3.j - Participating in Course Groups

Many instructors may divide their online courses into various "groups". Each group can have several students, and each group can have access to several tools such as:

Group Discussion Board
Group Email
Group Chat and Virtual Classroom
Group File Exchange (Dropbox)

Groups are defined by the Instructor for the course, and not all groups will have each of the features listed above. For example, a group might be defined to only have a group discussion board and email, but not group chat and file exchange. The type of group and the tools available depend on how and why the Instructor has created the group(s) and what the purpose of the group will be in the course. Students may belong to multiple groups in a course.

See the illustrations below for an example of a student participating in a group, and examples of the different types of tools available to the groups:

Groups are typically found in the "Groups Pages" tool in the "Communication" area. However, the Instructor can also link to groups from various parts of the course as well. In this example, the Group for which this student belongs can be found in the Communication Area under "Group Pages". First click on "Communication", and then click on "Group Pages":

This will open the Group Pages displaying all the groups defined for the course. Notice that only the groups for which the student belongs has an active link. Groups for which the student does not belong are listed, but the student cannot access the group pages and tools for those groups. In this example, the student is a member of the "Example Group 1":

Clicking on the Group Name will open the group page, and display the tools that are available to the student for this particular group, along with a list of members of this group:

Clicking on "Group Discussion Board" will open the private discussion board for this group. For more information about how to use the Discussion Board in Blackboard, see "Section 3.h - Using the Discussion Board" in this student guide.
Clicking on "Collaboration" will open the list of private Chat and Virtual Classroom sessions available for this group. For more information about using the Chat and Virtual Classroom Features, see "Section 3.i - Using Chat and Virtual Classroom" in this student guide.
Clicking on "File Exchange" will open the private Digital Dropbox for this group. For more information about using the Digital Dropbox, see "Section 3.f - How to submit files in the "Drop-box" or "Assignments" areas" in this student guide.
Clicking on "Send Email" will open an email dialog, allowing the student to send a brief email to all members of the group.
Clicking on the "Email" address next to any group member will open the client email program in order to send a private email directly to that member of the group.

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