• 1 Adding a Forum
• 2 General
• 3 Availability
• 4 Attachments and word count
• 5 Subscription and tracking
• 6 RSS
• 7 Discussion locking
• 8 Post threshold for blocking
• 9 Whole forum grading
• 10 Ratings
• 11 Common module settings
• 12 Restrict acess
• 13 Tags
• 14 Navigating within forums
• 15 Sorting posts
• 16 Notes

Quizzes are excellent ways to assess students' comprehension of course material. They can provide a secure, automatic way of collecting students' responses to questions that can be used as activities, weekly homework assignments, confidential feedback, etc.... as more than just quizzes. Quizzes where the answers do not require manual grading (i.e., for essay questions) synch directly into your course grade book.

There is a wide range of available question types, including drag and drop, calculated, calculated multiple choice, simple calculated, embedded answers, essay, matching, multiple choice, numerical response, random short-answer matching, short answer, and true/false. There are also a wide number of quiz delivery options and formats for quizzes.

This article covers the addition of a quiz to a course and discusses in full the wide range of settings available for different quiz delivery scenarios. To get going quickly with creating and adding quiz questions, all that is required is to add the quiz name and restrict students from accessing it using the common module 'Availability' setting.

Adding a Quiz

• Click on Turn editing on, near the top right side.
• Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc…) and click on the Add an Activity or Resource button.
• Click on the Quiz icon.
• A new page will appear with the quiz settings.
• There is a wide range of settings where you can enter specific customizations for your quiz. All that is required is the Name.

General

• "Name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• “Description”: Optionally provides explanation and instructions for your students.
• “Display description on course page”: The description of your quiz will be displayed on the course page below the link to the quiz.

Timing

• "Open the quiz": Determines when your students will be allowed to make attempts at the quiz. Students must complete the quiz between this time and the time specified in "Close the quiz".
• "Time limit": Determines how long students will have during each attempt of the quiz.
• "When time expires": Toggles what happens when the time expires.
  • 'Open attempts are submitted automatically': This default setting is a good choice because it handles most cases where submissions get left open and cannot be adjusted by instructors.
  • 'There is a grace period when open attempts can be submitted, but no more questions answered’
    Note: With a grace period for submission, students should be advised to click on the button "Submit all and finish" for their attempt to be recorded
  • 'Attempts must be submitted before the time expires or they are not counted'
• “Submission grace period”: If what to do when the time expires is set to “There is a grace period…”, this is the amount of extra time that is allowed.

Note: The timing settings that you specify here determine what options are available for students to review their quizzes after completion. See the 'Review options' section below.

Grade

• “Grade category”: Controls the category in which the grades in this quiz are placed in the gradebook. (Not required)
• “Grade to pass”: Determines the minimum required grade to pass. The value is used in activity or course completion, and in the gradebook, where pass grades are highlighted in green and fail grades in red.
• “Attempts allowed”: Determines how many attempts can be made while the quiz is open.
• “Grading method”: When multiple attempts are allowed, the following methods are available for calculating the final quiz grade:
  • Highest grade of all attempts
  • Average (mean) grade of all attempts
  • First attempt (All other attempts are ignored)
  • Last attempt (All other attempts are ignored)

Layout

• “New page”: Determines how many questions are displayed per page. We recommend that you only put a single question per page or set a small number of questions per page when building the quiz - if a student has spent a long time answering questions and runs into a network disconnection issue, they may lose their work. Forcing them to advance pages between questions saves their work in the event that something goes wrong.
• “Navigation method”
  • ‘Free’ - Students can go back and forward to different questions via the question list.
  • ‘Sequential’ - Students must progress through the quiz in order and may not return to previous pages nor skip ahead.

Question behaviour

• “Shuffle within questions”: Toggles whether or not the parts making up each question will be randomly shuffled each time a student attempts the quiz. This setting only applies to questions that have multiple parts, such as multiple-choice or matching questions. Note that if you have set questions and answers that require a fixed order you should set this to 'No'.
• “How questions behave”: Determines how you want the students to interact with the questions in the quiz. The following are the most commonly used modes of behaviour:
  • ‘Deferred feedback’: Students have to enter an answer to each question and then submit the entire quiz before anything is graded or they get any feedback.
  • ‘Interactive with multiple tries’: Students have to submit each question as they go along to get immediate feedback, and if they do not get it right immediately, they can have another try for fewer marks.
  • For more information about question behaviour modes, see this Moodle documentation.
• “Allow redo within an attempt”: Toggles whether or not the students will see a Redo question button when they have finished attempting the question. This allows them to attempt another version of the same question, without having to submit the entire quiz attempt and start another one. This option is mainly used for practice quizzes and only affects questions (e.g. not Essay questions) and behaviours (e.g. Immediate feedback, or Interactive with multiple tries) where it is possible for students to finish the question before the attempt is submitted.
• “Each attempt builds on the last”: Toggles whether or not each new quiz attempt will contain the results of the previous attempt, provided that the “Attempts allowed” option is enabled. This allows a quiz to be completed over several attempts.

