In your site's Control Panel, click the link for the Content Area in which you'd like students to access the Assignment.

Locate the drop-down menu to the far right of the Add toolbar. Learning Unit will be the default selection. Click the drop-down arrow to display other options, and select Assignment from this list.

Click GO (to the right). The Add Assignment page opens. Note that it is divided into four sections: Content Information, Availability Options, Assignment Attachments, and Submit.

In the Content Information section, enter a Name for the Assignment. If you'd like, you can customize the name's Color by first clicking the Pick button. Select a color from the Color Picker window by clicking on a color swatch. The default color is black.

For Points Possible, enter the highest score that a student could earn on the assignment.

Into the Text box, type or paste text copied from a word processing program. If you plan to attach a file with an assignment description or instructions, you can either skip this step or enter a description of the file that you will attach.

Scroll down to section 2, Options. If you want students to be able to submit their assignments immediately after you finish creating the assignment, leave the default Yes option for Do you want to make this assignment visible? Otherwise, click No. Once you have created the assignment, you can modify this option at any time.

For Do you want to track the number of views?, the default option is No. Because the Online Gradebook also records when students have submitted an assignment, you will not need to enable tracking, unless you want to know whether an individual student has accessed the assignment to read your instructions or guidelines.

If you would like to place date/time restrictions when students can access the assignment, use the drop-down menus for Display After and Display Until to select the desired dates and times. You can also use the Calendar tool to specify dates.

If you are attaching a file with the assignment description or instructions, scroll down to section 3, Assignment Attachments. Otherwise, skip to step 14.

To attach a file, click Browse. Your web browser will open a window in which you locate and select a file to attach. Use the Look in area's drop down menu at the top of this window to navigate to where the file is stored.

Once you find the file you want to attach, click its name. Then click Open in the lower right corner. You can also double-click the name instead.

The browser now returns to the Blackboard window. The Name of Link to File field allows you to specify what text should display for the link. If you leave it blank, the file name (e.g., syllabus.doc) will display as the link text. You can enter any text you like here: you might include the title of the document, what file format the document is in (e.g., Microsoft Word .doc file), or a simple directive (e.g., click here to view file).

 Click Submit at the bottom of the page.

Click OK to return to the content area page. The assignment will appear at the bottom of the page, along with a View/Complete link. (Don't click this link yet, because it will take you outside the Control Panel into the main view of the course, and you're not quite finished!).

If you want to change this item's placement in the list of materials in the content area, click the number drop-down menu to the left. After a moment, the items will be reordered on the page.

Click OK at the bottom of the page to return to the Control Panel.

Now click the Gradebook link in the Control Panel. The View Spreadsheet page opens.

Locate the assignment's column, scrolling to the right, if necessary. Click the link in the column heading. The Item Options page opens.

If you don't yet want a column for the assignment to appear when students check their grades, you will need to make its column (Blackboard refers to columns as Gradebook Items) not visible to students. On the Item Options page, click the link for Item Information. Scroll down to the Options section and click No for Make item visible to students.

Make any other changes that you would like, and then click Submit at the bottom of the page.

You can determine which students have submitted files for an assignment by viewing the assignment's information in the Gradebook. In the Control Panel, click Gradebook. A hyphen indicates that a student has not saved or submitted the assignment. An exclamation mark in a student's field indicates that the student has submitted that assignment. [ http://help.unc.edu/?id=5308 ] A padlock icon indicates that a student has saved but not submitted an assignment.

To view the file(s) submitted by an individual student, click the exclamation mark to open the Modify Grade. This page shows submission date, student comments, and once entered, instructor feedback to student as well as instructor's notes. A grade may be entered here or Grade Assignment page that opens in the next step.

To access a student's submitted files, click View. Note that the grade assignment page consists of five sections: Assignment Information, Student's Work, Feedback to Student, Instructor's Notes, and Submit.

In the Assignment Information section, all assignment information that you provided for students is displayed.

The Student's Work section includes comments entered by the student and the file(s) attached by that student. To open a student's file, click the linked file title.

The Feedback to Students section has three features: Grade, Comments, and File to Attach. Enter a grade for the assignment in the Grade field; this grade is also entered into the online gradebook. You can provide additional feedback either by entering your observations directly in Comments box or by attaching a file with your comments. Multiple files can be attached using this feature.

Use the Instructor Notes section to make notes and attach files which are not visible to students. You can enter text in the Notes box, and browse for files and attach them. These notes are preserved for subsequent reference and are accessible to other users with grading permissions (other Instructors, Teaching Assistants, and Graders).

In your site's Control Panel, click the link for the Gradebook, and then click the title of the assignment you would like to download. This takes you to the Item Options page for that assignment.

Click Item Download to reach the Download Assignment page. The first section of this page allows you to select the students whose papers you will download. A table lists students, submission dates for their assignments, and grade status.

To select a student's paper, click the box to the left of his or her name so that a check mark appears. To select all students, click the Check All link at the top of the table. To select only ungraded assignments, click Check Ungraded, or use Uncheck All to deselect all students. Both graded assignments and those which need to be graded can be downloaded.

Once you have selected the student papers you want to download, page down to the second section and click Submit.

A new page loads with a link stating download assignments now. Click this link to download the files as a single .zip file.

A Save/Download window opens, offering the options of saving or opening the file. By default, the file will have the same name as the assignment. Select Save. Your browser's Save As window opens. Save the file to a memorable location on your computer. You'll now be able to unzip and view these files outside of Blackboard.

All files are named systematically, allowing you to identify the assignment, the author (by Onyen), and the title given to the file by the author (for files submitted as attachments). Underscores separate this information within the file name. For example, an attachment for the assignment Term Paper submitted by user janedoe, who gave her file the name my paper, would have the filename Term_Paper_janedoe_my_paper. The .txt files listed include any materials that students added in the Comments box. These filenames include the assignment name and the student's Onyen (e.g., Term_Paper_janedoe).