This document provides instructions for several online course management tasks in Blackboard: 1) It describes how to create assignments and safe assignments, set availability dates, allocate points, and download submissions. 2) It explains how to run course reports to view student engagement and activity in different areas of the course. 3) It outlines how to set up the early warning system to send alerts about students falling behind based on rules checking grades, logins, and late papers.

1. ACTIVITY 7
TEACHING ONLINE
Day Six: Assignments and Course
Reports

2. AGENDA: DAY SIX
Creating Assignments
Grading Assignments
Downloading Assignments
Handling Multiple Submissions
Course Reports
Early Warning System

3. To Create an Assignment . . .
In a Learning Module, Folder, or Content page, click on the blue
Create Assessment button and then choose Assignment from the
drop down menu.

4. Fill in the name of the Assignment and use the Instruction
area to provide more detail about the Assignment.
You can also attach a file to the Assignment if necessary.
*Note the name of the Assignment will appear in the Grade
Center.

5. After you have typed (or copied and pasted) the Assignment
instructions into the Instruction box, assign a point value to the
Assignment in the Grading box.
You then will scroll down the page to see a
number of Assignment delivery and format
options available.
Note that you can give
students more than one
attempt.
The Limit Availability
option will cause the
Assignment to
disappear from the
student view once the
Display Until daet has
passed.

6. If you want to accept late papers, you can set the Display
Until date later than the due date and then use the Due
Date option to mark papers submited after the due date as
“late.”
You may also control who can see the
assignment. If, for instance, you assign different
topics to different groups, you can choose to
deliver the Assignment only to a particular group.

7. To Retrieve an Assignment from Grade
Center . . .
The submitted but ungraded
Once your students have assignments will appear in
submitted their Assignments, green with an exclamation
the assignments will appear in mark on them.
Grade Center and can be
downloaded from there.

8. There is also an
option in Grade
Center to view only
those items that need
grading.
Note that in this version of Grade
Center, you can sort by a number of
criteria.

9. A new screen will load in which
you can view the student’s
submission. You can also assign
In Full grade Center Mode, to grade
points, insert comments to the
individual students submissions,
student, type instructor notes
click on the green exclamation point
(only visible to the instructor)
to see the options for viewing the
and reattach files.
submission or entering a grade.

10. To do a mass download of student
submissions . . .
Go to Grade Center and
put your cursor on the
heading for the
Assignment you wish to
download. Then select
Assignment File
Download.
A new box will appear. Select
the files you wish to download.

11.  A new screen will appear like
the one to the right.
 Click on the blue hyperlink to
download the assignment.
You will then be prompted to save the file to your computer. They
will be saved in one folder, compressed in a zip file.
Once the file is downloaded, navigate to the folder where you
saved the file and double click on the zipped file. WinZip will
launch and you will see a list of files in the zip file. Click Extract
and then navigate to the folder that you created for your
student’s work.
Note: For each paper there will be 2 files. The .txt file will any
comments that the student submitted along with the paper. The
.doc or other file will be the document itself. Note that the
Student login and assignment name is appended to all
documents.

12. Multiple submissions
Perhaps due to a design
flaw, comments and
grades only “count” if
entered for the first
submission of any
assignment.
You can still see and
assess subsequent
submissions, but when
entering a grade, be A new box will appear. Select
sure that you enter is the files you wish to download.
under the first
submission

13. Safe Assign
Create a SafeAssignment
SafeAssignments are separate from Assignments. You cannot make
an existing Assignment into a SafeAssignment. Like regular
Assignments, however, SafeAssignments are integrated into the
Grade Center.
In a content area, select Create Assessment and then choose
SafeAssignment from the drop down menu.

14. Safe Assign Fields
FIELD DESCRIPT IO N
Title Type a title for the SafeAssignment.
Points Possible Type the points possible for the SafeAssignment. This value
will be shared with the Grade Center Item created for the Safe
Assignment.
Text Type instructions for completing the SafeAssignment.
Available Select whether or not the SafeAssignment should be visible to
Students.
Availability Dates Use these controls to set the date range when Students can
interact with the SafeAssignment. It is possible to set only a
Start date or only an End date.
Drafts Allows Students to validate their paper without submitting it to
the institutional database. Useful as an instructive tool to help
Students learn how to attribute papers properly.
Students Viewable Determines whether or not Students can see the report
generated when their papers are submitted.
Urgent Checking Sets papers to a high priority in the queue.
Optional Announcement
Create Select Yes to create an Announcement about the
SafeAssignment.
Subject Type a subject for the Announcement.
Message Type a message for the Announcement.

15. Safe Assign
Create a SafeAssignment
Give the SafeAssignment a name, add instructions, point value, and
date range. If you want to allow students to submit a draft and see
their SA score, select the Draft and Student Viewable boxes.

16. Safe Assign
SafeAssignments appear in the
Grade Center just ike regular
Assignments.
When you open the
SafeAssignment, you can click
on the green icon listed under SA
report.

17. Course Reports
A variety of reports on student
activity in various sections of the
course are available in the
Course Management area.
Access Course Reports in the
Control Panel.
Although these reports cannot
tell you everything a student did
online, they can allow you to
verify that a student has been
actively engaged in the course.

18. Course Reports
The reports provide data on
student activity in Content areas,
Discussion Forums, Groups
activities as well as a
comprehensive report of student
activity in every area of the
course (like assessments!).
To run a Course Report, click on You can choose a date range for
the arrow to the right of the title the report (say the period a test
and then click Run. was available) and a student’s
name. The report will be
generated as a pdf file unless
you select another format.

19. Early Warning System
The Early Warning System
will send alerts to you about
students who are falling
behind in class.
You can create Rules that find
students by looking for specific
warning signs: low grades, failure
to logon regularly, or late papers

20. AFTERNOON AGENDA
 Create an Assignment
 Create a Safe Assignment
 Run a Course Report
 Set up an Early Warning System
notification
 Enter a Blog post in the Activity 7 Blog