6 Responses New Likert Answer Options Expanded to Include 4 and 6 Responses When Likert questions were added as a question type, they were initially restricted to 3, 5, or 7 options in the response range. This update allows for more flexibility by introducing 4 and 6 answer options, which allows you to prevent students from choosing a neutral option. No Due Date Option for Tests and Assignments New No Due Date Option for Tests and Assignments Due dates are important for helping students stay on track with their learning; in Blackboard, they also provide the foundation for feedback visibility, controlling access to an Assignment or Test, key notifications/reports, and (if enabled) for automatic zeroes. However, there may be scenarios in which you do not want to provide or enforce a due date. Previously, you have been able to remove the due date by deleting the date from the Due Date field. It was not obvious that this was an option, however, so the new "No due date" checkbox will make it clear that you can remove the due date entirely from an assessment. Note that you cannot select "No due date" and utilize other settings on the assessment, such as feedback visibility that is based on the due date. Default Due Date Time Set to 11:59 PM New Default Due Date Time Set to 11:59 PM When you create a new graded assessment, the due date field is pre-populated with a default date and time. Previously, this time would default to 12:00 AM, which is ambiguous. It is unclear whether 12:00 AM refers to the start or end of the date selected as the due date. As a result, many faculty change the time to 11:59 PM to reflect the end of the day. To simplify this setting, the time will now default to 11:59 PM on the due date selected. This can be changed to the time of your choosing. For example, you may want to consider setting an earlier time for your due dates to promote healthier sleeping habits for your students or to ensure that they are submitting the assignment or test at a time when you are available to assist with last-minute questions or technical issues. Existing due dates will not be affected by this change; it only applies to new due dates. Release Conditions on Assessments No Longer Affect Grade Visibility Release Conditions on Assessments No Longer Affect Grade Visibility When release conditions are set, such as visibility dates and times, students cannot access the material until those conditions are met. However, this has the unintended consequence of also hiding assessments from them on the Gradebook tab. This is usually not the intended outcome, particularly when tests or assignments are hidden to prevent student confusion or access after the due date, and causes confusion for both faculty and students when students cannot view their grade or feedback. Now, release conditions that affect the visibility of an assessment do not affect the visibility of the grade item on the Gradebook tab. Students will see the item but be unable to access it if the release conditions aren't met (i.e., it is before the "Show on" date or after the "Hide after" date). Group Assessment Due Date Exceptions Group Assessment Due Date Exceptions There are times that you may need to set different due dates for each group working on a group assessment. In the past, there was no way to do so. With this update, you can now add a Due Date Exception for a group assessment using the same workflow that you would for an individual assessment. SafeAssign Direct Submit New SafeAssign Direct Submit Direct Submit allows you to submit items to SafeAssign for originality review yourself, instead of checking all of the student submissions to a particular Assignment, or to add files to the institutional database without checking for plagiarism. SafeAssign now appears as an instructor tool in Books & Tools, which you can access in the Details & Actions panel within any Ultra course. There are two document submission methods: Upload File: Select this option to drag or upload files via a pop-up window. The standard SafeAssign document processing rules apply: Maximum support file size is 10 MB Supported file types: .zip, .doc, .docx, .docm, .ppt, .pptx, .odt, .txt, .pdf, .rtf, and .html. Copy/Paste Text: Select this option to enter a title for the submission and paste the text. When uploading a file or copying and pasting text, be sure to select the settings to check for plagiarism and/or add to the institutional database. You can also choose to share the submission, which makes it available to other instructors in the course. If you do not check the Share box, you will be the only one who can access the SafeAssign report. Submissions will take some time to process. Return to the Direct Submit page to view the matching score and the originality report for each submission. AI Design Assistant - Context Picker for Test Question Generation New AI Design Assistant - Context Picker for Test Question Generation In March, the AI Design Assistant introduced the ability for you to select one or more course items and files to use as context for generating test questions. This release extends the context picker to other workflows, including: Learning modules Authentic Assignments Authentic discussion prompts Authentic journal prompts For example, you might use the Course Syllabus as context when generating learning modules so that the AI Design Assistant can use your course objectives and schedule as inspiration for the module topics and descriptions. AI Design Assistant New AI Design Assistant The AI Design Assistant uses a lot of information from the course as well as a description field to provide direction to the AI when generating content. This enhancement allows you to more precisely define the content that you want the AI Design Assistant to use when generating questions. Begin generating questions within a test, then click the Select course items button. You will be able to browse the course to select one or more items to use as context, including Ultra Documents and select file types. As always, you will be able to review and decide whether to use the questions that the AI Design Asisstant has generated. You can also modify or delete the questions after you have added them a test. Bridge to Quality Action Item New Bridge to Quality Action Item The "Add Image" button was introduced in November, 2023 as an easier way to add images within the text editor by uploading files or searching the Unsplash library. Initially, this was only available in Ultra Documents, Journal prompts, Discussions, and Messages. With this update, the "Add Image" button is now also available