Review options

These settings determine what students are able to see during the four phases of quiz timing:

• 'During the attempt': These settings are only relevant for some behaviours, like ‘Interactive with multiple tries’, which may display feedback during the attempt.
• 'Immediately after the attempt': These settings apply for the first two minutes after ‘Submit all and finish’ is clicked.
• 'Later, while the quiz is still open': These settings apply after this, and before the quiz close date.
• 'After the quiz is closed': These settings apply after the quiz close date has passed. If the quiz does not have a close date, this state is never reached.

The default option, checking the 'Marks' box, shows only how the student scored on the quiz (i.e., their score only).

If you wish to allow students to review the quiz, you will need to check 'The attempt' to activate other review options for the appropriate time period.

Note: For summative exams like midterms and finals, the recommended settings would be to uncheck all the review options until quizzes have been reviewed and then released to students by checking the 'Marks' box in the 'Later' and 'After' columns.

• Note: Students who have not attempted a quiz will not be able to view questions or answers until they attempt the quiz regardless of the review options settings.

Appearance

• “Show the user’s picture”: Toggles whether or not the student’s name and picture will be shown on-screen during the attempt, and on the review screen, making it easier to check that the student is logged in as themselves in an invigilated (proctored) exam.
• “Decimal places in grades”: Determines the number of digits shown after the decimal point when displaying grades. It only affects the display of grades, not the grades stored in the database, nor the internal calculations, which are carried out to full accuracy.
• “Decimal places in question grades”:  Determines the number of digits shown after the decimal point when displaying grades for individual questions.
• “Show blocks during quiz attempts”: Toggles whether or not normal blocks will be shown during quiz attempts.

Extra restrictions on attempts

• “Require password”: If a password is specified, a student must enter it in order to attempt the quiz.
• “Require network address”: Restricts quiz access to particular subnets on the LAN or Internet by specifying a comma-separated list of partial or full IP address numbers. This can be useful for an invigilated (proctored) quiz, to ensure that only people in a certain location can access the quiz. Note that this setting will apply to any review options you select in the settings above, so please leave this setting disabled if you require your students to have unrestricted access when reviewing the quiz. Please note: Changes to the mechanism of provisioning lab computers have altered the IP addresses available in campus computer labs. For more information about this, please contact IST eClass support.
  
• “Enforced delay between 1st and 2nd attempts”: Toggles whether or not a student must wait for the specified time to elapse before being able to attempt the quiz a second time.
• “Enforced delay between later attempts”: Toggles whether or not a student must wait for the specified time to elapse before attempting the quiz a third time and any subsequent times.
• “Browser security”
  • ‘Full-screen pop-up with some JavaScript Security’: The quiz will only start if the student has a JavaScript-enabled web browser. The quiz appears in a full-screen pop-up window that covers all the other windows and has no navigation controls. Students are prevented, as far as it is possible from using facilities like copy and paste.
• “Require students to accept academic honesty statement”: Toggles whether or not students will be able to start an attempt until they have ticked a checkbox confirming that they are aware of the policy on academic honesty.
• “Allow quiz to be attempted offline using the mobile app”: Toggles whether or not a mobile app user can download the quiz and attempt it offline. Note that it is not possible for a quiz to be attempted offline if it has a time limit, or requires a network address, or uses any question behaviour other than ‘Deferred feedback’ (with or without CBM).
• Quiz security can also be added to eClass quizzes by using ExamLock.

Overall feedback

Overall feedback is the text that is shown after a quiz has been attempted. By specifying additional grade boundaries (as a percentage or as a number). The text shown can depend on the grade obtained.

Common module settings

• "Availability": This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• “ID number": An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Group mode": The group mode defined at the course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at the course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • No groups - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • Separate groups - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • Visible groups - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping": A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• “Add group/grouping access restriction”: Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access

• See this article.

Tags

• See this article. Note that at present, tagging questions offers no functional utility - this will be introduced in a future version of eClass.
  

