Blackboard: College course organizer

Rated as #68 in the top learning tools of 2010 by C4LPT, Blackboard Learning System is a program that organizes any and every detail about your courses. Many universities use it since it is such a great and efficient tool. The image that the BLS portrays is very professional. It is incredibly organized, with the most important information about your Blackboard courses on the homepage. There is not much room for funny, random information or images; Blackboard is strictly business.

When you reach Blackboard, you really get the feeling that it is a very manageable program to use and do not feel overwhelmed whatsoever. Blackboard is trusted by the scholarly community and used by a large number of standout universities as a way of keeping all the course information in one place. Professors trust the program to be able to hold all of the important course content, or as a platform to explain things or get messages out to the student population when class is not in session. Some professors do their quizzes or assignments online, exclusively through Blackboard. This way they can avoid having to create and copy 200 paper tests, running the scantrons through, or maybe even hand grading them.

There are countless affordances of Blackboard. The teachers enjoy a variety of benefits, like the things I listed earlier. The students also benefit greatly from Blackboard. Each course page includes announcements a personal calendar where you can put dates for projects, homework, tests, etc. You are able to easily find contact information for professors, teaching assistants, and other students. Each course page includes a discussion board where only people from the same class can post and read, and a live chatroom. This way they can discuss class matters or get help from others. It helps students by having all information in one place so if they were to miss a class, or want to look back at something from a previous lecture, they can find it. All grades can be posted onto the page (although not every professor uses this feature), so students can keep up on how well they're doing in class.