Brightspace Blog
Lessons from D2L Fusion: How to Support First Generation Students in Brightspace
Aug. 7, 2021—My name is Jenny, and I am a new instructional technologist at the Vanderbilt Center for Teaching. My colleagues and I recently attended the annual D2L Fusion Conference, which focuses on how to maximize the use and support for the Brightspace platform. I had the opportunity to attend sessions on how to support first generation...
Lessons from D2L Fusion: My Top 5 Tips to Improve Discussions
Aug. 4, 2021—By Michael Coley, Fall 2021 Over the month of July, the Brightspace Support team had the opportunity to attend the 2021 D2L Fusion Conference. While this annual conference usually is held in locations across North America each summer, for the past two summers it has been all digital just like much of higher education. Throughout...
Brightspace hours in July and August
Jul. 4, 2021—For many of us at Vanderbilt, August is the busiest month of the year. That is certainly true for us here at Brightspace support at the CFT! And to get ready for our return to campus in August, we have new guides and resources, new faces, and a new expanded schedule ready to unveil. August...
The Brightspace Support Team is Taking Time for Professional Development
May. 22, 2021—The Brightspace team normally provides support to the Vanderbilt campus Sunday through Friday, usually from 7am to 11pm. In particular over the last year at Vanderbilt, we have been proud to step up to the challenges of remote and online teaching and offer expanded hours and services. For the next 10 days, the Brightspace team...
Brightspace Support this Summer
May. 4, 2021—During the Fall 2020 and Spring 2021 semesters, the Brightspace Team held drop-in hours each Thursday to allow faculty to meet with our team and discuss any questions they had about using the Brightspace platform. We’ve wrapped up our final drop-in session for the spring, and we’ll be dedicating our time during May, June, and...
What’s New on Brightspace? (Dec. 2020 + Jan. 2021)
Jan. 21, 2021—Every month, Brightspace will release new features and updates. You can get a comprehensive view of the updates here, but this blog post will give you a quick overview of what’s new on Brightspace! Updated video and audio player To improve accessibility and create a consistent user experience, a new audio and video media player...
New Feature – Allow students to retake only the quiz questions they answered incorrectly
Nov. 23, 2020—Brightspace’s November update included a new feature that many faculty may find useful. When students are allowed more than 1 attempt for a Brightspace quiz, instructors may now choose to have students only retake the questions they answered incorrectly. To enable this option, navigate to your quiz settings and choose the Assessment tab. Set the...
Don’t Forget These Grading Setup Steps!
Oct. 27, 2020—As instructors give assignments, quizzes and discussions, there are some key grading setup elements to check before opening these activities to students. Start with the Gradebook If you intend to use the Brightspace gradebook, then I would start with this setup. Step 1: How do I set up my gradebook? Step 2: How do I...
All About Recording – New Guides for Faculty!
Oct. 6, 2020—Have you been wondering about recording your live class meetings? We have several new guides available on our On-Demand Resources page that will walk you through some commonly asked questions. Should I record my live class meeting? New! How can I record and share my class meetings with my students? New! Can I record and...
What’s New on Brightspace? (September 2020)
Sep. 21, 2020—Every month, Brightspace will release new features and updates. You can get a comprehensive view of the updates here, but this blog post will give you a quick overview of what’s new on Brightspace! Assignments – Additional functionality in the new assignment creation experience Add special access conditions to assignments. Receive a notification email when assignments...
What is click tracking? How should instructors use it to improve their courses?
Sep. 3, 2020—Click tracking refers to the ability that both instructors and students have in Brightspace to see where students have clicked within a course. This tool can be very useful for students trying to track their own progress in a course and for instructors evaluating their own course design and learning activities. However, this tool should...
Turnitin Workshop on Wednesday 8/12
Aug. 6, 2020—Join our partners from Turnitin on Wednesday August 12th at 2 PM for a training session catered toward online teaching. In this session, we’ll be reviewing the many ways Turnitin can help facilitate learning and assessment in online spaces. This workshop is open to all Vanderbilt faculty, staff, and teaching assistants and will be held...
Brush up on some essential Brightspace skills before teaching in an online or hybrid format this fall!
Jul. 28, 2020—Join Stacey, the CFT’s Assistant Director for Educational Technology, on Zoom for workshops about Brightspace tools including Discussions and Grades/Feedback. You can register and learn more about the available workshops on the Brightspace workshops page. If you will be using Brightspace for the first time and want to get to know the content and navigation tools,...
What’s New on Brightspace? (June/July 2020)
Jun. 15, 2020—Every month, Brightspace will release new features and updates. You can get a comprehensive view of the updates here, but this blog post will give you a quick overview of what’s new on Brightspace! Assignments – New create and edit experience The create and edit Assignments page has an updated look and feel. The classic tabbed...
Turning a Syllabus into an Online Course on Brightspace
Apr. 24, 2020—by Stacey M. Johnson, Assistant Director for Educational Technology If you will be teaching online, how do you plan to convert your course plan into a clean, easy-to-follow Brightspace course? The course plan or syllabus is the blueprint of your course, but now you have to construct the virtual structure according to the plans you...