Bb Tip #55: What’s New in Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP9?

During the break between summer and fall semesters Blackboard will be upgraded to version 9.1 service pack 9. Upgrading to SP9 gives us a number of exciting new features as well as a few bug fixes. New features include course-to-course navigation, course structures and course themes, quick setup guide, automatic regrading, negative marking, and updated rubrics.

Course-to-course navigation: You no longer need to navigate to the XU home page or courses tab to access your other courses. You are able to move from course to course by clicking the course-to-course navigation drop down menu in the upper left corner of the page to select the next course.
Course structures: Course structures help you to setup a course in a short amount of time. Pre-built course structures focus on specific aspects of a course including activity, communication, content, systems, and time. You can use the pre-built course structure’s course menu links, instructions, and content examples to jump-start your course organization and create a meaningful learning experience for your students.
Course themes: Course themes provide an easy way to create a visually engaging course environment. Faculty can apply one of the available themes to match their design preferences and teaching methods. Course themes add a background image to the course display and change the color of the interface, including the Course Menu, buttons, and controls. Course themes do not affect the course content and can be changed at any time.
Quick setup guide: The quick setup guide makes it easy for faculty to choose an appropriate theme and structure for their course so they spend less time setting up their courses.
Automatic regrading: This new feature will save time and make it easier to correct problem assessment questions. Instructors can now fix problematic questions by simply editing the invalid assessment question directly. After the question has been updated, the score of all submitted assessments will be recalculated and the updated score will be changed in the Grade Center. Notification will be sent to the instructor and optionally to the students who are impacted by the change.
Negative marking: Negative markings allow instructors to assign negative point values for incorrect answers on assessment questions. Negative points discourage (by penalty) guessing on assessments. Assigning negative points means a student would be penalized when guessing at an answer. Negative markings are available for multiple choice, multiple answer, matching, and hot spot assessment question types.
Rubrics update: The interactive rubrics now include a percentage range type rubric. You can now create a rubric to assess by a percent range.

Want more information?
New features in Blackboard Learn 9.1 [HTML]
Stop by one of the drop-in sessions for one-on-one help.
Explore Blackboard's On Demand Learning Center [HTML].
Visit the Blackboard FAQs for additional blackboard information
or email or call Janice Florent: (504) 520-7418