When building your Ultra course or organisation, you can copy content from any other course or organisation where you are enrolled as Instructor / Leader or Assistant.
This video mentions some other functions please following for more details:
- TEL guide on Batch Edit Visible to Students
- TEL guide on Presenting files to students
- TEL guide on Uploading files
- TEL guide on Creating Documents
Copy Content
When adding content in a content area, hover over the divider line where you would like to add the content, then click on the plus icon to reveal the Add Content menu. The second option on the Add Content menu is Copy Content.
Select Copy Content, when the Copy Items screen opens follow these steps:
- Find the relevant Organisation/Course
- Find the relevant Content Area
- Find the relevant files
- Copy Selected Files
See our section on Consider Before Copying for some tips on how items copy into Ultra.
Step 1: Find the relevant course
Selecting Copy Content from the Add Content menu brings up a list of all the Courses and Organisations you are enrolled in with a staff role.
- Toggle to top menu between course and organisation as required (A in image)
- Find the source course from which you wish to copy the content.
- Or search for the course using the search field at the top of the screen (B in image)
To view the course content click on the title (C in image) or the right-hand side arrow (D in image), this will open a list of the areas/items and files on that course.
NB* Do not check the select box for the course. If you select the course from this level it will immediate add it to the Items Selected panel and copy the whole course, which is not recommended (nested folders will flatten out to one level and may take some time or re-organise).
Step 2: Find the relevant Content Area
When you select the course you wish to copy content from, it will open as a list of folders. Each folder is a Content Area (corresponding to a menu item) from the original course.
Click on the content area title or the arrow on the far right of the content area you wish to copy files from. This will open the content area and show a list of the files within.
NB* Do not check the select box for the content area unless you wish to copy the whole content area. Selecting from here will add it to the Items Selected panel, the content area will copy as a folder and all nested folders contained within will flatten out to one level and may take some time or re-organise.
Step 3: Find the relevant files
Once you have drilled down to the next level, it will show content within that specific Content Area (typically folders or items in the original course).
- Select any files you wish to copy
- Use the link back to the course to navigate back if necessary
- All the files you select will be added to the Items Selected section as you navigate around the folders.
NB* The copy screen does not show which items are un/available in the original course. It may help to have the source course open on a second screen, so you can see exactly what needs to be copied.
Step 4: Copy Selected Files
Once you are happy with all the files in the Items Selected section, press Start Copy. You can do this at any time and all the items listed in the Items Selected panel will copy.
- Check the Items Selected list to make sure you have not accidently added a whole course or content area.
The copy starts and a Copying Content wait screen will appear. This process will take longer if you are copying a lot of content,
The content items will be copied into the specified location, where you opened the Add Content menu.
If you do copy an entire content area from an original course it will copy as a folder into an Ultra course.
Once in Ultra you can rearrange copied items or move/add them to Folders or Learning Modules. However, moving the items around can be a bit cumbersome, we recommend copying in smaller batches starting the copying process at the exact point on the course where you wish the item to insert.
All newly copied items will be hidden from students by default. It is possible to use the Batch edit function to make them visible to student in one action, see our guide, TEL guide on Batch Edit Visible to Students.
Consider Before Copying
Copying Folders
Selecting a folder will copy that folder and all of its contents.
Before doing this consider
- Do you need the whole folder, or just the individual content items?
- Will copying the folder mean that you have exceeded the maximum 3-level limit in your new Ultra course/organisation? If so the content will copy across, but the structure of the materials will be changed (see Nested Folders below).
In most cases it will probably be best to go into the folder and then select individual items to copy
Nested folders
If copying content would result in the folder levels exceeding the Ultra limit, all items are copied, but items which were in a folder are now placed immediately underneath the relevant copied folder.
Content types that can’t / shouldn’t be copied
Turnitin assignments
These would not copy correctly, so Blackboard does not display them in the list of content items that can be copied.
If needed, they should be set up from scratch in the Ultra Organisation.
SCORM units
These can be copied, but Blackboard doesn’t copy the Grade Centre settings or give any options to set the SCORM up in the Ultra Gradebook (to record student progress).
You will need to set them up from scratch in the Ultra course.
Make content visible to students
After copying content into your course or organisation, it will all be Hidden from students / participants – you can make items visible one by one, or use Batch Edit.
Batch Edit
With Learn Ultra it is possible to change multiple items from Hidden from students to Visible to students in a batch action.
See our guide Ultra: Batch Edit – Visible to Students.
For more information on Batch Edit in Ultra see the Blackboard Help page Batch Edit.
Return to Copy Content section
Guide last updated on March 19, 2024