Once you have chosen all the settings, clicking Save and display will immediately enable you to begin adding questions to your quiz. If you click Save and return to course, you access the interface for adding questions by first clicking the quiz link on your course home page, then on the gear icon in the top right of the quiz section, and then on Edit quiz. For more detail on adding questions to quizzes, see the article Adding and Managing Quiz Questions.

Notes

• To review students' attempts once they have completed a quiz, enter the quiz and click the Attempts: xx link above the Attempt quiz now button. Alternatively, you can access the student attempts for the quiz, as well as their actual responses, statistics for each quiz question, and any items requiring manual grading (essays) by clicking on the gear icon in the top right of the quiz section, then on Results. For more details please see this article: Quizzes - Grading Quizzes.
• Hiding a quiz from the eClass course page will also hide the grade for that quiz in the gradebook.
• Other articles about quiz construction you may want to see as well:
  • Quizzes - Question Types
  • Cloze Quiz Question Settings
  • Multiple Choice Quiz Question Settings
  • Drag and drop Question Types
  • Quizzes - Editing and Regrading Submitted Quiz Attempts
  • Modifying Quiz Settings for Select Users (Overrides)

Adding an Assignment

1. Toggle on Edit mode, in the top right corner of your course page.
2. Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc.) and click on Add an Activity or Resource.
3. Click on the Assignment icon.
4. A new page will appear with the activity-specific settings.
   
5. There is a wide range of settings where you can enter specific customizations for your assignment. All that is required is the Assignment name.

General

• "Assignment name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
  
• "Description": Optionally provides explanation and instructions for students.
  
• "Display description on course page": The description of your assignment will be displayed on the course page below the link to the assignment.
• New in 2023 "Submission page instructions":  This set of instructions is only shown on the submission page where a student edits and submits their assignment.
• "Additional files" such as answer templates can be included for students to download.

Availability

• "Allow submissions from": The time at which students may start submitting assignments.
  
• "Due date": The time at which students are expected to submit assignments. Any submission made after this date will be marked as late.
• "Cut-off date": The time at which assignments will no longer be allowed for submission.
• "Remind me to grade by": The expected date at which marking of the submissions should be completed. This date is used to prioritize dashboard notifications for teachers.
• "Always show description": Toggles whether or not students can see the assignment description before the "Allow submissions from" date.

Submission types

• "File submissions": Toggles whether or not submissions may be made as files.
• "Online text": Toggles whether or not students can submit an assignment using an embedded online text editor.
• "Maximum number of files uploaded": Toggles how many files a student is able to make before being blocked from submitting.
• "Maximum submission size": Controls how large submitted files may be.
• "Accepted file types": Can be restricted by entering a list of file extensions or selecting from a list. If the field is left empty, then all file types are allowed.
• "Word limit": Toggles whether or not to set up a word limit for online text submission. See Adding word count tally feature to assignments for more details.

Feedback types

• "Feedback comments": Toggles whether or not graders can leave comments for the student upon grading.
• "Feedback files": Toggles whether or not the grader is able to upload files as feedback upon grading.
• "Offline grading worksheet": Toggles whether or not the grader can download a worksheet with the student's grades when marking.
• “Comment inline”: Toggles whether or not the submission text is copied into the feedback comment field during grading to make inline comments/edits easier.

Submission settings

• "Require students to click submit button": Toggles whether or not students are required to click a button confirming that their submission is final. This is useful for early drafts of work to provide commentary on - you can access any work that your students have uploaded or entered before they click the 'Submit for grading' button. After that point, they can no longer upload new files.
• "Require that students accept the submission statement": Toggles whether or not students will be forced to check a box before submitting their assignment that contains a statement about academic honesty. (The statement is: "The University of Alberta is committed to the highest standards of academic integrity and honesty. I understand the Code of Student Behaviour and am aware that all forms of academic misconduct will be addressed (the Code is available online for more information)").
• "Attempts reopened":

Determines how student submission attempts are reopened. The available options are:

• • Never - The student submission cannot be reopened.
  • Manually - The student submission can be reopened by a teacher.
  • Automatically until pass - The student submission is automatically reopened until the student achieves the grade to pass value set in the Gradebook (Categories and items section) for this assignment.
• "Maximum attempts": The maximum number of submission attempts that can be made by a student. After this number of attempts has been made the student's submission will not be able to be reopened.

Group submission settings

• "Students submit in groups": If groups are enabled, toggles whether or not the assignment submitted will be as a group, or as an individual.
• For more information on having students submit in groups, see the article Allowing Group Submissions.

