Tip #62: Best Practices for Student Test Taking

A Blackboard Tip of the Week: Best Practices for Student Test Taking

Tip: You can help students reduce the chances of technological mishaps while taking exams by encouraging them to follow a few best practices.

Best Practices for Students Preparing to Take a Test:

• Students should view Blackboard using Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox 3.5
• Students who have already updated to Internet Explorer 8 should enable Compatibility View by clicking on the Compatibility View button located to the right of the Address Bar
• Students should run a System Check at least 30 minutes before an exam
• On the TWU Blackboard system front page under the Getting Started Guide, they should click on System Check
• Students should disable pop-up blocking in their browsers
• In Firefox, they should:
• Go to Tools > Options > Content
• Uncheck Block pop-up windows
• Click OK
• In Internet Explorer, they should:
• Go to Tools > Pop-up Blocker
• Click on Turn Off Pop-up Blocker
• Students should close all other applications and browsers before starting their test, and not open any others for the duration of their exam session
• Students should check for possible firewall issues before choosing their test taking location—especially if they plan on taking an exam at their places of employment
• Students can make sure their test submission will not be blocked by a corporate or home firewall by submitting the Sample Exam in the Blackboard Sample Course
  1. Go to http://online.twu.edu and log in with “online” as the username and password
  2. Click on TWU Sample Course and click on Exams
  3. Take the Sample Exam (choose to “take the assessment again” if given the option)
• If, after agreeing to submit the exam, the student receives “Assessment successfully submitted” message, then there should not be a test taking firewall problem on that location’s connection

Best Practices for Students While Taking a Test:

• Students should not open any other browser window or application for the duration of their exam session
• Students should not click outside of the test—including the navigation on the left side panel in Blackboard
• Students should not click on any browser navigation such as the Back, Forward, or Home buttons
• Students should not use the scroll wheel on their mouse as this will sometimes inadvertently change answers
• Students should click the Save button every five questions to save their answers unless questions are being delivered one at a time—in which case, they will need to press save on every question
• When ready to submit, students should click the Submitbutton just once

Voicemail Tip of the Week: Transfer to Voicemail

TWU has a new voicemail system for all permanent faculty and staff. The new system integrates voicemail with e-mail, delivering all messages to both telephone and e-mail. To request an account on the new system, e-mail voicemail@twu.edu and include your name, campus, and telephone extension.

Since the transition phase to the new system has occurred, the old voicemail system will be taken offline. Please clear any messages from your mailbox on the old system. Due to technical differences in the old and new system, messages will not transfer. When you have set up your box on the new system, clear out your box on the old system and send request to voicemail@twu.edu to have it deleted.

To transfer a call directly to voicemail

To transfer a call directly to voicemail without ringing the phone or in case the phone is not forwarded:

• Stay on the phone and transfer the call to 4646 (or 814646).
• When the system answers, press *.
• Wait for the system to ask for the mailbox number. Enter the six digit mailbox number.
  Note: Six digit mailbox numbers are the campus code (Denton: 81, Dallas-Parkland: 82, Dallas-Presbyterian: 83, Houston: 84) + the four digit extension.
  
• Hang up. The caller will hear the greeting and be able to leave a message.

Voicemail is available for all permanent faculty and staff. To setup an account, e-mail voicemail@twu.edu from your TWU portal e-mail account and include name, campus and telephone extension.

Tip #61: Alter Assessment Settings

Tip: You can alter assessment settings even after you’ve initially released an assessment. This ability allows you to release results, answers, and feedback after students have completed the assessment.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Go to the Blackboard Control Panel, and click on the Content Area where the item is located


2. Click on the Modify button to the right of the assessment
• This will take you to the Modify Test page


3. Click on Modify the Test options


4. Scroll down to the Test Feedback subsection, and check boxes correlating to the kind(s) of test feedback you want to make accessible
   
   • Score
   • Submitted Answers
   • Correct Answers
   • Feedback

iPhone Apps of the Month: Organizational Apps

Organizational Apps for work and home

The iPhone offers applications that can be downloaded for a variety of uses. Applications can range from free to varying costs, and range in topic from business, education, weather, productivity, news, and more. This month’s iPhone tip highlights some free applications that can be used to organize work and school activities.

Ustream Live Broadcaster
Stream live moments from your phone and share with your friends, family, fans, followers, and others. After the live stream the video is recorded. Recorded videos can be shared to Ustream, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and automatically streams and records to your Ustream show page.

 

i-Clickr Lite
Use your iPhone to run a PowerPoint slide of 15 slides or less. Software must be installed on the computer running the slide show.

 

Dictionary
Dictionary & thesaurus including a Word of the Day feature.
 

 

Simplemind Express
Full featured mind mapping editor with an option to save mind maps to the camera roll.

 

My Files
App for Badongo.com, an online storage, management, and publishing system for personal content including photos, videos, music, business documents, and pdfs.

