Queen Mary, University of London

General

Specific help for:

Blackboard Support for Staff

Welcome to the Blackboard support area for staff.

We have divided the support into two areas: FAQs and Guides, and hope that you will find the answer to your question amongst these. If you are having a technical problem, please also ensure you have looked at the technical checklist to make sure your computer is appropriately set up to use Blackboard.

We would ask that you look for an answer to your query here or in your Getting Started course within Blackboard before submitting a query. If, however, you are unable to find an answer to your question, please use this form: http://www.esd.qmul.ac.uk/vle/forms/vlequery/.

Frequently Asked Questions

Blackboard General
Questions you may have when you first start using Blackboard

Access
Problems with your login or accessing Blackboard

Helping your Students
Queries about your students' use of Blackboard

Using Blackboard
Queries you may have whilst using Blackboard



How do I get an account on Blackboard?

It is quite likely that you already have an account on Blackboard. Blackboard uses your Central Staff Account also known as your "IMAP" account. This means that to access Blackboard, you use the same user name and password that you use to access your College email.

The main exceptions to this are staff in the following departments.

If you are in one of these departments you should follow the instructions below.

Computer Science

If you are in the Department of Computer Science you should be able to access Blackboard by using your DCS user name and password. You will have to prefix your user name with dcs. e.g. dcs.joe.

Note: To be able to make use of this facility, you will first have to have accepted Computing Services' terms and conditions of use which you can do by visiting https://intranet.dcs.qmul.ac.uk/information/personal/qmulterms.php. It will take a day after your acceptance of the terms and conditions for your account on Blackboard to be functional.

Electronic Engineering, Mathematical Sciences and Physics

Staff in these departments who wish to make use of Blackboard should apply to Computing Services for a "Central Staff (IMAP) Account". Further details, including an application form, can be found on Computing Services web pages on http://qm-web.its.qmul.ac.uk/getting_started.shtml (this page is only accessible if you are on campus).

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I can't login

  1. Can you see the Blackboard entry page on http://www.elearning.qmul.ac.uk? If not, please see the FAQ I can't see the Blackboard login screen.

  2. Are you using a bookmark or favourite to access Blackboard ? Try logging in from this weblink: http://www.elearning.qmul.ac.uk and see if you can login there. If you can, please change your bookmark to the homepage before the login screen.

  3. Are you getting the error "You entered an incorrect username or password." on the Blackboard login page?

    Are you certain you are using the correct username and password? Your username is case sensitive and the initial letters are usually lower case e.g. ydw632, using YDW632 in this case won't work. Your password should be the password you use to access College email. Can you log in to access your email? If not, it is likely that the problem is not with Blackboard. Have you changed your email password recently? If so, you will have to use the new password for Blackboard too. The password is also case sensitive, so check that you haven't got the Caps Lock key on by accident.

    If you are sure your username and password are correct, then it is likely to be an issue with spyware on your machine. Please see the section of the technical checklist on checking for viruses and spyware.

  4. If you are sure your username and password are correct and can log into other College services, then please contact the IT Services helpdesk on its-helpdesk@qmul.ac.uk.

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I can't see the Blackboard login screen

Are you sure that you are entering the correct URL - www.elearning.qmul.ac.uk?

Can you see any web pages at all? If not, then it is likely that there is a problem with your internet connection.

If you can see other web pages then it may be that there is a problem with the QMUL networks or servers, this is quite rare. It may also be that your access is being blocked by a firewall. This can be a particular problem for those who use a computer on a corporate network, usually at a place of work, to access Blackboard. If this is the case then you should contact whoever looks after your network, and also let the Blackboard support team know you're having this problem. It may be that your only option is to access Blackboard from a different location.

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Should I trust the Java applet?

Yes. This is a standard security process on your computer. The first time you use Blackboard you will be asked to agree to 'Trust' the Java Applets. You should select 'Yes', 'Allow' or 'Always'.

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What are Roles in Blackboard?

In Blackboard, a person can be enrolled on a course area in a variety of different roles. Each role provides a different level of access to a course area . Understanding these roles and assigning them correctly is essential to successfully managing your course area.

The most common roles for a staff member to consider are Instructor, Designer and Teaching Assistant. The course convener is likely to have both the the Instructor and Designer roles, but it should be noted that restricting access to one or the other for other members can greatly aid in managing your online area.

