Blackboard Collaborate Ultra – Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning

Reminder of where to get help with D2L, Collaborate, and Kaltura

As we gear up for the new school year, I wanted to remind you of some important information related to D2L, and for online teaching/learning, both for faculty and students.

For Students:

Logging into D2L – A Student Tutorial (opens a PDF document)
eLearning Tutorials (opens in a new tab or window)
Student Learning Success Guides (opens in a new tab or window)
Writing Centre and Learning Skills (opens in a new tab or window)
Centre for Accessible Learning (opens in a new tab or window)

For Faculty:

Things for Faculty to know about eLearning and D2L (opens a PDF document)
CETL Bulletin Sept 2021 – workshops, communities of practice, tips and articles related to online teaching, and more! (opens in a new tab or window)

Wondering where to get help? You can get help from eLearning Support, or book an appointment with an instructional designer, by emailing elearning@camosun.ca. Check out our list of workshops and the Events Calendar on the CETL website.

Updated Whiteboard in Collaborate!

Over the summer, the Whiteboard in Collaborate was updated. Here is our new tutorial on how to use the Whiteboard in Collaborate (also available on our Tutorials site).

This tutorial is designed for faculty who have previous experience using Blackboard Collaborate Ultra. For further information, please contact elearning@camosun.ca for assistance.

Scenario

This tutorial will cover how to use the Whiteboard in your Collaborate session.

Steps

Click the Collaborate link on your Navbar, and click on a Collaborate session link to enter the session.
Open the Collaborate panel (the bottom right icon).
Click the Share Content icon.
Click Share Blank Whiteboard. The Whiteboard will open in the main session area.
There are two panels above the whiteboard. The one on left contains:Pan Mode (the hand). Pan Mode allows you to select an object. Once it’s selected, you can then move it around, add a note to it, delete it (by clicking the Delete key), or duplicate it.
Zoom Out (a magnifying glass with a minus sign) and Zoom In (a magnifying glasses with a plus sign).

Fit Page (click the down arrow to select Fit Page or Fit Width).

Note that the Zoom and Fit functions are user-dependent, meaning that participants will need to Zoom in on a Whiteboard (or PPT) for themselves – you can’t do that for them.

The panel on the right side contains the drawing functions. These are:Drawing (pen icon) allows you to draw, or select Brush or Eraser (acts like a pencil eraser). We will look at these functions more in Step 7.
Text (the T icon) allows you to add text. We will look more at this function in Step 8.

Line (the diagonal line) allows you to draw Lines, Arrows, Rectangles, Ellipses, Polygons, and Polylines. We will look more at this function in Step 9.

Clear Annotations (the trash can) clears everything. You will be given a warning that this will delete everything on the whiteboard, and it cannot be undone. Only Moderators and Presenters have this ability.

Stop Sharing (the square) stops the Whiteboard.
Drawing Both the Drawing and Brush functions allow for:Changing the Colour (the paintbrush)
Adding a Fill Colour around the drawing (the bucket)

Changing the Opacity (the two overlapping squares), which makes the object lighter or darker

Changing the Thickness (the set of three lines)

Adding Blend Mode (the two overlapping squares at the far right) which allows you to manipulate the colour and saturation of an object by drawing over it.

Text The Text function allows for:Changing the Colour (the T with the square behind it)
Adding a Fill Colour around the drawing (the bucket)

Changing the Opacity (the two overlapping squares), which makes the object lighter or darker

Changing the Font (the set of three lines) which give you the option to change the font type, the font size, the alignment (left, centre, right), and the placement (top, middle, bottom of the text box)

Line The Line function allows for:Changing the Colour (the paintbrush)
Adding a Fill Colour around the drawing (the bucket)

Changing the Opacity (the two overlapping squares), which makes the object lighter or darker

Changing the Thickness (the set of three lines)

Changing the Line Style (the dotted curved arrow). This give many options to change a plain line to various kinds of arrows (you could use this as a pointer for a presentation by moving it around on the whiteboard) pointing in both directions from the line, and various kinds of dotted lines.

Click the Stop icon (top right of the slide in the main window) to stop sharing the Whiteboard. The Whiteboard will be saved in the session, meaning that when you launch it again in the session, the annotations will persist.

Things to Remember

While the Whiteboard annotations persist during a session (unless you delete them), you can’t save a Whiteboard from a session to your device. If you want to keep a copy of a Whiteboard, you can either use the screen printing option on your computer, or right-mouse click on the whiteboard, to save an image of the Whiteboard to your computer.

You can’t add an image (picture, graphic, etc.) to the Whiteboard. To present and work with an image in the main session area, you need to use Share Files.

eLearning: Spring Cleaning – Tips for Pruning Your Media Collections

With limited server space and the need to better manage our carbon footprint, we cannot accumulate volumes of media. As end of term approaches, it is time to start pruning your Collaborate and Kaltura media collections.

