Blackboard Vista offers various tools for managing your course sections. This guide covers the following topics:

• Getting Help
• Logging Into Bb Vista
• Creating Student Groups
• Creating Group Discussions or Chats
• Tracking Reports
• Selective Release

To create student groups with Group Manager:

1. From the Teach tab, click the Group Manager link from the Instructor Tools menu.



2. Click the Create Groups button.



3. The Create Groups page offers three choices for creating a group:
   • Create Custom Group allows you to create a group and specify which students are placed in the group. To create a custom group:
     1. Select Create Custom Group and click Continue.
     2. Enter a Group name and a group description (optional).
     3. Click Add Members to add students to the group.
     4. The Add Members page will display a list of users enrolled in your course.
     5. Click the checkbox next to the users you would like to add to your group.
     6. Click Add Selected.
     7. Click Save to save your group.
   • Create Multiple Groups allows you to either create one or more empty groups and add students to them later, or create one or more groups and randomly distribute students within them. To create empty or random groups:
     1. Select Create Multiple Groups and click Continue.
     2. Enter a word or phrase to include in each group name and a default description (optional).
     3. In the How Should the Groups Be Created Section, if you would like to create empty groups, select Create empty groups and add members later. In the Number of Groups text field, enter the number of empty groups you would like to create. If you would like to create groups that will be fully populated with randomly-selected students, select Create full groups, and randomly distribute Students.
     4. In the Students section, if you would like to include the course's Demo Student in the groups, select Include the demo Student in one of the groups. Remember the Demo Student is you when you are using the Student View tab.
     5. In the Set Up Groups section, you can determine the number of groups to create or how many students to put in each group. If you would like to specify the number of groups to create, select By number of groups and enter the number of desired groups in the corresponding text field. Your students will be evenly distributed amongst the specified number of groups. If you would like to specify the number of students to put in each group, select By number of Students per group and enter the desired number of students per group in the corresponding text field. An appropriate number of groups will be created, with the specified number of students randomly selected and added to each group
     6. In the section marked What Should Be Done with Any Extra Members, select Distribute extra members among the groups to randomly assign any remaining students to the created groups. You can also select Put extra members in their own group to create an extra group specifically for remaining students. If you prefer, you can choose to add these students to groups yourself by selecting Leave extra members to be added manually to groups.
     7. Click Continue.
     8. In the Confirm Created Groups page, you can edit the default names assigned to the groups and further customize each group's description. If you selected to create full groups, you can also randomly rearrange the students assigned to he groups by clicking Shuffle Members.
     9. Click the Save button when done.
   • Create Groups with Sign-Up Sheets creates groups with sign-up sheets, allowing students to sign up for the groups they would like to join. To create groups with sign-up sheets:
     1. Select Create Groups with Sign-Up Sheets and click Continue.
     2. Enter the number of groups to create, a word or phrase to include in each group name, a default description (optional), and the maximum number of students to assign to a group in the appropriate fields.
     3. If you would like students who are not assigned to a group to be able to see the names of students in each group, click the checkbox labeled Student View.
     4. In the Sign-Up Sheet Settings section, enter a title and, if desired, a set of instructions for your sign-up sheet in the appropriate fields.
     5. Select a location from the drop-down menu labeled Place the sign-up sheet link on to specify the page where students will find the sign-up sheet.
     6. Click Continue.
     7. In the Confirm Created Groups page, you can edit the default names assigned to the groups and further customize each group's description. You can also edit the maximum number of students allowed in the group.
     8. Click Save.
        

To create Discussion boards or Chats for student groups that only members of those groups can see:

1. From the Teach tab, click the Group Manager link from the Instructor Tools menu.



2. Check the boxes next to the student groups.
3. From the Create Group Activity drop-down, select Discussion topic or Chat room and click the Go arrow.



4. Enter the settings for your Discussion or Chat and click the Save button.
5. Discussion threads or chat rooms will be created, one for each group you selected. Selective release criteria will be set so that only group members will see their discussion thread or chat room.

To generate a tracking report:

1. Click the Tracking link from the Instructor Tools menu.



2. The Select a Report Type window will list a number of report types, with a brief description of each type provided. Select the type of report you would like to generate.
3. The Select a Date Range for the Report allows you to specify what time frame you would like covered in your report.
   • It is not recommended that date ranges span more than 1 week due to the volume of data involved.
4. Click Run Report.
   

Selective Release allows you to hide or show content, and specify criteria that must be met before content is made available to students. To regulate the release of content using Selective Release:

• Click the Selective Release link from the Designer or Instructor Tools menu.



• The Course Content tab displays a list of Folders and Content Links in a column called Title. Folders can be expanded to show the Content Links they contain by clicking the + next to the Folder's title.
• Next to the Title column is the Linked To column, which displays the items that each Content Link is linked to. This column also includes a Hide Item button (if the content is currently visible) or a Show Item button (if the content is currently hidden). You can Hide or Show an item by clicking this button. Note that hiding an item also hides the Content Link associated with that item.
• The last column on the Course Content tab is the Release Criteria column. This column contains a Set Release Criteria button if no criteria have been specified, and a truncated version of your criteria presented as a link if criteria have previously been specified. Click this button or link to specify criteria that must be met before release.
• The Set Release Criteria page contains four options: Add Date Criteria, Add Member Criteria, Add Group Criteria, and Add Grade book Criteria. Below these options is a list of previously specified release criteria; initially, this list will be empty. Click on one of the buttons to add a criterion.
  • The Add Date Criteria option allows you to specify a time frame when content will be available.
  • Add Member Criteria allows you to specify students to which an item should or should not be made available.
  • Add Group Criteria allows you to make content available to specified groups of students.
  • Add Grade Book Criteria based upon results posted to the Grade Book.
• Click the Save button when your changes are complete.

The Selective Release Map page also contains a Members tab that contains a list of Users enrolled in your course. You can see what content a student has access to by clicking the student's User ID from the list.

Author:

Jason Polubinsky, 2007

Contributor:

Mandi Witkovsky, 2007

Editors:

Han Fei, 2007
Scott Vitz, 2007
Mandi Witkovsky, 2007

Last Updated:

October 16, 2007