in the text editor in the following tools: Announcements Assessment Questions Student answers on questions (by uploading a local file only; no access to Unsplash) Authentic journal prompts Authentic journal prompts Announcement Indicators and Mark as Read/Unread New Announcement Indicators and Mark as Read/Unread Announcements are a critical communication channel, but they can be easily overlooked. This udpate adds a number next to the Announcements tab in the course to signal the number of unread announcements available. In addition, you and students will be able to mark announcements as read from the pop-up notification that displays when you access a course. You can also mark announcements as unread from the Announcements page. Individual Date Adjustments from Batch Edit New Individual Date Adjustments from Batch Edit Batch Edit has allowed you to take bulk actions to adjust your course dates, like moving them forward based on the course start date or adjusting them by a specified number of days. This update makes it easier for you to make adjustments to individual dates for any item by showing you all of the dates on a single page. This includes visibility dates for all content types (Show On and Hide After) as well as the Due Date for assessments. Bulk Change Dates on the Batch Edit Page New Bulk Change Dates on the Batch Edit Page The Batch Edit page is used for taking bulk actions on content in your course, such as rolling dates forward based on the start of the semester or making several items visible or hidden. This new update allows you to change several dates in your course at once to a specific date and/or time. This includes dates and times for content availability (show and hide) and assessment due dates. To use this new tool, simply select the items that you want to edit and click the Edit Dates button at the bottom of the page. Change the Edit Type menu to Change to specific date and/or time, then select which dates and times you want to change. You can choose to change both date and time or either date OR time. For example, perhaps you want to change all of your assignment due dates from 6 PM to 8 PM. You can change those in a single operation without changing the dates those assignments are due. Note that you can only change dates which already exist in the system. You cannot use this bulk operation to add dates to content or assessments. Batch Edit Enhancement - Modify Content in Multiple Folders New Batch Edit Enhancement - Modify Content in Multiple Folders Batch Edit has allowed you to take bulk actions to adjust your course dates, like moving them forward based on the course start date or adjusting them by a specified number of days. This update makes it easier for you to make adjustments to individual dates for any item by showing you all of the dates on a single page. This includes visibility dates for all content types (Show On and Hide After) as well as the Due Date for assessments. Forms - Collect Information from Students New Forms - Collect Information from Students Revisit your course learning objectives to ensure they use action verbs that can be assessed. Since your learning objectives form the basis for the entire design of the course, it’s important to create measurable course learning objectives, or course/program competencies. Likert Question Type for Forms New Likert Question Type for Forms With the release of Forms for the Ultra Course View, you will also be able ot use Likert questions to collect quantitative measures of opinions and attitudes. When creating a Likert question, you can select a range of 3, 5, or 7 response choices. You can also label the poles as desired (e.g., strongly agree/strongly disagree) and choose to include a "not applicable" option. Persistent Navigation for Learning Modules New Persistent Navigation for Learning Modules When viewed by a student or in the Student Preview mode, Learning Modules feature a navigation bar at the top of the page that allows you navigate forward and backward between content items in the Learning Module. This update makes that navigation bar persistent, so that it is always visible at the top of the browser when you scroll vertically through content. Self-Enrollment via URL New Self-Enrollment via URL Most courses have a defined enrollment managed by course registration in MyNIU. However, there are some use cases, particularly for Organizations, where you may want to provide the opportunity for someone to self-enroll in that space. For example, you could post a link to your website that would allow NIU students or employees to self-enroll for optional training or invite participants by emailing a link to them. To enable this for your Organization, please reach out to us at maratoukh@wpunj.edu. There is some configuration that has to happen on the admin side of Blackboard for self-enrollment to be enabled. Introduction of Group Spaces New Introduction of Group Spaces This release introduces the first step in a brand new feature to help students collaborate more effectively with one another: Group Spaces. In this first version, clicking on the group name will take students to a list of all of the assessments assigned to that group. From here, clicking one of the assessments will open it. Instructors can access Group Spaces from the Group Set page. Click the ellipsis (...) to access the group management options and select Enter group space from the menu. This is only the beginning for Group Spaces! Future milestones will include additional tools to help students collaborate, including synchronous communication and project management features. Student Feedback Remains Visible to Students Regardless of Release Condition Settings New Student Feedback Remains Visible to Students Regardless of Release Condition Settings Visibility of grades and feedback has been a confusing issue for most faculty and students. A recent update made the grade visible regardless of the availability dates set in the Release Conditions. This update extends that to any overall feedback provided on the assessment. Now, both the grade and overall feedback will be visible to students even if the assessment is hidden due to a Hide After date. Overall Grade Added to the Gradebook Download New Auto-submitted Indicator in Attempt Logs The download function in the Gradebook allows you to download grades to a spreadsheet to analyze in other applications, such as Microsoft Excel, or to use as an offline record for archival purposes. Now, when downloading the Gradebook, you can choose to include the Overall Grade as a column in the output. Total and Weighted