Last year we collaborated with a module leader managing a relatively large cohort of students who wanted to organise the class into groups of students. Her objectives were to:
- Facilitate group collaboration using tools like discussion boards.
- Assign a module tutor to each group, who would also handle the assessment grading.
- Enable the module leader to oversee grading, especially for newer staff members needing moderated marking.
- Provide a system for creating signup sheets for students to attend workshops.
All of this was achieved by using the Groups tool within Blackboard.
Groups of Students working together on Discussion Boards
A Group Set was created called Learning Sets. Once a Group Set is created it can be applied to discussion boards, tests and assignments. In this example students were manually divided into 6 groups; each group was clearly labelled with the name of the tutor leading the group.
When a new discussion topic was created, this was applied to the groups via Discussion Settings.
Using this method, students can only see posts from other members of their group. For more information on how to set this up visit our Group Discussion Board page
Using groups to filter assessments for marking.
In the Gradebook, click on the Assignment you are reviewing and then click the arrow next to “All Students.” This will display all the group sets you have created within the module. Select the relevant group set to view only the students in your specific group.
From the Gradebook ‘Marks’ view you can also apply a filter to only show students in your own group. This function is particularly useful for Module Leaders wanting a quick overview of marks.
Creating Sign Up Sheets
During the term a number of workshops are held, and students can pick a topic or session time they wish to attend. This was managed by creating self-signup groups where students add themselves to a group rather than being allocated.
You can limit the maximum number of students selecting each group.
When creating your group select Self-enrolment and the number of groups you want.
Students can then sign up for a workshop by clicking on Groups from within the module and pressing Join next to the group that suits them.
If you would like help setting up groups within your modules contact [email protected] or visit Blackboard pages: Create and Manage Groups.
