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About Janice Florent

Technology Coordinator in the Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Faculty Development at Xavier University of Louisiana

what is ePortfolio word cloud

An electronic portfolio (also known as an eportfolio) is a collection of electronic evidence (artifacts) assembled and managed by a user, usually on the Web. Such electronic evidence may include electronic files, images, multimedia, blog entries, and hyperlinks. If the ePortfolio is online, users can maintain it dynamically over time.

The American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) recently published a study on "Fulfilling the American Dream: Liberal Education and the Future of Work." In it, they report:

78% of executives and 81% of hiring managers find ePortfolios useful when evaluating recent graduates, versus 51% of executives and 48% of hiring managers who find college transcripts useful.

Students gain a number of benefits from incorporating portfolios in their learning. Here are a few benefits from an Educational Technology and Mobile Learning article:

  • Portfolios enable students to record their learning and document their growth over a period of time.
  • They provide students with a venue through which they can showcase their learning.
  • They can be used as a tool for self-assessment, self-reflection and personal development.
  • They help students focus on the process of learning rather than the end product.
  • They promote deeper learning as students actively engage in the learning process.
  • They develop students metacognitive skills (reflective practices) and help them take control of their learning.
  • They empower students' voice.
  • They are a ‘method of self-discovery and confidence building’.
  • They help students develop personal and academic identities.
  • They assist students in locating their strengths and weaknesses and plan for future improvement.
  • They invite teachers' feedback and input from peers.
  • They help students develop their writing skills.
  • A portfolio presents concrete evidence of the learner's work and achievements to prospective employers.

A good ePortfolio is both about being a product (a digital collection of artifacts) and a process (of reflecting on those artifacts and what they represent).

collection of ePortfolio artifacts

Our Brightspace system includes an ePortfolio tool that is available to all users. The Brightspace ePortfolio tool is typically used by learners to collect samples of their work ("artifacts"), write about experiences they have ("reflections") and then choose whether to share them with others (like peers, instructors, or even potential employers).

We’ve prepared this ePortfolio FAQ to provide you with answers to questions about the Brightspace ePortfolio tool.

Additionally, if you're interested in learning more about Brightspace's ePortfolio tool or if you want to learn more about ePortfolios in general, you should attend the upcoming CCE: Introducing ePortfolios workshop.

Want More Information?

ePortfolio Introduction video [3:28]
Document and share ideas and achievements
ePortfolio FAQ
ePortfolio how-to documents
View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Continuous Delivery release notes
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.

"Drip-feeding" is a term you will likely hear in association with online and hybrid learning. While the term "drip-feeding" is new to many people, most are familiar with the concept.

a drop of water

Drip-feeding is "scheduled lesson delivery." Essentially, instructors can determine when they want certain content in their courses to become available. Instructors can configure their course content and then set-up the sequential delivery of that content. Once set-up, the Learning Management System (LMS) will auto-drip the content to students without any more work by the instructor.

Utilizing date/time restrictions allow instructors to create content at a time that is convenient to them and make it visible to students at the appropriate time. This can be very handy because instructors can set-up their course content well in advance of when they want it to be available to their students. For example, create all the course content at the beginning of the semester, set the date/time restrictions, and then let Brightspace auto-drip the content.

The availability dates in Brightspace control when items are available to students. There are three types of availability dates, they are:

  • Start dates: These dates specify when a student can see the item. Students will see that the item exists, but they cannot open it beforehand.
  • Due dates: These dates specify when a student should complete an item. The dates will appear in the course calendar and students will be able to see and submit their work after the date has passed.
  • End dates: These dates restrict access to the item. They remove all access once the date has passed.

Some instructors may be hesitant to set date/time restrictions for the entire semester because assignment dates/times may need to be adjusted as the semester progresses. This means, the instructors would have to go into the content items to adjust the dates/times when necessary. The Manage Dates tool can simplify this process. The Manage Dates tool allows instructors to easily change due dates and availability dates at one time (all on one page). The Manage Dates tool will save instructors some time as they will not have to edit each individual item to adjust the dates/times.