Notifications

• "Notify graders about submissions": Toggles whether or not graders (instructors, TAs, etc.) will be notified whenever a student submits an assignment.
• "Notify graders about late submissions": Toggles whether or not graders will be notified whenever a student submits a late assignment.
• “Default setting for “Notify students””: Toggles the default value of the “Notify students” checkbox on the grading form.

Grade

• "Grade": Allows you to select the type of grading used for the assignment. If “scale” is chosen, you can then choose the scale from the "scale" dropdown. If "point" is used, you can then enter the maximum grade for the assignment.
• "Grading method": Allows you to specify 'Simple direct grading' or grading via the two advanced methods: 'Rubric' or 'Marking guide'.
• "Grade category": Allows you to choose which category it will be assigned to in the gradebook.
• "Grade to pass": Determines the minimum required grade to pass. The value is used in activity or course completion, and in the gradebook, where pass grades are highlighted in green and fail grades in red.
• "Anonymous Submissions ": Toggles whether or not graders are able to see the name of the student who submitted it when grading. See Anonymous Submissions (Blind Marking) for more information.
  
• "Hide grader identity from students": Turns off the display of which user scored each particular student's submission. This would be primarily useful for large enrollment courses where multiple TAs are grading student work and/or instructors want students to contact them with grade questions.
• "Use marking workflow": Marks will go through a series of workflow stages before being released to students. This allows for multiple rounds of marking and allows marks to be released to all students at the same time. See Using the Marking Workflow for more information.
  
• "Use marking allocation": If enabled together with the marking workflow, markers can be allocated to particular students. See Using Marker Allocation for more information.
  

For more details about actively grading student submissions within the assignment activity, see the article Advanced Use of the Assignment.

Common module settings

• "Availability": This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number": An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Group mode": The group mode defined at the course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at the course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • No groups - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • Separate groups - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • Visible groups - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping": A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• "Add group/grouping access restriction": Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access

• See this article

Tags

• See this article.

The feedback activity allows instructors to have students respond to a series of questions resembling a quiz. These questions are not gradable (there is no correct answer possible) and so are best for gathering feedback, not for assessment. 

The difference between the Feedback activity and the Survey activity is that the survey tool can only use its own built-in questions and generally is not recommended for use.

Once you've added the activity, you can refer to the article Using the Feedback Activity for configuration instructions.

Adding a Feedback Activity:

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right corner of your class page.   
2. Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc.) and click on the Add an activity or resource link.
3. Click on the Feedback icon, and a setings page will open.

General:

• "Name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students
• "Description" is optional. You may identify the purpose of the feedback here.
• "Display description on course page": Toggles whether or not the description of the feedback item will be displayed on the course page below the link to your feedback item.

Availability:

This setting allows instructors to specify a time frame in which the feedback tool is accessible. Leave the boxes unchecked if there are no time limitations.

Question and submission settings:

• "Record user names": Allows instructors to choose whether to receive anonymous feedback or log the user's name when submitting responses. The default is Anonymous
• "Allow multiple submissions": If anonymous feedback is enabled, students can submit an unlimited number of responses. If a user's name is logged during feedback, the user will be allowed to re-submit responses.
• "Enable notification of submissions": Allows instructors to receive an eClass notification when a response is submitted.
• "Auto numbers questions": If enabled, eClass will automatically number your feedback questions.

After submission:

• "Show analysis page": Toggles whether or not to display summary results.
• "Completion message": You may enter a message to the students here after a response is submitted.
• "Link to next activity": After submitting the feedback, a continue button is displayed, which links to the course page. If the URL of an activity is entered here, the continue button will link to that activity.

Common module settings:

• "Availability": This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number": An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Group mode": The group mode defined at course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • 'No groups' - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • 'Separate groups' - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • 'Visible groups' - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping": A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• '"Add group/grouping access restriction": Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access:

• See this article.

Activity completion:

Please note that you will not see the activity completion options until activity completion is enabled for your course. The steps to enable activity completion tracking can be found in our article on Completion Tracking.

• "Completion tracking": Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.
• "Require view":
  • Student must view this activity to complete it: A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
  • View as completed if the feedback is submitted: A tick will only appear once the feedback is submitted.
• "Expect completed on": This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags:

• See this article.

Once a feedback activity has been created, users can view Using the Feedback Activity to learn how to add questions and view student responses.

There are 2 main mechanisms for uploading files into eClass.

Adding a File Resource through the Activity Chooser

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right of your eClass page.

2. Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc.) and click on the Add an activity or resource link.

3. Click on File and a new page will open with the file activity settings:

Settings

General

• "Name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• "Description": Optional provides explanation and instructions for your students.
• "Display description on course page": The description of your file will be displayed on the course page below the link to the file.
• "Select files": You may upload the file(s) here.

