School of Pharmacy Educational Technology/ Blackboard Update Fall 2005

1. School of Pharmacy Educational Technology/ Blackboard Update Fall 2005

2. Administrative Reminders • Student Enrollment processing begins Wednesday 8/24 • Processed once daily Monday - Friday • Only students who are registered will appear in your course site • Graduate Teaching Assistants from PSC and PHSR will be enrolled automatically after their training has been completed. • Send any additional teaching assistant information to help@rx.umaryland.edu

3. Administrative Reminders • Course sites are only available if you make them available to your students • Previous Semester Course material will be made unavailable to students three weeks into the semester. • Exception (3rd Year Required Spring 2005 courses will be made unavailable 3 weeks after the Class of 2006 returns from rotations) • Course Archives • Material from Spring 2001-Fall 2002 has been removed from Blackboard • Spring/Fall 2003 Material will be removed mid-October • Spring 2004 Material will be removed mid-April

4. What’s New for Fall 2005 • Chris Klimas • New Instructional Technology Specialist • New Instruct! Newsletter for Instructors and Teaching Assistants (Monthly Publication) • New Learn! Newsletter for Students (Bi-annual Publication) • Incoming PharmD Student Survey • New online training for Blackboard • Blackboard Upgrade – Application Pack 3 and Building Blocks

5. Technology Survey of Incoming PharmD Students • 121 Students Responses • 86% of Students have had previous experience with one or more course management systems • 14% had no previous experience with course management systems • 51% have had previous experience with Blackboard Number of Student Responses

6. Self-reported Technology Comfort / Experience Level • Sending and Receiving Email • 86% Very Comfortable • 14% Somewhat Comfortable • 2% Somewhat Uncomfortable • Word Processing (Using MS Word, other word processing programs • 72% Very Comfortable • 26% Somewhat Comfortable • 2% Somewhat Uncomfortable

7. Self-reported Technology Comfort / Experience Level • Creating Spreadsheets • 39% Very Comfortable • 44% Somewhat Comfortable • 13% Somewhat Uncomfortable • 2% Very Uncomfortable • 2% Do not Use • Creating Presentations • 39% Very Comfortable • 42% Somewhat Comfortable • 7% Somewhat Uncomfortable • 5% Very Uncomfortable • 7% Do not Use

8. New Initiative – Online Blackboard Training • First Module • New Instructor and Teaching Assistant Training • Launches Today • Pilot group, new graduate teaching assistants • Planned Evaluation • Survey of GTAs once the semester begins to evaluate usefulness and instruction quality • Survey of Coursemasters with GTAs at the semester conclusion

9. New Initiative – Online Blackboard Training

10. Application Pack 3 Improvement Highlights • Review Status • Adaptive Release • Advanced Assessment Questions • Assessment Question Completion Status • Performance Dashboard • Advanced Navigation Bar • Gradebook Null Option

11. Review Status New content setting for items that allows students to mark the material as reviewed. The User Progress page reports which students have reviewed the content item.

12. Adaptive Release Provides the ability for an instructor to create custom learning paths through course content and activities. Content items, discussions, assessments, assignments, or other activities can be released to students based on a set of criteria including: date/time, specific individuals, group membership, institutional role, grade on a particular test or assignment, or Review Status.

13. Advanced Assessment Questions Allows the creation of additional questions types within assessments. • Calculation Question • Numerical Answer • File Upload Question Type • Hotspot Question Type • Either/Or Question • Fill in the Blanks Plus • Multiple Choice/Fill in the Blank Combo • Opinion Scale • Short Answer

14. Assessment Question Completion Status Students may skip questions that they may wish to come back to in a question-by-question assessment. This feature allows students to clearly identify which questions they have actually completed from the ones that they have skipped as they progress through the assessment.

15. Performance Dashboard View key information and outcomes for all course users. The Performance Dashboard displays the last time each user logged in, their course role, Adaptive Release criteria, Review Status for content items, and grades.

16. Advanced Navigation Bar Commonly used tools are separated from the Course Menu to make them easier to find and use. New detail view added. If allowed by the instructor, users can toggle between the default Course Menu view and the Detail view.

17. Gradebook Null Option Excludes incomplete items from Gradebook calculations – items that have not yet been taken or graded can be excluded from grades, averages, and other calculations.

18. New Building Block – Link Checker

19. Information Available to Faculty • Available now • Blackboard how-to tutorials and special School of Pharmacy specific Blackboard documentation • Training Module for New Instructors/ Teaching Assistants • Available in the coming weeks • Full Survey Results of Incoming Student Survey • Summary of Blackboard Usage Statistics for the 2004-2005 Academic Year • September 20th 11:00 am – Noon (Location TBA) • Open Seminar Instructors and Teaching Assistants – Using Blackboard Effectively • Available Early October • Online Training for new features in Blackboard Application Pack 3 and Building Blocks