Improvements to Consistency in BOLT

With our October update at the end of this week, there will be numerous changes to BOLT in the language and workflows controlling visibility of items.

Here are the key changes:

1. Language used to denote an activity is not visible to a learner will be “Hidden” and noted with a consistent visibility icon. 
2. Differing visibility controls will change to a checkbox. 
3. Visibility controls will appear on the Restrictions tab. (This is a big change in Discussions!) 
4. Consistent ordering of activity and tool specific icons on activity list pages. 
5. Visibility icon switch in Content. 
6. TOC flyout will no longer allow changes to visibility. 
7. TOC completion method icon switch in Content. 
8. New activities will have Save, not Publish buttons (and will include the “hide from users” checkbox consistent with the other tools. 
9. Visibility controls in context menus (drop down menus) of modules and topics. 

For more information, please read on.

BOLT FAQ: Time Savers in BOLT

Save Time with These BOLT Tips

	Combine multiple sections of a course. If you are teaching several sections of the same course in a semester, consider combining them into one course offering.
	Use the Course Copy tool. If you already developed a course, you can use the Course Copy tool to copy it over to a new semester’s course. Remember to modify dates and documents with semester or new information!
	Upload and add multiple topics. Zip multiple files, upload the zip file to the Manage Files area, and unzip the file there. Select the files and click Add Content Topics to add them to Content at once.
	Use Copy features where possible. Did you know you could copy quizzes, surveys, questions, and content files? If you create a “template” item, you can copy it to create similar items in your course.
	Use Bulk Edit to modify multiple items. Using the Bulk Edit feature allows you to make multiple changes to multiple items at once. The feature is available in a number of tools in BOLT. You can change names of items, dates settings, add conditions, or change the status of the items using Bulk Edit.

Language Changes Go Live May 20

Language changes  in BOLT will go live May 20, 2016. Please note this is a display change only- the functionality of the tools will remain the same!






Based on the results of usability testing conducted by Brightspace, the terms changing in BOLT are:

• News to Announcements
• Dropbox to Assignments
• New to Upload / Create
• Add Existing Activities to Existing Activities

Again, please note these are language term changes and that functionality will remain the same. 

For more information on the changes and for ways we plan to support your transition, follow the jump cut...

New to BOLT November 19: EBSCO Curriculum Builder

BOLT is pleased to announce the integration of the new EBSCO tool Curriculum Builder. The tool will be available to instructors November 19th.

What can you expect from Curriculum Builder?