4. Click the file selection button above then browser to find the file you want on your computer.

5. Your file will show in the file settings:

Appearance

• 'Display': Together with the file type and whether the browser allows embedding, determines how the file is displayed.
  • 'Automatic' - The best display option for the file type is selected automatically.
  • 'Embed' - The file is displayed within the page below the navigation bar together with the file description and any blocks.
  • 'Force download' - The user is prompted to download the file.
  • 'Open' - Only the file is displayed in the browser window.
  • 'In pop-up' - The file is displayed in a new browser window without menus or an address bar.
  • 'In frame' - The file is displayed within a frame below the navigation bar and file description.
  • 'New window' - The file is displayed in a new browser window with menus and an address bar.
• "Show size": Displays the file size, such as ‘3.1 MB’, beside links to the files. If there are multiple files in this resource, the total size of all files is displayed.
• "Show type": Displays the type of the file, such as “Word Document”, beside links to the file. If there are multiple files in this resource, the start file type is displayed. If the file type is not known to the system, it will not display.
• "Show upload/modified date": Displays the upload/modified date beside links to the file. If there are multiple files in this resource, the start file upload/modified date is displayed.
• Different addiitonal display options will appear depending upon the initial 'Display' option chosen
  • "Pop-up width (in pixels)": You may enter the pop-up width here, provided that the ‘In pop-up’ option for the display is enabled.
  • "Pop-up height (in pixels)": You may enter the pop-up height here, provided that the ‘In pop-up’ option for the display is enabled.
  • "Display resource description": Toggles whether or not the resource description will be displayed, provided that either ‘Automatic’, ‘Embed’, or ‘In frame’ is enabled for the display.
  • "Use filters on file content": Select ‘All files’ or ‘HTML files only’  according to your file types.

Common module settings

• "Availability": This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• “ID number": An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.

Restrict access

• See this article.

Tags

• See this article.

• 1 Adding Anonymous Forums to a course
• 2 Posting to Anonymous Forums

Adding a Workshop

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right corner of your class page.
2. Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc…) and click on the Add an activity or resource link.
3. Choose Workshop and a settings page will open.

General

• "Workshop name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• "Description" is optional. You may provide an explanation or instructions here for your students.
• "Display description" on the course page toggles whether or not the description of the workshop will be displayed on the course page below the link to the workshop.

Grading settings

• "Grading strategy" - Determines the assessment form used and the method of grading submissions. There are 4 options:
  • 'Accumulative grading' - Comments and a grade are given regarding specified aspects.
  • 'Comments' - Comments are given regarding specified aspects but no grade can be given.
  • 'Number of errors' - Comments, and a yes/no assessment, are given regarding specified assertions.
  • 'Rubric' - A level assessment is given regarding specified criteria
• "Grade for submission" - Specifies the maximum grade that may be obtained for submitted work.
• "Submission grade to pass" - Determines the minimum submission grade required to pass. The value is used in activity and course completion, and in the gradebook, where pass grades are highlighted in green and fail grades in red.
• "Grade for assessment" - Specifies the maximum grade that may be obtained for submission assessment.
• "Assessment grade to pass" - Determines the minimum assessment grade required to pass. The value is used in activity and course completion, and in the gradebook, where pass grades are highlighted in green and fail grades in red.
• "Decimal places in grades" - Determines the number of digits shown after the decimal point when displaying grades. It only affects the display of grades, not the grades stored in the database, nor the internal calculations, which are carried out to full accuracy.

• "Instructions for submission" - You may provide instructions for submission in the box.
• "Submission type" - Specifies whether online text or file attachments are allowed and whether they are required
• "Maximum number of submission attachments" - Specifies the maximum number of attachments that can be submitted.
• "Submission attachment allowed file types" - Submission attachment file types can be restricted by providing a list of allowed file types. If the field is left empty, then all file types are allowed. Note that PNG files are not recommended.
• "Maximum submission attachment size" - Specifies the maximum attachment size that can be submitted.
• "Late submissions"
  • 'Allow submissions after the deadline' - Toggles whether or not an author may submit their work after the submission deadline or during the assessment phase. Late submissions cannot be edited though.

• "Instructions for assessment" - You may provide instructions for assessment in the box.
• "Use self-assessment"
  • 'Student may assess their own work' - Toggles whether or not students can mark their own work.

