Instructors can choose between several layout options for a course site’s homepage. Each choice is made up of an arrangement of Widgets and has been designed to highlight different site elements: focusing on content, course structure, or communication.
Unfortunately, true customization is limited to these selections.
It is possible to change the active homepage layout at any time through the ellipsis button in the bottom-right of any homepage.
On this page
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Related
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Homepage
Optionsoptions and widgets
All homepage options consist of a combination of the following widgets:
The default option (#4) offers has a balanced and familiar set of widgets in Announcements, Visual Table of Contents, Calendar, and Single Course Instructor ProfileInformation.
Activity Feed
:An interactive hub for site members to post messages that are visible site-wide. Instructors can also link to assignments, quizzes, and other tools.
Announcements
:A
typicalcommunication tool that allows instructors to create course announcements using the full text-editor. These can be targeted at specific roster sub-sections and by default prompt email notifications. Detailed instructions are available in the guide for creating and managing Announcements.
Calendar
:A monthly course calendar that will display upcoming events within the site, including date-dependent assignments, quizzes, discussions, etc.
Single Instructor Profile: A profile card with some brief biographical and contact options along with an image. Only one profile can be added to a homepage.
It is also possible to create events directly in the Calendar widget.
Visual Table of Contents
:An interactive tiled list of content items that links directly to course material and provides students with a progress bar to track what they have read. Each item is tied to a Content Unitand all changes are managed within that tool (including the display image, which can be changed from the default by adding another image to the first page in the Content item). Other configuration details can be changed (e.g., default image, text colour, and progress bar colour)
please--reach out to edtech@brocku.ca for more information.
Multi-Profile Widget
Profile cards share information about the course instructor(s) and/or teaching team and include images that are retrieved from Brightspace Profiles when available. Only site members in the Instructor role can edit the Multi-Profile Widget.
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The Single Instructor Profile was replaced by the Multi-Profile Widget on October 9th, 2024. The new widget offers significantly more flexibility, including the ability to include a full teaching team. |
The ellipsis in the top-right offers the following options:
Update User Settings provides control over which members of the teaching team are visible, how they are labeled (which can be different from their actual site role), and in what order they appear.
Add Biography, Contact, More Information offers a text box for sharing any necessary information, e.g. preferred methods of contact, office hours, and external site links. It also provides a link to edit a user’s global Brightspace Profile Information which can share external/social media links.
Add an Instructor or Teaching Assistant
A tool dedicated to quickly adding a teaching assistant or co-instructor to a site’s roster. Further information is available in the guide for adding TAs or co-instructors to a site.
It is also possible to handle TA site enrollment to only specific sections through Classlist.
Course Connector for MS Teams
The Brightspace-Microsoft Teams integration that is used to create a Teams site based off the membership of your Brightspace site’s Classlist in a few simple steps.
Homepage types one, two, and four
include a plus version with the Teams Course Connector widget.
Courses that require a Microsoft Teams site
can use the Connector widget and
to
build a Teams site
from the Brightspace Classlist in just a few steps
.
Full details are available in the guide for using the Teams Course Connector in Brightspace.
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The look and feel of the different homepage options will change as more content is added to a site. It may be best to toggle between the options once the rest of the site is set up. |
Change a course site’s Homepage
Navigate to a course site’s homepage or click the Course Home tab in the navbar.
Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the ellipsis button in the bottom-right corner.
Select the Manage Homepages button to view and choose between the different layouts.
Remove the Banner will eliminate the image across the top of a homepage, along with that instance of the course name. More details can be found on the Navbars and Banners page.
The Manage Homepages page will show afull list of homepage options with a brief description. Note that Widgets are positioned differently in the various options and it may be worth toggling between them to compare.Select from the Active Homepage dropdown menu and click Apply.
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If your department or program is Departments, Programs, or teams interested in a custom homepage please can reach out to edtech@brocku.ca to explore custom discuss bespoke options. |