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Yes! Your grade center organization matters!
Posted September 13, 2023
By IDLT
As we hit our stride in weeks three and four of the fall semester, it’s important to review your course organization and make sure it's working as intended for your students. By now, some work has been submitted and graded and you are providing feedback for your students.
The Blackboard Grade Center can be a confusing grid of columns, and it is especially challenging when you import content from a previous course. Transparency is important for you and your students. The easiest way to see your columns at a glance and reorder them is through the Manage> Column Organization menu. This is also a location where you can make bulk changes, like assigning categories to groups of columns or deleting extra columns.
Review this list to keep your grade center organized.
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All graded items should be named consistently across the grade center, your syllabus, and anywhere you post instructions or refer to the item in your Blackboard shell.
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Put your grade center in an order that makes sense to you and keep it that way. For example, use one of these three options for grade center organization:
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Put common items together (quiz columns, assignment columns, etc.)
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Put everything in chronological order as the items are due
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Put items in order based on how they are listed in the syllabus
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Remember to move your columns around if you add a new column later in the semester to maintain consistency.
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You can hide columns from instructor or student view to reduce clutter as necessary.
Remember that the instructional designers in ITS-IDLT are available for consult when you are overwhelmed by the organization of your grade center.
