{"id":5027,"date":"2014-01-30T12:45:28","date_gmt":"2014-01-30T17:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/blackboard-tip-of-the-week-72\/"},"modified":"2014-01-30T12:45:28","modified_gmt":"2014-01-30T17:45:28","slug":"blackboard-tip-of-the-week-72","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/blackboard-tip-of-the-week-72\/","title":{"rendered":"Blackboard Tip of the Week"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

A number of faculty like to create a Discussion Forum in the Discussion Board area of their course, which they name something along the lines of Social Caf\u00e9 <\/strong>or Ask a Question<\/strong>, and which they intend for their students to use as a place where they can engage in virtual conversations, ask questions of one another, share course-related information, etc.<\/p>\n

Did you know, though, that by using the Groups tool in the current version of Blackboard<\/em>, you can allow your students to form their own study groups, in which they can share files or e-mail within their Group, create and use a group-specific Discussion Board, interact within a virtual classroom or take advantage of available communications tools such as blogs or journals?<\/p>\n

To provide your students with a potentially motivating and powerful learning resource of this kind, simply create a tool link on your course menu that points to the Groups area of your course (How do I do that?<\/strong><\/a><\/em>), and to which you give an appropriate name, such as Student Study Lounge<\/strong>. By default, students who access the Groups area in your course can freely create their own groups, in which other students can then enroll themselves.<\/p>\n

To create a group, a student does the following:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Navigating to the Groups area of your course, s(he) selects the dark grey Create Group <\/strong>button.<\/em><\/li>\n
  2. In the Create Self-Enrollment Group <\/strong>window that displays, the student gives the Group a name, provides a title for the Group sign-up sheet, indicates \u2014 if wanted \u2014 the maximum number of users who can enroll in the Group, and then selects Submit <\/strong>to create the Group.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    When students enroll in a Group and enter that Group area, they will automatically have access to the following Group tools, which they can use however they wish as part of their work for your course:<\/p>\n