using Blackboard

Yesterday I set up the Blackboard site for COMM 144 Winter 2008. I kept the features to a minimum with just the quizzes and grade tools available. Added one announcement to direct students to the class website. Found it frustrating that I couldn't link the grades and announcements options to the main page; can only list them on the navigation bar. Having multiple pathways to reach an endpoint is a key feature of internet communication. Blackboard seems to work to subvert that principle.

Working with Blackboard CE6 reinforced my decision to move the class out of the learning management system to a freely accessible website supported by Google's groups and blogging functions. Using a commercial site such as Google does have drawbacks (e.g., driving students to a commercial site using proprietary software), Blackboard's limitations outweigh any concerns I have about Google.

In a recent paper presented at the National Communication Association convention in Chicago, I concluded:

Blackboard does provide mechanisms for students to interact directly with each other and the instructor. But the Blackboard platforms have yet to move beyond extremely basic communication features; the structure of the Blackboard Inc. online classroom seems stuck in the 1990s. What has changed is the instructor's increased ability to track students' use of the class website: number of messages posted, number of messages read, and how many times various pages or sections are accessed. But this type of information provides no insight into how students engage each other or the class. For Blackboard, teaching remains textualized (static) rather than performative (dynamic).

This term, my goal is to create a more performative learning experience for my students and for me as we blog about the class and organizational communication--outside the constraints of a traditional learning management system.

-Prof. Cyborg