Blackboard provides several communication and collaboration capabilities.
Announcements can be used by instructors to inform students of timely events and important reminders.
Email can be used in conjunction with Announcements to serve as a way to present important reminders and to discuss course related information in a private nature.
The Discussion Board enables instructors to set up threaded, asynchronous discussions. Instructors can set up multiple forums around different topics and embed those forums in appropriate content areas or lessons. Instructors can determine whether students can modify, delete, post anonymously, include attachments, and other options. Forums can be sorted/viewed by thread, author, date, or subject and are completely searchable.
The Collaboration Tool, designed for live, synchronous interaction, supports a text-based Chat environment, as well as a full Virtual Classroom. Instructors can schedule collaboration sessions using either environment. In addition to text-based chat, the Virtual Classroom provides a collaborative whiteboard, group web browsing (web touring), private question-and-answer, and breakout room capability. It can be run in a Lecture Mode or an Open Participation Mode. Users can "raise their hand" to be called on or given full participation control. All chat sessions can be logged and archived.
To support peer collaboration, instructors can use the Groups tool to form multiple groups of students. Each group can be given its own file exchange area, Discussion Board, Virtual Classroom and a Group Email tool to send messages to all group members. Students can belong to multiple groups simultaneously, so an instructor might assign different groups for different assignments or projects.
Eric Kunnen
Wed, Nov 18, 2009 9-10am