The "To Keep Up" Wiki

Things that we as facilitators and/or instructors need to do prior to the start of a course.

1. Class Discussion
   1. Check FAQ (make sure all content is brought from last semester's running)
      1. Check How will my java programs be graded? and make sure that the general grading criteria is posted and that it refers to just assignment 14.
      2. If it is missing
         1. Here is the file to download to your computer as of Spring 2024 (and earlier): generalgradingcriteriaforjavaprograms.pdf (It used to have an 08 in front of the file name that's been removed.)
         2. Cursor over the post's text, select Edit
         3. Select the file to upload from your computer.
      3. Also make sure that it only addresses assignment 14:
         In assignment 14 you will be asked to write and submit a Java program. In addition to being graded for its functionality, you will also be graded based on whether your program meets the attached general criteria.
Note when submitting your program, only include the .java files (no other files and no directories) in the .zip file you submit.
   2. Post your introduction thread to Introduce Yourself
   3. Add, or make sure there is, a thread You can reply to this thread to post your intro!
   4. Subscribe to discussion threads
      1. Ask a Facilitator
      2. Ask a Math Question
   5. Subscribe to other discussion threads optionally
      1. Introduce yourself (so you can read others' introductions)
      2. XAMPP, Java and Eclipse (so you will see issues and maybe you can help)
      3. Watercooler (to keep track on student-to-student chats)
         
         
2. Internal Messages
   1. Send your welcome message to each of your groups
      
      
3. Live Classrooms/Office
   1. Ensure each Classroom and Facilitator's link is unique
   2. Add description for each facilitator's office. Consider including:
      1. When you'll hold your live office time or class
      2. How long you'll stay if no one shows
      3. A reminder that you can meet 1:1 at other hours with advance notice
         
         
4. Other make-sures
   1. Disable group discussion board
   2. Disable External Email
   3. Make sure all graded assessments don’t allow answer view (as we set that after Thursday)
      
      
5. Grade Center
   1. Ensure all TurnItIn assignment statistics and percentages are removed from student view, currently this is for assignments 1, 5, and 6
      to do this, do for each of the Turnitins:
      1. Grade Center, go to assignment 1's Turnitin column, right click on a row in the column and Grade User Activity
      2. Upper right, click on the gear for Settings
      3. Click on Optional Settings to expand it
      4. Under Similarity Report, remove any checkmark from Allow students to review similarity Reports
         

smi does this so he can search through students taking the course in previous semesters to see when a student has previously taken the course.

Needed tools for these steps:

• OneNote
• LibreOffice Spreadsheet (although Excel should work similarly).

The steps

1. Users and Groups > Users > in lower right, Select All lists all students that signed up to take the course on a single page
2. Manually select all students listed, copy
3. Open LibreOffice Spreadsheet
4. Paste Special > Paste Unformatted text. Ok the dialog.
5. Sort everything to shove blank lines out of the way
6. Copy appropriate columns (e.g., first & last name, email, role, and yes/no. yes/no is whether they were there at the end of the course.)
7. Go to OneNote, create a page if you want, and then in the page, Paste and Match Formatting

Say it's Summer and you have a student in your group who took the course in Spring.
You want to see what work they did in Spring. But suppose that they dropped the course before the end, and thus they don't show in the Grade Center for the Spring running. You'd like to make that student's entry in the Spring Grade Center visible so you can see the work they had done in Spring, maybe to check against what they do in this current Summer semester.

You need to have access to the Spring running of the course to do this. If you don't have the access, ask the instructor or another facilitator that does have access to do this stuff.

Assuming you can access Spring, here's what you do.

1. In Blackboard, change to the Spring course.
   • To do this: from main Blackboard menu, select Courses. Go ← or → till you see the course you want to view, and select it.
2. Full Grade Center
3. At the top, select Manage > Row Visibility
4. Find the student you want (e.g., Doe John jdoe Hidden)
5. Put a checkmark into the box to the left of their name
6. At the top, select Show Rows (will change selected rows to be Shown)
7. At the very bottom, Submit