This checklist contains everything you need to ensure that your Brightspace course is ready for the upcoming semester. If you have any questions or concerns as you complete the tasks, please email etd@dal.ca.
Semester Start Checklist [PDF]
This section contains all resources related to Brightspace.
This checklist contains everything you need to ensure that your Brightspace course is ready for the upcoming semester. If you have any questions or concerns as you complete the tasks, please email etd@dal.ca.
Semester Start Checklist [PDF]
Each semester, Brightspace course sites must be activated as all courses are set to “inactive” to prevent students from seeing unused course spaces. Where possible, instructors are encouraged to leave their course start date as is (the default start date) to allow students to see introductory content, such as a welcome announcement and the syllabus. Otherwise, instructors are encouraged to delay commencing significant course activity until the semester begins.
Students are added to courses automatically in Brightspace, based on their course registrations. While Instructors do not have to worry about adding students to their courses, they will need to add other instructors, lab instructors and/or teaching assistants to their courses. We recommend searching for users to add based on the user’s NetID.
Adding Users to a Brightspace Course [PDF]
Please note it is NOT possible to unenroll a user from your course. If it is necessary to remove a user from your course, please contact ETD at etd@dal.ca.
Associating dates with content release is a very effective tool for instructors to manage pace and minimize content overload for students. Release Conditions for a module are grouped with date restrictions, but they can also be applied to assessment items such as quizzes, assignments, and surveys. The advantage of adding a release conditions is that they allow students to access specific materials based on criteria that is not related to date. The manage dates tool gives instructors the ability to efficiently bulk edit and offset the date restrictions of each aspect of their course, such as discussion topics, assessments, announcements, and modules. This tool also gives instructors the option to edit the start and end dates of the course. This is very useful for instructors who wish to give students early or prolonged access to the course materials before the course has started or after the course has finished.
Each semester, the course created for the current academic year will be empty. Each instructor can choose how much material to import from a previous offering into the current course space. It is always possible to start from scratch, building a course with updated material. If you did not teach the previous offering of a course and you wish to import this content, you will require permission from the previous instructor to gain access to the old course, as well as any content within it.
Importing Content [PDF]
Urkund, now known as Ouriginal, is a software platform that integrates with Brightspace for the purpose of verifying the originality of student submitted assignments. Operationally, there aren’t a lot of differences and the name change is reflected in most places within Brightspace.
From the company’s website, “Ouriginal brings together the combined expertise of Urkund and PlagScan’s plagiarism detection solution, that combines text-matching with writing-style analysis to promote academic integrity and help prevent plagiarism.” Their Quick Start Guide (https://www.ouriginal.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Guide-to-the-Analysis-Report_EN.pdf) provides a detailed, step-by-step overview of their improved and modernized interface. At this time, it is still possible to toggle back to Urkund’s report interface.
After being integrated with a course and connected to assignment dropboxes, Ouriginal works by immediately searching for matches in a student’s submission with the internet, journal publications, assignments submitted by other Dalhousie students, and Ouriginal’s global database of student submissions. Depending on the size of the submission, reports are typically generated within 30 minutes.
Ouriginal/Urkund can be enabled for any Assignment in a Brightspace course, and reports are generated automatically for any submissions. For information on setting up Ouriginal in Brightspace, visit this post on our blog https://edtechtruro.edublogs.org/2021/08/20/adding-ouriginal-to-your-brightspace-course/.
Best Practices for Using Ouriginal
Ouriginal (formerly known as Urkund) is Dalhousie University’s approved plagiarism detection service and is available via Brightspace. The instructions below explains how you add the Ouriginal integration to your Brightspace course and how to turn on the Ouriginal submission within assignment folders.
Rubrics are a useful tool instructors can use to define their expectations for students and can be used in providing feedback. The Brightspace Rubrics tool makes it easy for instructors to integrate rubrics into their online or blended courses. The following instructions will cover creating new rubrics and adding rubrics to an assignment or a discussion in Brightspace. A document on viewing rubrics for students has also been included. It is recommended that instructors intending to use rubrics circulate this document to their students.
Brightspace Rubric Tool [PDF]
Viewing Rubrics for Students [PDF]
The Brightspace Gradebook is a tool that stores and organizes student grades and calculates final marks based on the marking scheme established by instructors. Setting up a well-organized and balanced gradebook before the semester begins is essential and allows for ease of editing throughout the semester if adjustments are required.
Gradebook Setup [PDF]