 

iPhone apps can be downloaded via the iPhone app store

Blackboard Tip of the Week: Copying an item from one course to another

Tip: You can copy an item from one course to another without having to use the Course Copy function on the Control Panel.
Here’s how to do it:

1. Access the course from which you want to copy an item
2. Go to the Blackboard Control Panel, and click on the Content Area where the item is located
   
• For example, if you want to copy a folder that is located in Course Documents, click on the Course Documents course menu link
  
3. Click on the Copy button next to the item you want to copy
4. On the next screen, select the destination course from the drop-down list of courses
   
   • NOTE: Only courses for which you are an instructor are listed in this drop-down list
     
5. Click Browse to find a destination folder within the destination course
6. Select whether you would like the item to be removed from the current course after it is copied to the destination course
7. Click Submit
   
8. When you receive confirmation via email that the item copy was successfully completed, navigate to the destination to confirm that the item was successfully copied

Web 2.0 Tool of the Week: Delicious

(http://www.Delicious.com)
Delicious is a social bookmarking service that allows users to tag, save, manage and share web pages from a centralized source. Users can bookmark any site on the Internet, and access from anywhere. Bookmarks can be shared with others, whether or not they use Delicious.

Account Information:

• Users must create a free account
• Users can make bookmarks public or private

Items that can be bookmarked in Delicious include:

• Web pages
• Audio items
• Video items
• Images
• Documents
• Multimedia file type RSS Feeds

Why use Delicious?

• Find popular sites being bookmarked
• Find information about areas of interest including research topics, course topics, work topics, hobbies, etc.
• Discover useful and interesting bookmarks on the web being marked by others
• Develop relationships with others in your industry, or interested in the same topics
• Get bookmarks in return from friends or by searching
• “Tag” bookmarks with a description for easier searching.

What is tagging?

The term “tag” is the option that allows a user to use a word or words to denote an item. For example, when collecting information for the Widget project, all items collected could be “tagged” with the word “Widget.” Then when searching for items related to the project, search by the word “Widget” and all resources could be gathered.

Ready to explore Delicious? Sign up for an account here.

Already using Delicious? Tell us about using Delicious for your projects.

Blackboard Tip of the Week: Limit Dropped Student Access to Blackboard Courses

Tip: When students drop a class and are not automatically removed from Blackboard, you can limit their access to the course.

Limiting access to students who drop the course mid-semester

Students who have dropped a course mid-semester will not be removed from your Blackboard course roster. This is designed to allow instructors to keep records of all students in the course. Removing a student from the Blackboard course will delete all information, including grades for that student.

How to limit access and retain student information:

1. Go to the Blackboard Control Panel, and click on List/Modify Users
2. Type the student’s last name, or click search to list the whole class roster
3. Select properties next to the student’s name
4. Scroll down to Section 4: Role and Availability
5. Under Available (this course only) select No
6. Click Submit
   

NOTE: Limiting access to students will not remove them from your grade book. However, the student will no longer be able to log into the course.

Removing students from a course

If a student is not enrolled in the course per your WebAdvisor roster, removal of the student may be appropriate. Keep in mind that all student data will be removed including grades, assignment submissions, and course statistics.

NOTE: Blackboard roster updates occur several times a day through the twelfth class day. It is possible that during these first days of the semester, students removed from a course will be added back into the course when the roster updates occur. Removing students after the twelfth class day will be permanent.

How to permanently remove a student from the course:

1. Go to the Blackboard Control Panel, and click on Remove Users from Course
2. Type the student’s last name, or click search to list the whole class roster
3. Place a checkmark next to the student’s name
4. Type the word Yes
5. Click Submit
   

NOTE: Official student rosters can be obtained from WebAdvisor and compared with Blackboard. Students who are not listed in Blackboard but listed in WebAdvisor should call the Help Desk at 940-898-3791 for assistance.

Blackboard Tip of the Week: Beginning of Semester Checklist

Tip: Beginning of semester tasks

1. Enhance course design and menu options
2. Combine multiple course sections into one shell (if applicable)
3. Make the course available

Enhance the course design and menu options:

1. Access your course
2. Go to the Blackboard Control Panel, and click on Course Design where you can:
   
   • choose a course menu design
   • manage how the menu is displayed
   • manage the tool panel
   • add/change the course banner
3. Return to the Blackboard Control Panel, and click on Manage Course Menu
   
   • To re-arrange the order of menu items, click the number next to an item and select a new number order for the item
   • To modify or remove a menu item, click the Modify or Remove button next to an item
   • To add a content area, a link to a course tool, a link to a course area, or an external link to the course menu, click the appropriate button at the top of the page
4. Click OK

Combine multiple course sections into one shell (if applicable):

1. Access the course from which you want to move users
2. Go to the Blackboard Control Panel, and click on Course Copy (located in the Course Options category)
3. Click Copy Course Materials into an Existing Course
4. Type or Search for the Destination Course ID
   
• NOTE: The Destination Course is the course to which the enrollments will be copied
5. Place a checkmark next to Tasks and next to Enrollments
6. Click Submit
   
   • NOTE: You will receive an email notification when the enrollments copy is complete

Make the course available:

1. Access the course you want to make available
2. Go to the Blackboard Control Panel, and click on Settings (located in the Course Options category)
3. Click Course Availability
4. Select Yes, and click Submit