Please see the article Roles in Blackboard on the Distance and E-Learning Unit website for more information on this topic.

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What is 'Rollover'?

Rollover is essentially our ‘cleaning house’ on the VLE. Basically we backup existing course areas, take them off the system and replace them with fresh areas for the new year. These fresh areas will have the files and structure of the previous ones but all student-generated data will be removed to make room for the new cohort.

After Rollover you will no longer have access to your previous course areas.

Rollover consists of the following steps:

  1. We will request notice for courses that should run again next year
  2. We will backup all course areas in late August at the end of the resit period
  3. We will only make 09/10 versions for course areas for which we have received notice
  4. We will then take all 08/09 course areas off the system

This process will take place at the end of summer after the resit period. This year (2009) this process will take place the week beginning 24th August. We will ‘go dark’, meaning we will remove all access to the system, for that week.

We have a Rollover each year for the following reasons:

1) We run the VLE as a live teaching environment; data that must be kept for a longer period of time than the academic year must be archived *off* the VLE. This means that exams, assignment submissions, etc. must be kept locally by departments under the same regulations that govern paper copies. We do this as we cannot guarantee a retrievable archive of this data over upgrades or migrations of VLE’s.

2) As the system grows larger in use and size we design formal processes with direct lines of ownership and responsibility for course areas to help manage it. We will refresh this information each year to insure that the contact we have for a course area is correct.

3) The system grows in size each year and, where possible, we need to remove unused content.

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What do my students need to know?

We would suggest that some information on using Blackboard is given to students in either a student information pack or during induction. We have produced a document that can be distributed to students which can be access here: http://www.esd.qmul.ac.uk/vle/students/BBStudentGuide2009.pdf.

We also have a page for student support which can be found here: http://www.esd.qmul.ac.uk/vle/students/index.htm If your students are encountering technical problems please direct them to this page. The answers to many common questions can be found here and there is a link to a web form which can be used to submit queries..

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What support/training is there available for students?

Support and training for students is provided online. The support site can be found on http://www.esd.qmul.ac.uk/vle/students/ This site provides guidance on solving some of the most common problems and also has a number of guides on using the different features in Blackboard. There is also a link to a web form which can be used to submit queries that are not answered in the support materials. If students are having difficulties they should be directed to this site.

Although the Distance and E-Learning Unit do not routinely run face-to-face training sessions for students we can run bespoke sessions for student cohorts alongside representatives of the deparment. e.g. at student induction. If you are interested in such a session for your students then please contact us to discuss your requirements.

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How do I request a course in Blackboard?

We have an online form to request new courses in Blackboard. You will need to know:

  • The course title
  • Your username
  • The usernames of any staff members you would like to access the course
  • If you would like the course to be SRS-integrated (see How do I register my students onto a course? for more information on this) you will also need to know the QM course code

Click here to fill out the form

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How do students get access to my course?

Student access to your course will be either Automatic, or Manual and you must first establish which applies to your course.

Look at the title of your Blackboard course area.  Does it include the letters NS?

Automatic

Automatic enrolment happens for the vast majority of Blackboard courses.  Student lists are taken directly from the central Student Records System (SRS) and used to populate your course.  When you set up your course, you will have given us the QMUL course code for it – typically 3 letters representing the department followed by 3 numbers, e.g. ESH111.  This is then used to create student lists for Blackboard.

Enrolment for your course is entirely automated and there is nothing we can do to manually enrol students.  Once a student has chosen his or her modules, then their department must submit the Course Registration Form to Student Administration before the information will be available to Blackboard. 

When you set up your course, it is likely that you will have given us the main QMUL code, e.g. ESH111.  However, sometimes associate students on the course are officially enrolled on a slightly different code, e.g. ESH111A or ESH111B.  For automatic enrolment to work for all students, you must give us ALL the official codes for your course.

You can check which codes your course is linked to by looking up its title in the list of Blackboard courses at http://www.esd.qmul.ac.uk/vle/courselisting.shtml.

If students do not have access to a course on automatic enrolment, there are three possible explanations:

Manual Enrolment

You have two options for enrolling students onto your course.  If you have only a few students, it is quickest to do this yourself.  If you have more than 10 students to enrol, then we will do it for you.

Enrolling students yourself

In addition to these instructions, you can view a short demo on How to enrol students on a non-SRS course (requires Adobe Flash player).

