The Collaboration Tools allow the Instructor and Students to participate in real time lessons and discussions and also view archives of previous Collaboration sessions. The Collaboration Tools can be used to hold real-time, online classroom discussions, TA sessions, and office hour type question/answer forums. Guest speakers and subject matter experts can also communicate with the class using the Collaboration Tools.
The following Collaboration Tools are available:
· Virtual Classroom - Allows users to enter a real-time discussion with Instructors, Students, and colleagues; access the Web; and engage in question and answer sessions.
· Lightweight Chat - The Lightweight Chat is part of the Virtual Classroom but can also be accessed separately. It allows users to open just the Chat function of the Virtual Classroom.
When developing an activity that requires the Collaboration Tools, consider the following.
· The Collaboration Tools are Java applications and may initially take a few moments to load into a browser window. Before developing assignments that require the Collaboration Tools, be sure that all Students have Java enabled browsers.
· Due to the synchronous nature of the Collaboration Tools, multiple users must participate at the same time. Be sure to notify Students about a scheduled Collaboration session to ensure attendance.
· Sometimes a Collaboration session can be overwhelming if there are too many users. Consider grouping Students into several small groups to keep the conversation manageable.
Note: It is important to remember that Collaboration Sessions are not recorded and archived by default. The leader of the session must start the recorder to create an archive. For more information, please see Record Menu.
Macintosh users running OS X and Netscape should run Netscape 7. When opening the Collaboration Tool, Netscape may put the tool in the background. If this happens, check under the Window menu for the Collaboration Tool. Netscape 6.2 does not work well with the Collaboration Tool and should be replaced with Netscape 7. For those users that wish to use Safari, be aware that the Safari browser is not yet supported by Blackboard, however, the Collaboration Tool should function normally in Safari so long as Pop-Up Window Blocking is disabled. When Safari is supported by Blackboard, it will be listed in the Client/Browser Configuration Guide available at http://behind.blackboard.com.
Macintosh users running OS 8 or OS 9 must use the Accessible version of the Collaboration Tool. See below for more information on running the Accessible Collaboration Tool.
An accessible version of the Collaboration Tool is available in the Blackboard Learning System. Users running Macintosh Operating System 8 or 9 should also use this version.
On the launch page, which opens when Join is selected on the Collaboration Sessions page, a link to this version appears. This link will open the Accessible version / Macintosh OS 8 and 9 version of the Collaboration Tool, which resembles the Lightweight Chat. Links to items that appear in the Virtual Classroom, such as items in the Course Map and Group Browser, will appear in this version. Documents created on the Whiteboard may be viewed if the Instructor takes a snapshot of them, using the Snapshot button on the Whiteboard action bar. A link will be created to the snapshot for users to view it.
When a user, using the Accessible Collaboration Tool, enters or exits the room the sound of a door opening or closing will be audible to all participants in the Collaboration Session.
The Java 2 Run Time Environment 1.4.1 or higher is required to use the Collaboration Tools. This plug-in may be downloaded from the page that appears when a user joins a Collaboration Session, or may be found at http://java.sun.com/products/plugin/index.html.
Users should take care to uninstall any existing Java plug-ins before installing a new version.