|
Blackboard Gradebook
Tips
The Blackboard gradebook is a great tool
for communicating grades to students. To make your usage of
the Blackboard gradebook a pleasure we have compiled this
short list of tips:
Use the Blackboard Gradebook as
a communication tool - not a gradebook calculation tool
Blackboard provides a utility to post grades for students
via an easy to use graphical user interface - however, the
tool does not excel at advanced calculations such as curves,
weights, or dropping students lowest grades. For advanced
gradebook calculations we always advise instructors to use
the "Download Grades" button to pull the gradebook
down onto their hard drives; for advanced calculations instructors
can then open the file in Microsoft Excel and program in formulas
and other calculations related to curves and weights. Once
the calculations are complete that column can then be uploaded
to the system.
Firefox and the Blackboard gradebook
- disaster waiting to happen
The Blackboard gradebook does not function well with Firefox
- there is a weird code issue that causes firefox to continually
append an autoincrement value to the width of the gradebook.
This ends up causing multiple problems ranging from a gradebook
display that is way too wide, to a gradebook that takes forever
to download. It is recommended that instructors use IE when
working with the blackboard gradebook.
Downloading and Uploading
The Blackboard documentation recommends the following procedure
when using the download and upload utilities for the gradebook:
1 - First add all of the columns that you will be calculating
from the download on the blackboard system first - click "Add
Item" in order to add the columns.
2 - Download the gradebook with all of the empty columns
that you have just added.
3 - Perform all of your calculation on the downloaded copy
filling in any blank columns you have added.
4 - Upload the copy back to the system
The idea is to not create additional columns in the downloaded
copy and then attempt to re-upload - this could potentially
lead to loss or overwriting of data. Instead you are encouraged
to add all columns on the server, and then fill in the data
in the downloaded copy and then re-upload.
Mac users - use CTRL click to download
the gradebook
Apple users commonly run into problems when attempting to
download the gradebook. Instead of being prompted to download
the resultant CSV file the system just opens the file in the
main browser frame. In order to achieve the desired functionality
Mac users should hold down CTRL and then click on the link
in order to download the gradebook CSV file. That file, once
downloaded, can be opened in Excel or any other spreadsheet
program that can manipulate comma seperated value files.
return to top |
