Mike wrote about his experiences with WebCT:
> Yes, it's cumbersome and not easy to learn (I've had to
> pester a more knowledgeable grad student more times
> than I care to admit). I'll ask the students to provide
> me with feedback on its use in my course evaluations.
>
> Anybody here have any helpful hints?
Use Blackboard.com. =)
Our main campus has a site license with WebCT, so I've had a chance
to play around in it some, both from the instructor and student
viewpoints. There seems to be a lot in WebCT that's not intuitive.
When we decided to offer our first class on the web, I decided that
instead of hooking into the main campus WebCT site license, I'd try
Blackboard.com. You can put up a course for free using their server,
you can pay them $100 per course for more goodies, or, I believe, you
can buy a site license. I'm just using the free version. I find it
to be much more user friendly and intuitive than WebCT. Like WebCT,
you don't have to know HTML, but if you know it, Blackboard seems to
allow you to integrate it much more easily than WebCT does.
One problem I'm currently having with Blackboard is that sometimes
I can't post more than one message to the discussion board per
session. I have an inquiry into the techies at Blackboard about
that.
Blackboard and WebCT don't allow you to do anything you couldn't do
on your own if you know HTML, JavaScript, Java, and PERL. I just
didn't want to bother with it. =)
In my non-web classes, I don't use Blackboard. Instead, I have them
subscribe to a class listserv for out of class discussion. Also, I
post their grades (with their permission, by randomly generated ID
number) on my website. (I keep their grades in Excel, then save the
table in HTML format.)
As for copyright... I had the library staff scan a couple essays
that I'm having students read for the web course. The essays have
been uploaded to the Blackboard server and are only available to
those enrolled in the course via password. I was told by our library
director that these files may only be used this semester. If I want
to use them next semester, I need to get permission from the
publisher.
--
Sue Frantz [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Assistant Professor of Psychology Office: (505) 439-3731
New Mexico State Univ - Alamogordo Fax: (505) 439-3802
Alamogordo, NM 88310 http://web.nmsu.edu/~sfrantz
