Preliminary exploration of student use of Blackboard Collaborate in fully online courses

Abstract

This paper explores how students use Blackboard Collaborate (i.e., Collaborate) in fully online courses. It is the initial collection of data for a two-phase stuidy exploring the 'how' and 'why' of integrating technology into fully online courses from the context of Collaborate. The findings report that despite anecdotal evidence suggesting a decline in student use of Collaborate, surveys results and usage exported from Collaborate via the learning management system (LMS) validate its continued inclusion in the design of fully online courses. Student benefits included interaction/connectedness, support for course content and assessment and the tool itself. Whilst areas in need of improvement were bound to technical issues and structure including purpose of the Collaborate session. Irrespective, the results favour the inclusion of Collaborate as a learning support tool in fully online courses.