Drip-feeding course content will not work for every situation. However, if you think it can work for you, give it a try.

Want More Information?

How to Add Dates and Release Conditions to a Modules and Topics
Manage Dates
View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Continuous Delivery release notes
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.

image showing various disasters

Tropical Storm Gordon should be a reminder that course delivery is vulnerable to unplanned events. Potential interruptions to class activities include but are not limited to natural disasters, widespread illness, acts of violence, planned or unexpected construction-related closures, severe weather conditions, and medical emergencies.

Here are a few things you can do in Brightspace to help you prepare should the need arise.

For those who missed last week's "Preparing to Teach During an Interruption: Strategies for Maintaining Instructional Continuity" workshop and for those who want to learn more about instructional continuity, you will find a link to the workshop recording, PowerPoint slides, and resources discussed in the workshop here:

Want More Information?

View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Continuous Delivery release notes
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.

Image credit: "The threat of disasters is real" by jflorent is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

update

D2L (the company that owns Brightspace) uses Continuous Delivery to update our Brightspace system. The Continuous Delivery model gives us regular monthly updates allowing for incremental and easily integrated changes with no downtime required for our Brightspace system.

Our Continuous Delivery update occurs on the 4th Thursday of each month. D2L provides release notes to help users stay up-to-date with the changes.

Here are a few updates in the August 2018/10.8.4 release that were added to our system this month:

1) Quizzes – Dynamic preview available in question pools

Question pools now include a dynamic preview. The preview displays questions randomly selected from the current question pool. A refresh button allows instructors to navigate through several selections to ensure the question pool is working as expected.

question pool - refresh preview
Dynamic Preview in Question Pool

2) Rubrics - Improvements to rubric feedback for learners

To provide learners with more detailed feedback on activities and apply a consistent look and feel to rubric feedback, this release includes the following improvements:

  • User Progress displays general feedback, score, and a graded rubric for Grades, Discussions and Assignments. Feedback displays to learners as soon as instructors save rubric and overall feedback assessment.
  • Content tool for Assignments displays general feedback, score, and a graded rubric. This replaces the previously displayed Instructor Feedback.

Rubric feedback for assignments progress
Rubric feedback for Assignments Progress in the User Progress tool

Rubric feedback for discussions progress
Rubric feedback for Discussions Progress in the User Progress tool

3) Turnitin - Improvements to Turnitin Integration

The following improvements have been made to the Turnitin (TII) integration:

  • Learners can view GradeMark feedback in User Progress under Grades and in Content.
  • Error and status messages are being improved upon.

If you are interested in getting more information about these and all the August Continuous Delivery updates, refer to the Brightspace Platform August 2018/10.8.4 Release Notes.

Additonally, refer to the Brightspace Release Notes for Continuous Delivery Releases, for details about current, past, and to preview upcoming continuous delivery updates.

Want more information?

View current, past, and preview upcoming Continuous Delivery release notes
View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.

1

Use due dates in Brightspace to help students stay on track. Students will see due dates when they look at entries in the course calendar.

Due dates and availability dates are generally entered when the instructor creates assignments, assessments, discussion topics and forums, etc. The dates automatically populate into the course calendar.

calendar

Instructors can use the Manage Dates tool to view, edit in bulk, and bulk offset date availability from one central location. You can also set the calendar status of all content topics and modules, discussion topics and forums, assignment submissions folders, grades categories and items, announcement items, quizzes, checklists, and surveys in their course in the Manage Dates tool.

Course objects display in a grid that you can sort by any of the column headings. You can also use the Type column to sort the Manage Dates page based on the tool-specific order and use advanced filter options to work with smaller sets of objects. If you filter your course objects, any bulk changes you make apply only to the filtered results. This enables you to update multiple availability dates based on specific criteria.