To enrol students, you should use the Grade Book. When in your course area, click on the Teach tab near the top of your screen. You should see a menu titled "Instructor Tools" and the "Grade Book" item is in this. When you click on the grade book you will see a spreadsheet-type display of everyone that is currently enrolled on the course and what roles they have. To enrol a student:

  1. Click on Enrol Members
  2. Enter the username of the student you wish to enrol – this is the first part of their QM email address, e.g. ha1111.
  3. Select the checkbox for ‘Student’
  4. Click Enrol
  5. When you have enrolled all the students you require; click Save.

Requesting Student Enrolment by Blackboard Support

The students you want to enrol must already have usernames – this is typically the first part of their QM email address. You will need to complete an excel spreadsheet and email it to vle-support@qmul.ac.uk. Please fill in all the fields as accurately as possible. Be sure to include the following details in two separate columns.

  • Students Computing ID or QMUL email address (e.g. ha****@qmul.ac.uk)
  • Course code or Course title (as it appears in Blackboard) that you would like them to have access to

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How can resit students get access to my course?

According to College regulations, resit students (that is, those resitting "out of attendance") do not get access to course areas on Blackboard. If you want resit students to be able to see the materials in your course area you can do this by enrolling them as an "Auditor" on your course area. You do this through the Grade Book tool in your course area.

Please see Enrolling Students yourself for instructions on how to do this, but remember that you must enrol them as an Auditor and not a Student. If you enrol them as a Student they will be automatically denied access the next time Blackboard updates its enrollment information.

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How do I get access to an existing course?

If you require access to a course that already exists on Blackboard you should first talk to one of the main instructors for that course. Any person with instructor access to the course area will either be able to enrol you onto the course themselves or, if you require instructor access to the course, they will be able to request access for you.

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How can other staff get access to my course area?

If you have course instructor access to your course area, you can enrol other members of staff as designers, teaching assistants, auditors or students yourself. (If you don't understand the differences between these roles please see the section on What are roles in Blackboard?). If you want a member of staff to be enrolled as an instructor please see below for details.

Enrolling staff yourself

To do this, you can use the Grade Book in your course area. When in the course area, click on the Teach tab near the top of your screen. You should see a menu titled "Instructor Tools" and the "Grade Book" item is in this. When you click on the grade book you will see a spreadsheet-type display. This will show you all the people that are currently enrolled on this course and what roles they have. To enrol a user:

  1. Click on Enrol Members
  2. Enter the username of the staff member you wish to enrol
  3. Select the role you would like them to have
  4. Click Enrol
  5. When you have enrolled all the members you require; click Save.

If you get an error when you try to enrol someone this way, please see Why do I keep getting an error when I try to enrol someone onto my course area through the Grade Book?.

Although you can actually enrol students onto your course area in this way too, if your course area is linked to the central student record system you should not do this.

Enrolling other staff as instructors

If you would like other staff to be enrolled as instructors on your course area please email vle-support@qmul.ac.uk giving their Blackboard username and the title of the course (as it appears in Blackboard) you wish them to have access to.

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I've deleted something from my course area, can I get a back up?

Blackboard is backed up by IT Services. If you require the restoration of a backup, please fill out our request form (http://www.esd.qmul.ac.uk/vle/forms/vlequery/index.htm), stating that you require a backup of your course to be restored and taking extra care to note the exact title of the course and the course code and also to note the date and time that you want the backup to be restored from. We will endeavour to retrieve the nearest backup to your request.

Please note that it will take approximately five working days to restore a back up.

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Why do I keep getting an error when I try to enrol someone onto my course area through the Grade Book?

There are two possible reasons why you might get an error when trying to manually enrol someone onto your course area:

  1. You don't have the correct Blackboard user name for them
  2. They are already enrolled on the course area

In the case of 2, you can check whether the person is already enrolled on the course area by looking in the Grade Book. If they are listed, you will be able to see what type of access they already have in the Grade Book too. Blackboard does not allow certain combinations of roles e.g. a person cannot be enrolled as an Auditor and a Student, they can't be enrolled as a Teaching Assistant and an Auditor etc. So, if you are trying to enrol someone as an Auditor and they are already enrolled as a Student then you will have to unenrol them first before you can re-enrol them. You do this by selecting the check box next to their name in the Grade Book and then clicking the "Unenrol" button.

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My name appears incorrectly, how can I change it?

