Tag: VoiceThread

Instructional Technology News – September 14

Attend Adobe Day, tweak your Blackboard Learn notifications, get started with Gradescope and Hypothesis, and more.

Adobe Day

Make plans to attend Adobe Day on Friday, September 17, in Gorgas Library. Guest presenters and panelists from across campus will dive into new Adobe offerings that utilize some of the most exciting trends in emerging technology: interactive design, on-the-go video storytelling, and more. Adobe Creative Cloud is available to all UA students, faculty, and staff.

Blackboard Learn

Notifications when and where you need them

In case you missed it, Blackboard Learn recently moved to the cloud! With the move came a new look and feature set, Blackboard Ultra Base Navigation. One of our favorite things about the new way to interact with Blackboard content is the Activity Stream, which captures activity across all your courses. The Activity Stream page is also where you can specify the types of activities for which you’d like to receive notifications (institution announcements, new messages, new gradable items, etc.) and how the notifications are delivered (Activity Stream page, email, SMS, push).

myBama logout troubleshooting

If you are getting logged out of Blackboard Learn when you access it via myBama, try closing the myBama tab after accessing Learn or logging into Blackboard Learn directly.

Heard about Hypothesis?

Whether you’re teaching with digital texts, news, blogs, journal articles, legislation, or other digital documents, you and your students can use Hypothesis to annotate course readings collaboratively.


Students in an edX course using Hypothesis to annotate a Wikipedia page

Here are some resources to help you get started with Hypothesis:

Getting started with Gradescope

Gradescope helps you administer and grade all of your assessments, whether on paper, online, or both. Using Gradescope, instructors can apply detailed feedback with just one click; make rubric changes that apply to previously graded work; see question and rubric-level statistics to understand better what students know; and easily export grades and data. In addition, Gradescope works well for various answer types: paragraphs, proofs, diagrams, fill-in-the-blanks, multiple-choice and more.


Gradescope grading interface for a sample question and submission, showing the student submission on the left, the rubric on the right, and navigation actions at the bottom

Visit our website for additional information about Gradescope and steps for adding it to your Blackboard course.

Voicethread is out, Flipgrid is in

UA has transitioned to Flipgrid as our video discussion and collaboration tool. Flipgrid offers a modern, fun, and accessible video discussion option for UA instructors and students, ideal for engaging students asynchronously. If you previously used VoiceThread for recorded lectures, you can export that content, upload it into Panopto, then share it as a link in Flipgrid:  How to Export VoiceThread Content

We’re here to help

Your colleagues in The Center for Instructional Technology provide training, support, workshops, webinars, and consultations for UA’s instructional technologies and technology accessibility. You can reach us at cit@ua.edu or 205-348-3532. Join us at an upcoming webinar or schedule a consultation with us.

Want more updates from us? Subscribe to our news updates and follow us on FacebookTwitter, and YouTube.

Instructional Technology News – July 23

Final grades due, more information about the Blackboard Learn SaaS upgrade, and hello Flipgrid/goodbye VoiceThread. Subscribe to our news updates and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

Final Grades due August 3

Did you know you can import your final grades from Blackboard Learn with just a few clicks? Learn how on our website: Importing Grades Into myBama from Blackboard. Grades for all Summer classes must be submitted via myBama no later than 11:59pm on Tuesday, August 3. For additional information on non-attendance grading as well as other grading policies, definitions, and terminology, please visit the University Registrar’s Grade Reporting page. Speaking of “final,” if you administer exams via Blackboard Learn, you might share this resource with your students: Testing Tips for Students

Blackboard Learn unavailable August 5-13

Blackboard Learn and certain tools accessed through Blackboard Learn (Panopto, Collaborate, and Turnitin) will be unavailable from Aug. 5 until Aug. 13 while UA’s instance of Blackboard Learn moves from being hosted in Blackboard’s data centers to being hosted in the cloud, also known as software as a service (SaaS).

Moving UA’s Blackboard Learn instance to SaaS allows for flexibility, scalability, resilience and innovation. The move also allows us to deploy Blackboard Ultra Base navigation, which offers a modern look that is more accessible and fully responsive. If you’ve used Blackboard Collaborate or the Blackboard Learn mobile app before, you’ve seen the Ultra look. Although the look is new, the course features and workflows remain the same, so there is little learning curve for students and instructors. There are, however, some new ways to navigate the Blackboard Learn environment that benefit all users.

