How do I use Journals in Blackboard?
Journals are personal spaces for students to communicate privately with you. Students can also use journals as a self-reflective tool. By default, this tool is private between the instructor and an individual student.
Instructions
Add a tool link to the course menu for easy access to the Journal tool.
In the Journals tool, select Create Journal.
Type a name and optional instructions. Make the journal available to students.
Select the Display After and Display Until check boxes to enable the date and time selections. Display restrictions don't affect the journal availability, only when the link appears.
Choose settings options: Monthly or Weekly Index Entries; allow users to edit and delete entries, or delete comments.
In the Grade Settings section, select No grading or the Grade option and type the number of Points possible.
If you set the points possible to a non-whole number, letter grades may not be assigned correctly.
Points possible will apply to one or more entries made by a user to the journal topic.
After you enable grading, a column is created automatically in the Grade Center. The journal is permanently gradable, and you can't change the setting to No grading.
Optional: select the check box for Show participants in needs grading status and select the number of entries required. If you apply this setting, the Needs Grading icon will show in the Grade Center. The entries will appear in the queue on the Needs Grading page after student activity meets this threshold.
Optional: add a due date.
Optional: Add a rubric.
Select Submit.