Feedback

• "Overall feedback mode" - If enabled, a text field is displayed at the bottom of the assessment form. Reviewers can put the overall assessment of the submission there, or provide additional explanation of their assessment.
• "Maximum number of overall feedback attachments" - Specifies the maximum number of overall feedback attachments.
• "Feedback attachment allowed file types" - Feedback attachment file types can be restricted by providing a list of allowed file types. If the field is left empty, then all file types are allowed.
• "Maximum overall feedback attachment size" - Specifies the maximum overall feedback attachment size.
• "Conclusion" - The conclusion text is displayed to participants at the end of the activity.

Example submissions

• "Use examples"
  • 'Example submissions are provided for practice in assessing' - If enabled, users can try assessing one or more example submissions and compare their assessment with a reference assessment. The grade is not counted in the grade for assessment.
• "Mode of examples assessment" - Provided that ‘Example submissions are provided for practice in assessing’ is enabled, you may choose from any of the following:
  • 'Assessment of example submission is voluntary'
  • 'Examples must be assessed before own submission'
  • 'Examples are available after own submission and must be assessed before peer assessment'

Availability

This setting allows you to set up the available time for submission and for assessment.

• "Switch to the next phase after the submissions deadline" - If the submissions deadline is specified and this box is checked, the workshop will automatically switch to the assessment phase after the submissions deadline. If you enable this feature, it is recommended to set up the scheduled allocation method, too. If the submissions are not allocated, no assessment can be done even if the workshop itself is in the assessment phase. See Submission phases below.

Common module settings

• "Availability" - This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number" - An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Group mode" - The group mode defined at course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • 'No groups' - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • 'Separate groups' - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • 'Visible groups' - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping" - A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• '"Add group/grouping access restriction" - Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access

• See this article.

Activity completion

• Please note that you will not see the activity completion options until activity completion is enabled for your course. The steps to enable activity completion tracking can be found in our article on Completion Tracking.

• 'Completion tracking' - Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.

• "Require view"
  • Student must view this activity to complete it - A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
• "Require grade"
  • Student must receive a grade to complete this activity - A tick will only appear once the student receives a grade for this activity.
• "Expect completed on" - This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags

• See this article.

Submission phases

As the instructor, you will have to move the workshop into its various phases (submission, assessment, grading evaluation or closed). When you are ready to move into the next phase of the workshop, enter the workshop then click the link to switch to the next phase at the top of each phase.

If on the other hand you have set Availability to move automatically to the next phase, you must also allocate submissions:

Any incomplete action in a phase can be set by clicking on the 'X' beside the incomplete item.

An in-depth guide for using the workshop is available from Moodle HQ.

The page resource allows you to create a simple web page within your eClass course that can include text, images, and embedded videos. Pages offer an alternative to PDF documents when displaying content to students that are more easily updated and can offer more interactivity and media integration.

Wikis are collaborative tools where you and your students can enter any type of content regarding any topic that you specify. They are similar to both the Glossary and Database.

Wikis are an excellent way to make students work together to create a resource. A wiki starts with a front page, and all subsequent pages are created by creating links to new pages.

Adding a Wiki:

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right of your course page.
2. Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc.) and click on the Add an activity or resource link.
3. Choose Wiki and a settings page will open.

General:

• "Wiki name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• "Description" is optional. You may provide explanation or instructions for your students here.
• "Wiki mode": Toggles whether the wiki is a:
  • 'Collaborative wiki' - Everyone can edit the wiki.
  • 'Individual wiki' - Everyone has their own wiki which only they can edit.
• "First page name" is also required: The name of the first page of the wiki, a foundation for the rest of the activity.

Format:

• "Default format": Determines the default format of the wiki. See Notes below.
• "Force format": If selected, there is no option to change the format when creating a new wiki page.

Common module settings:

• "Availability": This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number": An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Group mode": The group mode defined at course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • 'No groups' - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • 'Separate groups' - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • 'Visible groups' - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping": A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• '"Add group/grouping access restriction": Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access:

• See this article.

Activity completion:

• Please note that you will not see the activity completion options until activity completion is enabled for your course. The steps to enable activity completion tracking can be found in our article on Completion Tracking.

• "Completion tracking": Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.
• "Require view": Student must view this activity to complete it: A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
• "Expect completed on": This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags:

• See this article.

Editing a Wiki (in HTML Format):

Some Wiki elements may also be added using HTML, including: Links and URL.

• To add an internal link (to another eClass Wiki page), use double square brackets: [[internal page name]]
• To add an external link, type out the URL: http://www.ualberta.ca

Recall that you may use the HTML editor to make the majority of formatting changes.