You can change the way your name is displayed in Blackboard by editing your profile. On the "Homepage" tab, click on the "My Settings" link which can be found at the top right of the window. Click the "Edit Profile" button, enter your changes and then click "Save". Please note that you may not see the effects of your changes until you have logged out and logged in again.

It is not possible to change your surname through Blackboard. This information is gathered from College central systems. If you wish to make changes to your surname you should email vle-support@qmul.ac.uk giving your Blackboard user name and the changes that you require.

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The title of my course is incorrect, how do I change it?

This depends on whether your course is integrated with the central student record system (SRS) or not. If you do not know this information, please check our course listing page on http://www.esd.qmul.ac.uk/vle/courselisting.shtml. Find your course in the list and check the "SRS Enrolment?" column, it will say one of the following:

  • Automatic - the course title is picked up automatically from the course information on the SRS. To get the course title changed you must contact Student Administration.
  • Manual - please send a request to vle-support@qmul.ac.uk and we will make the change for you.

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I keep enrolling a student on my course using the grade book and they keep being unenrolled. What's happening?

The most likely situation is that you are trying to manually enrol a student on a course that is integrated with the central student record system (SRS) and the student is not registered for the course on this system. For courses that are SRS integrated, enrollment information is updated every night therefore the student will be unenrolled on the next refresh. The student must get their enrollment information updated on the SRS by contacting Student Administration.

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What's the problem with dark backgrounds on PowerPoint files?

Dark or black backgrounds on documents uploaded to Blackboard, or even sent by email, are a problem because when students try to print them at home it is expensive in terms of ink or toner costs, and when printed in College can result in the printers becoming jammed, due to the large volume of toner used to tint almost the entire page.

We would always recommend that you convert your PowerPoint presentations to *pdf documents first. If you have the Adobe pdf writer installed you will be able to 'print' to pdf. We would strongly recommend selecting the options in PowerPoint to print in black and white and to print handouts so several slides appear on the one page.

This will greatly reduce printing costs and associated difficulties for your students.

If there is an important reason why your files must remain as .ppt files; please make certain that either you do not use dark backgrounds or that your students are aware of the print option to print in 'pure black and white' and as 'handouts' to print several slide on one page.

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How do I make materials accessible for students with disabilities?

(This text has been supplied by the Disability Office in QMUL and focusses on text-based materials. For advice on video, audio, or other media please contact us.)

The Disability Discrimination Act has applied to Higher Education since 2001 and requires Higher Education Institutions to make reasonable adjustments for students with disabilities.

The DDA is modelled on a similar piece of legislation in Australia which has been in force since 1993. The experience there has been that teaching and learning, rather than physical access, has been the cause of most litigation. The majority of case law has related to teaching and learning issues, either through direct discrimination regarding access to a course (or modules) or the inability to provide materials in alternative format in a timely manner which invariably has led to students having to defer their studies.

As such, ensuring that materials are accessible for all Queen Mary students is very important, particularly given the relatively high numbers of blind and visually impaired students at the College.

Below is a brief guide to making learning materials accessible. For further information or advice please feel free to contact the Disability and Dyslexia Service on 020 7882 2756, disability@qmul.ac.uk or visit us at http://www.disability.qmul.ac.uk/

  • All materials, wherever possible, should be provided in electronic format and either directly emailed to the student(s) concerned or uploaded onto Blackboard.
  • If materials are converted into PDF files, make sure that the original Word, PowerPoint, etc. documents are saved as they can then be amended in the future when necessary.
  • Use the latest version of Adobe Acrobat when creating new PDF documents
  • Try to copy from original materials (e.g. books) wherever possible, rather than making copies of photocopies
  • Ideally, documents should be saved as Rich Text Format, (RTF), as this enables the student to access them on either a PC or a Mac platform and on any version of Microsoft Office. The ‘Save As’ option under the ‘File’ menu in Word will have RTF in its drop-down menu
  • Similarly, any PowerPoint documents should also be saved as RTFs or as a text outline
  • Avoid embedding PowerPoint slides within the browser. It is better to have downloadable PowerPoint documents
  • Do not require visually impaired students to use source material from websites such as Google Scholar. Google Scholar is not accessible to screen-readers and currently flouts all current equal access legislation in both the US and UK

For more information about making electronic documents more readable please see http://www.techdis.ac.uk/resources/sites/accessibilityessentials1/index.html

For more advice and information about how to write accessible electronic documents using MS Word see http://www.techdis.ac.uk/resources/sites/accessibilityessentials2/index.html

For more advice and information about how to create accessible presentations see http://www.techdis.ac.uk/resources/sites/accessibilityessentials3/index.html

For further advice and information about making the most of PDF documents see http://www.techdis.ac.uk/resources/sites/accessibilityessentials4/index.html

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I can't upload my files

If you see a "red cross" where the My Computer icon should be when you are trying to upload a file to Blackboard then the probability is that you have not allowed Java Applets to run on your computer.

