Step 3:   Navigation

Introduction

STEP 3: NAVIGATION - HOW TO NAVIGATE AROUND BLACKBOARD

This step will walk you through the navigation of Blackboard, including learning how to view your course, locate pertinent information about your course and expand and collapse the navigation side panel.

 Logging In

Finding Your Courses

Also note: courses for fall do not appear in Blackboard until some time in July and/or August, depending on the class. You may not see any of your courses in Blackboard until late July or early August. This is not a reflection of your registration status, which you can view via the SURFS system. Any questions about registration for classes should be made to sswregistration@ssw.umaryland.edu

Favoriting Your Courses

On the Courses tab, after logging into Blackboard:


First change  the Current Courses dropdown to go to select the current semester (ie Fall 2022)

That will limit the results to only your classes for that semester.


If you don't see your course listed, this may be because the courses are not yet in Blackboard or your instructor has not yet made the course available to you. Most Fall courses won't show up until sometime in August and Spring courses in January. Once all courses are in Blackboard and made available to you, you can always use the Search box at the top and search by course number (670, 744, etc.). Alternatively, you can just use the Search box to locate any of your courses at any time.


When you locate the classes you are in, click the Star icon on the right to "favorite" them, and they will then show up at the top of your list when you click on Courses each day.


If you can't find your course at all using any of these methods (and it is in August/January), there is a chance there was an issue with your enrollment, and it should be verified with SSW Records and Registration (sswregistration@ssw.umaryland.edu)

 2. Simply click on the name of course link you would like to view. 

NOTE: Your instructor can control whether the course is available to students or not. If you see a course that is Not Available  (Private) - you should email your instructor to request access. 

Also: The IDEA Team, working with UMB CITS, archives Bb classes older than 3 years and removes them from Blackboard. The archives are able to be restored if at some point a faculty member requests this.  There is no guarantee of access to course materials after a course is completed. If you intend to download/save any course materials, you should do so during the current semester. Access to Blackboard after graduation is managed by UMB CITS via the UMID, and will be removed according to their policies.

Please note that your instructors make the course available to you in Blackboard. Until they do, you will not see your course listed as available in Blackboard. 

Some instructors open courses early and some do not. If you do not see your course available and are eager to enter, please email your instructor. 

NOTES ABOUT COURSES IN BLACKBOARD

Important

The name of the orientation course may be different than in the image below...it is currently called "Incoming Student Prerequisites (History of Oppression +) and once you are enrolled, it should display in the "My Courses Plus" box on the My Institution tab.

Navigation

To locate the pertinent information of your course, you will need to utilize the navigation on the left hand side of your course.

Some instructors change the default navigation, removing links to some tools, moving or renaming others, or adding in their own navigation. 

Some of the primary areas you will need:

Can't see anything but Announcements or Welcome in your course?

Please note: the image below may not match what your course looks like. Each instructor has the ability to change the look and colors of the navigation, as well as the tools, and links available there.  But it will always be in the left side/column in your Blackboard course. 

If you don't see navigation buttons on the left, it is likely because the "hide/show" toggle arrow was clicked at some point, and the menu is hidden!

The image below displays a gray tab on the left navigation with a white arrow within it. This arrow toggles (hides/shows) the navigation. Sometimes for whatever reason, this might get inadvertently clicked or triggered so that you only have Announcements showing in your course and no navigation. When the occurs, locate the gray tab and click it to re-display the navigation buttons.

This can also happen if your Blackboard browser window is sized too small - so you may need to first expand the size of your Bb window/tab to the size of your whole screen. If you don't see the gray/white icon highlighted in blue in the image below no matter what, screen size is most likely the issue:

EXERCISE 3: