Ultra Course View

The Blackboard Ultra course view, organized into three sections, provides a simpler and more modern course experience for instructors and students. 

  1. Course Navigation (which allows instructors to quickly access key areas of the course such as the calendar, announcements page and gradebook). 
  2. Course Content (all the teaching, learning and assessment resources) 
  3. And Details & Actions (where instructors access course tools and functionality). 

Navigation bar 

Access these frequently used tools from the Navigation bar located at the top of the page.  

  • Content: The default opening page organized using Learning Modules or Folders. 
  • Calendar: Opens the Blackboard Calendar for the course. 
  • Announcements: View and create announcements. All course announcements will be available here. 
  • Discussions: Lists discussions created in the course and within course content. 
  • Gradebook: Access to view, mark, and manage all assessments in the course. 
  • Analytics: Provides access to reports on student activity in the course. This tab is not visible to students. 
  • Groups: View, create, and manage groups in the course. 
  • Student Preview: Opened from the top right of the Navigation bar to see how the course looks to students. 

Details & Actions 

The Details and Actions menu is the main point for instructors to access course tools and manage the course. 

  1. Roster: View the users enrolled in the course. 
  2. Progress Tracking: Enable progress tracking features. 
  3. Course Image: Change the course image displayed on the title card. 
  4. Course Availability: Change the course’s availability status. 
  5. Books and Tools: Access course tools and any integrated books. Instructors can configure tools like WebEx, Teams, and Respondus LockDown Browser here. 
  6. Question Banks: create a database of questions they can reuse in multiple assessments. 

Course Content 

Blackboard Ultra provides faculty with a focused Course Content area in which to upload, build, and organize content. There is no course menu, Learning Modules or Folders organize materials into main topic areas. 

Add Content menu. 
  1. Click on the Content tab on the Navigation bar to view the Content area. 
  2. Hover over any dividing line until it turns purple and a + icon appears.  
  3. Click on the + icon to see the Add Content menu. 
  4. Click the appropriate item from the Add Content menu. 
    • Create to open the Create Item menu on the right-hand side of the screen. 
      • Separate resources explain the three sections of the Create Item menu, Course Content Items, Assessment and Participation and Engagement. 
    • Copy Content has limited availability. 
    • Upload to quickly upload files from your computer/mapped drive in the preview mode. 
    • Content Market to add integrated tools and third-party resources. 
    • Content Collection to link to current course content and eliminate the need to update multiple copies of the content. 
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