In this case you should:

  1. Log out of Blackboard
  2. Shut down and then restart your internet browser
  3. Log back in to Blackboard. You will get a dialog box titled something like "Security Warning" making reference to Java Applets. You must "OK" this by clicking "Run" or "Yes" or "Trust" . (The exact wording of this dialog box may vary depending on the particular configuration of the computer you are using.)

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When I click on a file, nothing happens

If you are using Internet Explorer, the most common cause is that your browser is set to block file downloads. If you look towards the top of your browser window, you may see an information bar which looks as follows:

Information bar in Internet Explorer

The information bar has been highlighted in red for illustrative purposes, in reality it can be easy to miss.

If you click on the information bar you can choose to temporarily allow downloads. However, if you choose this option file downloads will still be blocked the next time you log in to Blackboard. If you wish to always allow file downloads then you should click on the information bar and select the "More Information..." option which will describe how to do this.

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What's the problem with Office 2007 files?

As far as Blackboard is concerned, there is no problem. You can put Office 2007 files on Blackboard as usual. The problem lies with those downloading the files having software on their computers capable of viewing the files. Office 2007 has introduced new file formats which cannot be opened in previous versions of Office without the installation of an extra piece of software. This means if you create files in Word 2007, Powerpoint 2007 or Excel 2007, those files may not be readable by users of previous versions of Office unless they have installed the necessary piece of software on their computer. These new file formats are identified by an "x" at the end of the filename extension e.g. .docx is a Word 2007 file, .xlsx is an Excel 2007 workbook and .pptx is a Powerpoint 2007 file.

The teaching service computers on campus have Office 2007 installed so there is no issue for students accessing Office 2007 files if they are using one of these. Students using their own computers could, however, have issues. If they are using previous versions of Office, they will have to install an extra piece of software to be able to open them.

If you are using Office 2007 to prepare materials for students, you may consider:

  1. Use File > Save as... in the Office application, rather than File > Save. In doing this you will be given the option to save your document in a format that can be read by previous versions of the Office applications.

    OR

  2. Convert your document to PDF.

If you receive an Office 2007 file and you have an earlier version of Office you have two main choices:

  1. Download and install the "Office 2007 Compatibility Pack". This will allow you to open Office 2007 documents using your current version of Office (unless you are using Office 97). This is available on the Microsoft web site on http://tinyurl.com/y5a879. Or go to http://www.microsoft.com/ and search for "Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack".

    OR

  2. Ask the person who sent the file to you to resend it in a different format. They can use File > Save as... in their Office 2007 application to save their document in a format that can be read by earlier versions of Office applications.

In the long term, installing the Office 2007 compatibility pack is probably the best solution as Office 2007 files are likely to become more common as time goes on.

More information on the new Office file formats and the issues around sharing them can be found on the Microsoft website. The Introduction to new file name extensions and Open XML formats article is a good starting point.

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Guides

The following guides are flash movies and .pdf files showing how to use various tools in Blackboard. You will need the flash player and the Acrobat Reader to be able to view them which you can download and install from here: http://www.adobe.com/downloads.

You will also need headphones or speakers to hear the audio.

The Designer guides explain the tools you will use for building your course and adding tools. The instructor guides explain how you would use a course that has already been built for teaching.

General Guides
Guides for Designers
Guides for Instructors

General Guides for all Staff using Blackboard

How To guides for building your Blackboard area.

Guides for Blackboard Designers

How To guides for building your Blackboard area.

For Designers - Summary Document (pdf)

Course Content

Assessment Tools

TurnitinUK Assignments

Note that these are repeated in the below section for Instructors

Communication Tools

Organising your Course

Guides for Blackboard Instructors

How To guides for course instructors in Blackboard.

Student Administration

Teaching with Blackboard

TurnitinUK Assignments

Note that these are repeated in the above section for Designers

Organising your Course

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