LLTI Archives

May 2001, Week 3

LLTI@LISTSERV.DARTMOUTH.EDU

Options: Use Monospaced Font
Show Text Part by Default
Show All Mail Headers

Message: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]
Topic: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]
Author: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]

Print Reply
Subject:
From:
LLTI-Editor <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Language Learning and Technology International Information Forum <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 17 May 2001 15:25:27 EDT
Content-Type:
text/plain
Parts/Attachments:
text/plain (61 lines)
--- Forwarded Message from Paul Chapin <[log in to unmask]> ---

>From: Paul Chapin <[log in to unmask]>
>To: "'Language Learning and Technology International Information Forum'"     <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: RE: #6117.4 Course Management Software (!)
>Date: Wed, 16 May 2001 09:22:42 -0400

------------------
We went with Blackboard over WebCT largely because we believe it is easier
for the faculty to use and understand.  The only major problems we've seen
is the process by which a faculty member can add a student to a course -
it's awkward and confusing and can result in a student being in the student
data base multiple times - and a tendency to release upgrades too often and
too early - we found major problems with 5.0 and are waiting for 5.5.

We've taken some actions to simplify the administrative part of the using
Blackboard. Course sites are created for all courses, but marked as
"unavailable", i.e., nobody sees them, until requested by a faculty member.
All courses have the preregistered students preloaded and the load is
repeated several times during drop and add period.  Adding students between
or after these loads must be done by the faculty member (or us if they ask).
Due to issues on our side, the faculty must manually remove any student who
drops.

Support has been an issue.  The sales people need help, to be polite.
Operational support is uneven.  The company has grown enormously and it
shows in inadequately trained personal and often simply inadequate numbers
of people.  There's got to be some good job opportunities with them if
anybody is interested. 

Bottom line is that a lot of our faculty use and like Blackboard.  Most are
not doing anything very exciting; mostly they are posting documents, using
the mail lists and perhaps the discussion boards.  Only a few are really
trying to do anything very original.  Student reactions have, oddly, been
all over the map ranging from this is the end of civilization as we know it
to this is the greatest thing since sliced bread.  The most amusing student
comment was a complaint that with the BlackBoard mailing list, they couldn't
get away from the instructors.  The student would log on in the evening and
find the instructor has emailed everybody in the class additional clarifying
comments of the previous class.

I've actually taken a course using Promethesus.  As a student it didnt'
strike me much one way or the other except that I liked the look of
Blackboard better and I didn't like how it presented threaded discussions.
In essence, you either had to see every message every time or you could
restrict what you see to unread messages but the messages weren't organized
very well.  I kept switching back and forth, a disruptive task when you're
trying to work, depending on what I needed from the list at the moment.

There was a new version of Prometheus coming out even as I took the class,
but I didn't see any great advantage and decided to stick with what I knew
rather than change in mid-semester.  I don't know what the current version
is like.

Also, Prometheus was quite a bit more expensive that BlackBoard and WebCT.
In the case of BlackBoard, they are clearly trying to sell you some of their
higher levels - it comes in three different levels - and may be low-balling
the basic price to get you to sign on to their product line.  We were told
that there was very little profit in the basic level.  Prometheus may only
have one level making such pricing tactics unavailable.

ATOM RSS1 RSS2