Notes:

• If you are not an experienced wiki user, you should generally leave all wiki pages in HTML format.
• Wiki links that are red, mean that the page associated with that link has not yet been created and therefore contains no content.  The link turns green when the page has been created.
• At any time you can view the revision history of the wiki or a map of all the wiki pages using the links in the top left corner of the wiki.
• There are some known Moodle issues with using groups/groupings and wikis so you should generally only use a wiki activity only for your entire cohort of students.

Adding blocks:

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right of your course page:

2. Open the block drawer if necessary:

3. Click the Add a block link :

4. From the menu, click on the type of block that you would like to add. The block will be added automatically to the block drawer:

Editing block settings:

1. Click on the gear icon, then click, in this example, Configure Activities block to customize the block.

2. Each block has a standard set of customizations that are the same for each element:

• • Where this block appears:
    • "Original block location" - This is the original location where the block was created. Block settings may cause it to appear in other locations (contexts) within the original location. For example, a block created on a course page could be displayed in activities within that course. A block created on the front page can be displayed throughout the site.
    • "Display on page types" - Determines what page types you want your block to be displayed. You can choose any of the following: 'Any page', 'Any course page', or 'Any type of course main page'.
    • "Default region" - Themes may define one or more named block regions where blocks are displayed. This setting defines which of these you want this block to appear in by default. The region may be overridden on specific pages if required.
    • "Default weight" - Allows you to choose roughly where you want the block to appear in the chosen region, either at the top or the bottom. The final location is calculated from all blocks in that region. For example, only one block can actually be at the top. This value can be overridden on specific pages if required.
    
    
    
    
  • On this page:
    • "Visible" - Toggles whether or not the block will be visible on the current page you’re on.
    • "Region" - Toggles where you want the block to be displayed on the current page you’re on.
    • "Weight" -  Allows you to choose roughly where you want the block to appear in the chosen region on the current page you’re on.
    
    
    
    

3. Set the customizations for each area and save it when you are done.

Moving blocks:

Blocks can be dragged and dropped to different areas of the screen when in Edit mode.

1. Click and hold on the four-headed arrow to drag-and-drop the block to where you need it.

Depending on your browser settings, you may not be able to drag-and-drop, and may have to move blocks manually.

2. If you simply click on the four-headed arrow, you can select the location to move it.

3. Click on the location under which you would like the block moved:

Detailed Descriptions of Blocks:

Some blocks have detailed articles explaining their function:

• Course Management block
• Demostudent view block
• Group sign-up block
• Completion progress block
• New in June 2023: Multiblock

Adding a Database:

1. To add a Database, click on Edit mode at the top right of your course page.
2. Select the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc.) and click on the Add an activity or resource link.
3. Click on the Database icon, and a settings page will open.

General:

• "Name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• "Description" is optional. You may provide an explanation or instructions here for your students.
• "Display description on course page" toggles whether or not the description of your database will be displayed on the course page below the link to the database.

Entries:

• "Approval required" toggles whether or not entries require approval by a teacher before they can be viewed by everyone.
• "Allow editing of approved entries" toggles whether approved entries can be edited or deleted by the user who added them, provided that 'Approval required' is enabled.
• "Allow comments on entries" toggles whether or not students are allowed to post comments on entries.
• "Entries required before viewing" determines the number of entries a student is required to submit before they can view entries from other students. Note: If entries are required before viewing, the database auto-linking filter should be disabled: the database auto-linking filter cannot determine whether a user has submitted the required number of entries.
• "Maximum number of entries": Determines the maximum number of entries a student is allowed to submit for this activity.

Availability:

This setting allows the instructors to specify the access dates when participants can enter items in the database and when they can only read the contents with the "Available from", "Available to", "Read only from", and "Read only to".

RSS:

• "Entries in the RSS feed" toggles how many articles appear in the database RSS feed.

Ratings:

• See this article.

Common module settings:

• "Availability": This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number": An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Group mode": The group mode defined at course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • 'No groups' - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • 'Separate groups' - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • 'Visible groups' - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping": A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• "Add group/grouping access restriction": Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access:

• See this article.

Activity completion:

• Please note that you will not see the activity completion options until activity completion is enabled for your course. The steps to enable activity completion tracking can be found in our article on Completion Tracking.

• "Completion tracking": Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.

• "Require view":
  • Student must view this activity to complete it: A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
• "Require grade":
  • Student must receive a grade to complete this activity: A tick will only appear once the students receives a grade in this activity.
• "Require entries":
  • Count of entries: If enabled, you must specify the number of entries the student is required to submit.
• "Expect completed on": This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags:

• See this article.