We’ve posted more information about the upgrade, answers to frequently asked questions, and guides and tutorials on the CIT website: Blackboard Learn SaaS upgrade information – and a new way to navigate Blackboard Learn

We think these resources are especially helpful for instructors and students:

Base Navigation for Instructors
Base Navigation Video for Instructors
Base Navigation Guide for Instructors (PDF)

Base Navigation for Students
Base Navigation Video for Students
Base Navigation Guide for Students (PDF)

Flipgrid to replace VoiceThread

UA is transitioning from VoiceThread to Flipgrid as our video discussion and collaboration tool. Flipgrid offers a modern, fun and accessible video discussion option for UA instructors and students, ideal for engaging students asynchronously. Learn more on our website, and start using Flipgrid today: Flipgrid to Replace VoiceThread

VoiceThread will be removed during the August 5-13 Blackboard Learn upgrade. If you previously used VoiceThread for recorded lectures, you can export that content and upload into Panopto, then share it as a link in Flipgrid. Step-by-step instructions on how to export VoiceThread content are available on our website:  How to Export VoiceThread Content

We’re here to help! Contact the Center for Instructional Technology for help with instructional technology needs, questions and concerns.

Instructional Technology News – July 12

A quick introduction, Blackboard course content cleanup, Panopto recorder update, Blackboard Learn unavailable Aug. 5-13, and hello Flipgrid/goodbye VoiceThread.

New CIT Assistant Director Melissa Green

Thanks to Meagan Bennett for last week’s introduction and for shepherding our Instructional Technology News over the past year. I’m Melissa Green, and I’m thrilled to serve as the new Assistant Director of the Center for Instructional Technology. This role focuses on instructional technology education and outreach for our campus. Along with technology accessibility and thoughtful integration of technology in teaching and learning, building community is a passion of mine, and I look forward to growing this community together. If you haven’t already, please subscribe to our news updates and follow us on FacebookTwitter, and YouTube.

Blackboard cleanup begins THIS THURSDAY, July 15

Beginning July 15, the Center for Instructional Technology will remove old course content from the Blackboard Learn system. This is in accordance with UA’s LMS Course Retention Policy, which states that materials more than two years old will be removed from the system. Students and instructors should save any materials they wish to keep.  Visit the CIT website for more information on how to back up Blackboard content: How to Back Up Blackboard Content as an Instructor

Panopto recorder update required after July 15

Panopto for Windows and Panopto for Mac users: A July 15 Panopto update will require you to update your software. Step-by-step guidance and instructions for upgrading are available on Panopto’s website:

Blackboard Learn unavailable August 5-13

Blackboard Learn and certain tools accessed through Blackboard Learn (Panopto, Collaborate, and Turnitin) will be unavailable from Aug. 5 until Aug. 13 for a database migration and upgrade. This move will help provide a more stable, scalable, secure, and updated Blackboard Learn experience for UA users.

More information is available on the CIT website, and our CIT team will be sending additional communications to all Blackboard instructors.  We began communicating about this upgrade and downtime in April, but as always, we appreciate your assistance sharing this information! We know there is never a good time to bring down a critical system like Blackboard Learn, but we are looking forward to this migration and the capabilities it will offer.

Flipgrid to replace VoiceThread

UA is transitioning from VoiceThread to Flipgrid as our video discussion and collaboration tool. Flipgrid offers a modern, fun and accessible video discussion option for UA instructors and students, ideal for engaging students asynchronously. Learn more on our website, and start using Flipgrid today: Flipgrid to Replace VoiceThread

VoiceThread will be removed during the August 5-13 Blackboard Learn upgrade. If you previously used VoiceThread for recorded lectures, you can export that content and upload into Panopto, then share it as a link in Flipgrid. Step-by-step instructions on how to export VoiceThread content are available on our website:  How to Export VoiceThread Content

We’re here to help! Contact the Center for Instructional Technology for help with instructional technology needs, questions and concerns.