Calculations New Total and Weighted Calculations The Calculation item in the Gradebook lets you create custom formulas for calculating student grades. However, sometimes what you really need is an additional Total or Weighted calculation and not a custom formula. This update adds the ability to create new Total items that operate in the same way as the Overall Grade calculation. You can add a Total calculation from either the Grid View or the List View by clicking the plus icon above, below, or between any existing graded items. The Total calculation can be based on points or a weighted calculation and can include calculation rules to drop scores from a category (which you cannot do currently with a custom Calculation). Enhancements to the Gradebook Grid View New Enhancements to the Gradebook Grid View Blackboard continues to focus on improving the usability of the Gradebook. To maximize screen real estate of the Gradebook Grid View, they have made the following enhancements: Displaying more rows Reduced the size of the icons in the column header and the spacing around them Removed group names and highlighting on group assessments Course name moves up and hides when scrolling vertically to show more rows Improved student identification When a student's name is truncated for space, you can hover over the name to view the full name in a tool tip Category Information Added to the Gradebook List View New Category Information Added to the Gradebook List View To provide greater efficiency and clarity in the Gradebook List View, this update adds a new Category column. This column, along with the grading item icon, helps you mroe readily identify to which category the item belongs. You can also sort this column ascending or descending alphabetically. Grid View Sorting Controls New Grid View Sorting Controls Sorting controls for columns have been added little by little throughout the Grid View of the Gradebook. This update adds sorting controls for all remaining columns: Calculations Discussions Group Assessments Journals Group Discussions LTI tools Sorting Controls on Students Tab New Sorting Controls on Students Tab The Flexible Grading page has sorted students alphabetically by last name. This update allows you to sort students in various ways, including: Submission date of latest attempt (oldest - newest and newest - oldest) Last Name (A - Z and Z - A) First Name (A - Z and Z - A) Student ID (ascending and descending) The sorting control is also "sticky", meaning that if you stop grading and resume later, the last sorting option you used will still be applied. Copying Grading Schemas Between Courses New Copying Grading Schemas Between Courses You can now copy individual grading schemas from Ultra and Original courses to other Ultra courses. Previously, you had to copy all schemas from the Original course. From the new Grading Schemas folder on the Copy Items panel, you can select which schemas to copy. Note that a course may contain up to 100 grading schemas. If copying the selected schemas would cause the course to exceed this limit, you will see a banner to alert you of this. The copy process will copy as many as possible until it reaches a total of 100. Add Per-Question Feedback when Grading by Student New Add Per-Question Feedback when Grading by Student Detailed feedback on assessments is critical for students to understand their progress and achievement. In addition to overall feedback on the assessment, you can now provide question-level feedback to provide more direct and individualized feedback. Click the conversation bubble next to the grade pill to open the question feedback editor. When saved, the bubble is purple to indicate that feedback is present. In this first release, you can provide question-level feedback when grading by student (i.e., when you can see all of one student's responses at a time). Providing question-level feedback when grading by question is planned for a future release. Usability Improvements for Flexible Grading New Usability Improvements for Flexible Grading Flexible grading continues to improve to make grading easier and more efficient. In response to instructor feedback, this update moves the attempt selector closer to the grade pill to improve visibility and make it easier to switch between submissions by a single student. This update also eliminates the second grade pill for the final grade to reduce confusion. You can still override a grade by using the ellipsis menu (...), but this change prevents accidental grade overrides. Feedback on Override and Automatic Zero Grades for Tests and Assignments New Feedback on Override and Automatic Zero Grades for Tests and Assignments Feedback is crucial for students as it supports and shapes their learning journey. Now, you can give feedback for overridden tests, assignment grades, and automatic zeros. This option appears in the Gradebook grid view, and the Submissions list after the override or automatic zero is entered. You can also add feedback when working offline with the Gradebook. Download a single column to include the feedback column, enter the grades and feedback, then upload the file again. Attempt Logs for Assignments and Tests New Attempt Logs for Assignments and Tests The Ultra Course View currently provides you with informtaion on when a student opened and submitted an assessment, but there is no way to know what happens in between. The new Attempt Log provides you with valuable insights into students' progress through the assessment and can help to validate issues students may encounter during an assessment. For tests, the logs provide the following: Detailed information, including the date and time fo the start and when the answer to each question was saved Question-specific details, such as question number, a preview of the question, and estimated time spent on each question Submission receipt number, final grade, and attempt grade Easy toggling between all in-progress and submitted attempts for comprehensive assessment tracking Auto-captioning for Audio and Video Grading Feedback New Auto-captioning for Audio and Video Grading Feedback Recording audio and video feedback can help students to better understand your feedback to them and can support a stronger sense of connection with you as the faculty member, but it is not accessible to all students without captions. This update adds automatic captioning for any audio and video content recorded in assessment feedback. What's New in Blackboard Ultra Here’s where you’ll find the freshest insights into the latest features and improvements. May 2024 April 2024 March 2024
