The following table contains a list of the tools in Sulis. It explains their purpose, then directs you to the equivalent of that tool in the new VLE, Brightspace.
Sulis tool |
Purpose |
Brightspace equivalent tool |
Announcements |
Allows for the delivery of messages to the entire class, to groups, or to specific sections within the class |
|
Assignments |
Allows instructors to create, distribute, collect, and grade online assignments. |
|
Blogs |
Allows students to create private and public blogs. There is no Blog tool available on Brightspace. Workarounds are Discussion Board single groups or Microsoft Sway. |
Several potential solutions here Internal tools:
External tools:
|
Calendar |
Allows instructors to post events in a calendar format. Assignments and quiz due dates will automatically pop into the calendar. You can also use the calendar tool to link to a BBB meeting and restrict visibility of that meeting to certain groups. |
|
Drop Box |
Creates a folder for each student in the course to enable file sharing between students and teachers, and groups of students. We don’t have drop box on Brightspace. The nearest equivalent is group locker |
Group Lockers. Carleton have instructions on this This feature currently has a 50MB limit but we are looking to increase it |
Forums |
Allows participants to hold class discussions online |
|
Groups |
Brightspace allows you to set up groups in seven different ways. Groups of 1 can be used for private blogs or access to certs of completion. Students can self enrol in groups, saving you the trouble, or be enrolled in tutorial groups, or BBB webinar groups, or groups of max X members. Late entrants to the course can automatically be added to a group. |
|
Gradebook |
Enter grades; auto calculate grades; define grading schemes etc |
|
Lessons |
Allows an instructor to organize resources, activities, and media on a single page. The nearest equivalent to a lesson page on Brightspace is a HTML page.HTML pages on BS are very versatile and well worth the time invested into learning how to make them. |
|
Messages |
Send and receive private messages to other members enrolled in the course site. On the Brightspace Navbar choose Communications/Instant Messages |
Instant messages (external link) |
Overview |
Landing page for a course or project site. |
|
Permissions and Roles |
Allow users to access certain features of a site, depending on their roles, and on the decisions made by the site owner and the system administrator. |
You can add people to your site as ‘Instructor manually added’, as ‘learner’ or as ‘read only’. The latter can be used for an external examiner. External users (non—UL accounts) can be added to the site. See ‘adding users to your Brightspace Course’. |
Panopto |
You can copy Panopto videos from Sulis into Brightspace. |
|
Podcasts |
Allows instructors to distribute audio, video, and PowerPoint files to their students either manually or via a RSS feed |
Use of Panopto for podcasting: Podcasting-with-Panopto (1).pdf
|
Polls |
Allows instructors to post multiple choice survey questions on their site |
Surveys (external link) |
PostEm |
upload and distribute a comma-delimited (CSV) spreadsheet to present individual feedback and/or grades to students. Students only see their own individual feedback and/or grades. There is no equivalent to this on BS, but Group Lockers is a workaround. |
Group Lockers (share files using group locker) or Grades/assignments feedback section. |
Profile |
Contains basic user information |
|
Resources |
Allows instructors to share a wide variety of files with their students within a site. The equivalent area for ‘Resources’ tool on BS is in the toolbar Admin/Manage Files area. |
|
Rubrics |
Allows instructors to create and share grading rubrics |
|
Section Info |
Provides a way for instructors to efficiently manage sections of a class |
Groups and group categories |
Sign-Up |
Allows students to sign up for office hours, meetings, review sessions, and other events in one convenient place |
D2L are looking to rollout the Meeting Scheduler tool to UL – updates to follow. |
Statistics |
Allows instructors to view site usage statistics and user activity events. |
Intelligent Agents , visible via NavBar, Admin/Intelligent Agents and Class Progress, visible via NavBar, Admin/Content Reports. |
Tests and Quizzes |
Allows instructors to create online assessments (i.e., tests, exams, quizzes, and surveys) |
|
Wiki |
Allows people to collaboratively author web pages, without the need for advanced web authoring skills |
No direct alternative – use of OneNote Example here A lecturer can also set up a file on One Drive, and share with the class. They can then add a link to the One Drive file in BS. |