Collaborate:

At end of term, delete Collaborate recordings from your courses.
If there are specific recordings you want to keep, you can download them and upload them to Kaltura MyMedia for future re-use.
Revisit courses from past terms and delete those historical recordings.

Kaltura

Go through your MyMedia account and delete copied or duplicate videos that you have created or uploaded but don’t need.
Delete any single use videos that you do not plan to use again.
Encourage your students to delete any videos created for the course that they won’t need in the future.

Camosun is working on a more formal data retention plan to help manage the growing volume of media. In the meantime, it is good practice to get in the habit of cleaning out your media at end of term or making it part of your annual SD plans. Questions? Email elearning@camosun.ca.

Camosun eLearning Updates

There have been some changes with some of the tools we support here in eLearning at Camosun we wanted to let you know about here:

D2L/Colleague Integration

The new D2L/Colleague Integration will result in changes and improvements to the faculty and student experience in D2L. Read our CETL notice to learn more.

Coming Soon to Collaborate: Gallery View with 25 Simultaneous Videos

Blackboard Collaborate Ultra has been working on improvements to its video gallery to enable Moderators and Participants to view up to 25 simultaneous video feeds. Moderators will see up to 25 simultaneous video feeds beginning April 8, and Participants will get access to this functionality later in the month. Note that we still recommend not having all videos active all the time during a session to conserve bandwidth especially for students with poor connections.

Read our CETL notice to learn more about what’s coming to Collaborate in the future.

Reporting Collaborate Issues (Chrome Freezing, etc.)

If Camosun College faculty are having a problem during a session in Collaborate, either in Chrome or Firefox, please do the following from within the session, while the issue is happening (or immediately after logging back in, in the case of Chrome freezing).

First:

Immediately after you encounter your issue (during your Collaborate session if possible,) click Report an Issue to outline your problem directly to Collaborate. This will give Collaborate all the info about the session including exact time of the issue, right down to connection speed and servers involved.

Second:

Then, after your Collaborate session, email the session name and time, along with an outline of the issue, to elearning@camosun.ca and we can escalate it, if need be, with a formal support ticket. We want everyone who is having the Chrome freezing issue in particular to report it in the moment. It is best to define the issue in the little text box so they know the exact issue. This way Collaborate will be aware of exactly how often certain issues are happening and hopefully find solutions.

Thanks!

Polling in Blackboard Collaborate Ultra

This tutorial is designed for faculty who have previous experience using D2L and Blackboard Collaborate Ultra, and will cover how to create and run polls for participants in your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session. For further information, please contact desupport@camosun.ca for assistance.

Steps

Go to the location in your D2L course site where you have linked to your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra room (for example, in the Content tool), click on your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session and enter your session.
Open the Collaborate panel (the bottom right icon).
Click the Share Content icon.
Click Polling.
Select Multiple Choice or Yes/No Choices, depending on your poll.
For Multiple Choice, type in your question into the Ask a question box, then add your choices (click Add choice to add more choices). Then click Start.
Yes/No Choices work in a similar way, except that you only need to add your question to the Ask a question box, then click Start.
Ask participants to click on the Poll icon at the bottom of their Blackboard Collaborate Ultra window to complete the Poll, and watch the responses come in. The first image is the Moderator view, and the second is the Participant view.
Click Show Responses to allow participants to see responses come in. Click the End polling button to end the Poll. The first image is the Moderator view with Show Responses enabled, and the second is the Participant view.

Things to Remember

You can run a Poll at any point during your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session. Make sure to tell participants that you are starting a Poll, as they may need to click the View Poll icon to see it.

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Recording a Blackboard Collaborate Ultra Session in D2L

This tutorial is designed for faculty who have previous experience using D2L, and Blackboard Collaborate Ultra (BBCU), and will cover how to record your (BBCU) session, and what you can do with the recording later. For further information, please contact desupport@camosun.ca for assistance.

Steps

Go to the location in your D2L course site where you have linked to your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra room (for example, in the Content tool), click on your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session and enter your session.
Open the Session menu (the top left icon).
Click Start Recording.

A Session is being recorded message will pop up.
To stop the recording, click the Session menu, and select Stop Recording.
To access your recording(s), go back to the location in your D2L course site where you have linked to your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra room (for example, in the Content tool), and click the Menu at the top left above the Course Room link.
Select Recordings (note that it may take a bit of time before the recording(s) appear – and you may need to log off of D2L and log back in again before you see them).
Make sure Recording downloads are enabled by clicking on the Room (or Session) link and under Recording, selecting Allow recording downloads, and click Save.
Go back to the Recording area (see steps 5 and 6), and then click the three dots to the right of the recording you want to download, and select Download (from here you can also Watch the recording, Edit its name, Delete it, Copy its link for emailing to people, or Add a caption source, if you have a caption file saved on your computer. Note, if you would like the recording closed captioned, download it, upload it to Kaltura, and Kaltura will add auto closed-captions to it).
Save the recording video to your device. You can then edit it using a video editing program, or upload it directly into Kaltura for sharing with your students.

