Easy ways to make your Blackboard site more user-friendly Matching information to styles of learning

Points to consider… What does it mean to be more user- friendly? Blackboard features Material for use on Blackboard Text read back software Bandwidth for home downloads ‘Reasonable adjustments’ – Senda legislation

User friendly = ? Awareness of how differently people learn Looking for the most simple way to explain what you are doing…without being patronising! Putting yourself in the user’s head and check what your site looks like frequently – from their point of view What does this mean in practice?

Blackboard features Buttons Font colour for headlining information Instructions for accessing information

BackBack!

Over explain what you are doing in each section Make the instructions for opening the page as clear as you can

Assessment on Blackboard can be a minefield….

Designing material

Print style This is Times New Roman. It is not recommended for ease of reading because of all the extra ‘bits’ it has on it. This is Comic Sans, which is a very popular font. It is smooth and easy to read, though some people find it too ‘informal’. Arial, this font, is the college ‘house style’ font. It is also plain and easy to read. This is Tahoma. This is Verdana.

Summary Keep it simple Keep the individual user in mind and check your site frequently for clarity Vary what you do if you have the time Remember that some will be using Blackboard with text read back software and find out what that means in design and usage terms Some things are not better if they are on a computer or Blackboard! Ellen Lessner, Abingdon and Witney College