Blackboard Tip
Personalize a Course Shell
By Ireta Ekstrom

The settings button under course options has some interesting ways to personalize each course shell. For example, you can modify the course name and description of each course so it is easily identifiable: PSY101 can become Monday morning PSY101. Then if you teach another section of the same course, it can be Tuesday afternoon PSY101.

The Settings button is also where the course is made available for students. The default for CMU is “unavailable” so you can choose when to allow students to enter the shell.

Another option that can be useful is to choose the course entry point. If you never use announcements, and always want students to go to assignments first, you can set that entry point here. Use caution with this option. If you do choose to create an announcement later in the semester, students may not be able to see it.

The last button is to select a Language Pack. You can choose which language is used for all course shell features such as buttons, titles and all other text. Your choice of language here overrides any choices that students may have made. This can be helpful if you teach a language other than English and wish to give students additional practice in the course’s language.

Blackboard tutorials for organizing and personalizing your course shells can be found by clicking here.