In addition to managing dates, you can open each course object in a new window by clicking on its name. This launches the object's edit page where you can edit additional properties for that object without leaving the Manage Dates tool.

The Manage Dates tool can be very useful after a course copy. For example, if you copied content from one course into another course, you can use the Manage Dates tool to easily adjust dates after the course copy. Additionally, if you've entered dates on items in your course and later need to adjust dates in bulk, try using the Manage Dates tool.

Follow these steps to do it.

To add availability and due dates in Content:

  1. Get into the course you want to add availability and due dates to course objects.
  2. On the NavBar (of the course you want to change dates in), click Content.
  3. On the Table of Contents page, click Bulk Edit.
  4. For any topic or module that you want to add availability or due dates to, click Add dates and restrictions.
  5. Do any of the following:
    • Click Add start date. Enter your start date details.
    • Click Add due date. Enter your due date details.
    • Click Add end date. Enter your end date details.
  6. Click Update.
  7. Click Done Editing.

To edit dates in bulk:

  1. Get into the course you want to change the dates of course objects.
  2. On the NavBar (of the course you want to change dates in), click Course Admin.
  3. Click Manage Dates.
  4. Select the check box of the items for which you want to bulk edit dates.
  5. Click Bulk Edit Dates.
  6. In the Bulk Edit Dates dialog box, update the due dates and availability dates.
  7. Click Save.

Want More Information?

Add availability and due dates in Content
About Manage Dates
Bulk edit dates in Manage Dates
Offset dates in Manage Dates
Manage Dates - Offset Dates (video)
View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Continuous Delivery release notes
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.

G Suite Apps

Xavier provides all faculty, staff, and students with a G Suite for Education (formerly Google Apps for Education) account, which includes Mail, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Forms.

With the Google Apps integration into Brightspace, you can upload files from your Google Drive into Brightspace. Google Drive is a service for storing, syncing and sharing files.

Before you can take advantage of the Google Apps integration, you must authorize Brightspace to access your XULA Google account. The authorization will link your Google and Brightspace accounts so that you can upload files from your Google Drive into Brightspace.

Follow these steps to do it.

To enable Google Apps integration:

  1. Login to your Brightspace account.
  2. Scroll to the bottom of the main landing page (the "My Home" page) and locate the Google Apps widget.
  3. Click on the Link to your Google Apps account and follow the prompts.
link to Google Apps

To upload a file from your Google Drive into Brightspace:

  1. Click on the Upload/Create button and then choose the Upload Files option.
  2. From the Add a File window choose Google Drive and follow the prompts.
Upload/Create button
Upload/Create button

Want more information?

Getting Started with Google Apps
Google Apps integration
Add a Google document to Brightspace
Adding Google documents to Brightspace - Learners
View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Continuous Delivery release notes
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.

1

music notes

Do you use music in your teaching and learning? If not, maybe you should consider using music.

Research has shown that music can:

  • Set a positive mood
  • Raise energy levels
  • Reduce stress levels
  • Calm your students
  • Motivate and inspire your students
  • Keep students focused and attentive

Whether you need to calm your students down, or get them up and moving, music is just the thing to try out.

Additional information can be found in this Music and Learning: Integrating Music in the Classroom article by Chris Brewer.

Also, it may not be a simple task to find suitable free music to use in your classroom or for your videos and presentations. Here are a few websites with affordable royalty-free audio clips that you can try:

Is there a website that you use to find royalty-free music? If so, let us know in the comments.

Photo Credit: Image by Alexas_Fotos from Pixabay

1

A Quicklink is a way for instructors to insert a direct link to content that is inside or outside of their course.

insert link in HTML Editor

Quicklinks are useful because they allow instructors to provide students with a direct link to content in the course. For example, instructors can create an announcement or email for students with links that take students directly to specific content files or assignments inside of the course.