Things to Remember

Recorded BBCU sessions are saved as MP4s, and only Moderators can turn recording on in sessions.

Recordings include the following activities from in the live session: Audio, shared content, active speaker video (if shared during the session), captions added during the live session, chat messages in the Everyone chat channel (NOT chat messages in breakout rooms).

Recordings can be viewed from any device, and can be viewed as often as needed – there are no view limits.

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Managing the Chatroom in Blackboard Collaborate Ultra in D2L

This tutorial is designed for faculty who have previous experience using D2L and Blackboard Collaborate Ultra, and will cover how you can manage your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra (BBCU) session Chatroom. For further information, please contact desupport@camosun.ca for assistance.

Steps

Go to the location in your D2L course site where you have linked to your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra room (for example, in the Content tool), click on your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session and enter your session.
Open the Collaborate panel (the bottom right icon).
Click the Chat icon.
Moderators will be able to chat to Everyone or to Moderators only. Participants will be able to chat to Everyone, and may also be able to Private Chat another participant if the Moderator has not disallowed that function. Click Everyone to chat to the whole group.
Type your message in the Say something box and hit Enter. Click the down arrow to select an emoji to add to your message.
To toggle from Everyone to Moderators (or to chat with an individual) click the back arrow next to Everyone.
To find a specific person to private chat with, start typing their name into the Find someone to chat with box, select them, and hit Enter.

Things to Remember

If the Collaborate panel is closed while you are facilitating your session, chat messages will pop up in the main window, and if your Collaborate panel is open, but NOT on Chat, chats will register as numbers at the bottom of the Collaborate panel next to the Chat icon.

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Managing Attendees in Blackboard Collaborate Ultra (D2L) – Blackboard Collaborate Ultra Tutorial

This tutorial is designed for faculty who have previous experience using D2L and Blackboard Collaborate Ultra, and will cover how you can manage Blackboard Collaborate Ultra (BBCU) session attendees. Information on how to use individual feature is contained in relevant tutorial documents. For further information, please contact desupport@camosun.ca for assistance.

Steps

Go to the location in your D2L course site where you have linked to your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra room (for example, in the Content tool), click on your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session and enter your session.
Open the Collaborate panel (the bottom right icon).
Click the Attendees icon.
To manage an attendee’s settings, click the Attendee controls icon (the three dots) to the left of their name.
From here you can:
1. Send a private chat message to that attendee.
2. Change the role of that attendee, for example (as shown here) promoting a Participant to Moderator, Presenter, or Captioner status.
3. Mute the attendee’s microphone.
4. Remove the attendee from the session/room.
You can also view an attendee’s Internet and audio connection by clicking the Attendee connection icon (to the left of the Attendee controls).
Finally, you can set the Attendee panel to stay open to make it easier to manage your attendees. Click the More Options icon (the three dots at the top of the Attendees panel) to:
1. Find an attendee (especially useful if you have a large group).
2. Detach the Attendee panel completely to keep it open.
3. Mute all attendees at once.

Things to Remember

It’s a good idea to recommend to attendees/participants that they mute their microphones upon entering the session, and to remind them they will need to unmute them to talk. That way you don’t have to worry about distractions from a lot of background noise.

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Sharing your Screen in Blackboard Collaborate Ultra (through D2L)

This tutorial will cover how to share your computer screen within your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session, and is designed for faculty who have previous experience using D2L, and who have had some experience with Blackboard Collaborate Ultra. For further information, please contact desupport@camosun.ca for assistance.

Steps

Go to the location in your D2L course site where you have linked to your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra room (for example, in the Content tool), click on your Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session and enter your session.
Open the Collaborate panel (the bottom right icon).
Click the Share Content icon.
Click Share Application/Screen.
Select which application you wish to share: Your Entire Screen, one Application Window (for example, WORD), or a specific browser Tab. Click Share.
You and the participants will see what you have shared, and what you are doing with it, in the main session window.
Use the View Controls to Zoom In, Zoom Out, see the Best Fit, and view the Actual Size.
Click Stop Sharing (in the pop-up box which appears when you begin sharing your Application/Screen) OR click the Stop icon (top right of the slide in the main window) to stop sharing your Application/Screen.

Things to Remember

You can’t save an Application/Screen sharing session. The only way to “save” the sharing session is to record the entire Blackboard Collaborate Ultra session, and then edit the recording later.

This content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence.Icons by the Noun Project.