Instructors should take advantage of Quicklinks, they are useful for pointing students to specific content in the course!

Follow these steps to do it.

Watch this short video for instructions on inserting Quicklinks:

Want more information?

Brightspace Tip #43: HTML Editor
HTML Editor Quick Reference (pdf)
Making Use of the HTML Editor (video)
Format HTML course content
HTML Editor Basics
View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Continuous Delivery release notes
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.

push pin

The My Courses widget (on the My Home page) uses tile-based images to make finding your courses easier. Users can choose which courses they see in their My Courses widget by pinning and unpinning courses.

  • Pinning a course makes it appear in the My Courses widget.
  • Unpinning a course makes it disappear from the My Courses widget.
  • Pinning a course also makes it rise to the top of the Select a Course list and on the My Courses widget.

Search through all of your courses and manually pin and unpin courses to ensure that your most relevant courses are visible on the My Home page.

Follow these steps to do it.

To pin/unpin a course, you should:

  1. From the Minibar, click Select a course (i.e., the waffle icon).
  2. Select a Course

  3. Type the name of the course that you want to pin or find it by searching in the Search for a course field or scroll down to find the course.
  4. Click the Pin icon beside the course. The pinned course will move to the top of the Select a Course list and to the first position in the My Courses widget.
  5. pin/unpin course

Note: To unpin a course click the Pin icon beside the course.

If you want to completely change the order in which your courses are displayed, unpin all of them and then pin them in the order you want them to appear. The most recently pinned course will always appear first.

Want more information?

Pin courses to the top of the Select a Course list
How to Pin Courses (pdf)
How to Reorder Pinned Courses
View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Continuous Delivery release notes
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.

1

copy stamp

There are a some situations where you may want to copy components of a Brightspace course OR copy an entire Brightspace course into another one. For example,

  • You have a course from a previous semester and you would like to copy the course contents into your empty course shell for the current semester.
  • You have a Master Course Shell that you input content into and would like to copy the course contents into your empty course shell for the current semester.
  • You are teaching multiple sections of a course, you created all the content in one Brightspace course section and want to copy the content into the other sections.
  • You created content in one course (e.g. rubrics, discussions, quizzes, etc.) and would like to copy that specific content from one Brightspace course into another.

Copying an entire Brightspace course OR copying components of a Brightspace course into another Brightspace course is not hard. As long as you are the instructor for both courses, it is a simple process you can do.

Follow these steps to do it.

If you want to copy an entire Brightspace course OR copy components from a Brightspace course into another course, you should:

  1. Get into the course you want the content copied into.
  2. In the NavBar (of the course you want the content copied to), click on "Course Admin".
  3. Click on the "Import/Export/Copy Components" link.
  4. Click on the "Copy Components from another Org Unit" radio button.
  5. In the Course to Copy option, click the "Search for Offering" button.
  6. Click on the magnifying glass in the "Search for" field OR enter the name of the course you want to copy from in the search field.
  7. Click on the radio button to the right of the course you want to copy content from and then click on "Add Selected".
  8. Verify your selections are correct before proceeding.
  9. At the bottom on the browser window you will click on either "Copy all Components" OR "Select Components" and follow the prompts.

Important:

Double-check to make sure that you are in the course you want the content copied into AND that you have selected the correct course you want to copy content from. There is no way to reverse the copy process once the wrong course is selected and the copy request is submitted.

Want more information?

Copy Course Components
Import/Export/Copy - Copy Components video [1:31]
About Copying Course Components
View all the Brightspace training recaps
Brightspace Known Issues
Continuous Delivery release notes
Request a sandbox course
Sign-up for Brightspace training sessions
You can find Brightspace help at D2L's website.
Join the Brightspace Community.
Try these Brightspace How-To documents.
Visit our Brightspace FAQs for additional Brightspace information
or schedule a one-on-one session, email, or
call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418.