Types of Database Fields:

A field allows the input of data. Each entry in a database activity can have multiple fields of multiple types including:

• Checkbox: Allows participants to select one or more options.  
• Coordinates (latitude/longitude): Allows participants to enter a geographic location using latitude and longitude. This will automatically generate links to geographic data services such as Google Earth, OpenStreetMap, GeaBios, Mapstars, etc. Add west longitudes as negative numbers. 
• Date: Allows participants to select a day, month and year from a drop-down list.
• Dropdown list: Displays a drop-down menu based on the text entered in the options area (note: each line becomes a different option).
• File: Allows participants to upload a file.
• Image: Allows participants to upload an image file.
• Multi-select list: Displays a list based on the text entered in the options area (note: each line becomes a different option). By holding down the CTRL or shift key as they click, participants can select multiple options at the same time.  
• Number: Stores a floating number (e.g. -1000, 0, 0.123).
• Radio button: Allows participants to select one option from a range of options. Participants will be required to select one option before submitting an entry.
• Short text: Allows participants to enter up to 60 characters of text. For more text, use Text Area instead.
• Text area: Allows participants to enter a longer string of text as well as some formatting options.
• URL: Allows participants to add a URL. If autolink is selected, a live link is automatically generated.

To add new database fields:

1. Under the Fields tab, click on the drop-down menu under the Create a field option to select a type of database field.
   
   
   
   
2. Add a unique field name. The field description is optional. Then click the Save button.
   
   
   
   
3. Your newly-added database fields will be displayed in your database.
   
   
   
   

Notes:

• You must view the database template and save it, even if you do not make changes to it.  If you do not, the template will not show up correctly and students will not be able to add database entries.
• There is a known issue with re-using database entries from year to year. eClass considers these entries as user-submitted content so it gets excluded via the regular content-copy course creation routines. If you want to re-use entries, there is a manual process you can use to pull data forward explained in this article.

• 1 Adding a chat
• 2 General
• 3 Chat sessions
• 4 Common module settings
• 5 Restrict access
• 6 Activity completion
• 7 Tags
• 8 Notes

Adding a chat

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right of your course page.
2. Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc…) and click on the Add an activity or resource link.
3. Click on the Chat icon, and a settings page will open.

General

• "Name of this chat room" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• "Description" is optional. You may provide an explanation or instructions here for your students.
• "Display description on course page" - Toggles whether or not the description of the chat room will be displayed on the course page below the link to the chat.

Chat sessions

• "Next chat time" - Displays the day and hour the next chat session will be hosted by you. This allows students to see when you will be hosting the next chat session in their calendar but does not stop students from accessing the chat at any time before or after this time.
• "Repeat/publish session times" - Allows you to change when chat times will be available for students. You can change this so that there is only one chat session scheduled (good for small classroom discussions), or it is repeated at the same time each day or each week (good for hosting virtual office hours).
• "Save past sessions" - Allows you to change the length of time for which the chat sessions are stored.
• "Everyone can view past sessions" - If set to no, only users with special privileges will be able to see past chat sessions.

Common module settings

• "Availability" - This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number" - An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Group mode" - The group mode defined at course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • 'No groups' - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • 'Separate groups' - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • 'Visible groups' - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping" - A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• "Add group/grouping access restriction" - Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access

• See this article.

Activity completion

• Activity completion must be activated in your main course settings before completion tracking can be used. See our article on Completion tracking.
• "Completion tracking" - Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.
• "Require view"
  • Student must view this activity to complete it - A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
• "Expect completed on" - This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags

• See this article.

Notes

If you set up your chat so that you and/or others can see the transcripts of what is written in the room, for ethical reasons please make sure that is made clear to students.

Adding a Glossary

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right of your course page.  
2. Choose the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc.) and click on the Add an activity or resource link.
3. Click on the Glossary icon, and a settings page will open.

General

• "Name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• "Description" is optional. You may provide an explanation or instructions here for your students.
• "Display description on course page" - Toggles whether or not the description of your glossary will be displayed on the course page below the link to your glossary.
• Global glossaries are accessible across eClass. They are not implemented here.
• "Glossary type"
  • 'Main glossary' - A glossary in which entries from secondary glossaries can be imported. There can only be one main glossary in a course.
  • 'Secondary glossary' - A glossary in which glossary entry import is not required.

Entries

• "Approved by default" - Toggles whether or not entries require approval by a teacher before they are viewable by everyone. Setting this to "no" allows for greater quality control.
• "Always allow editing" - Specifies whether entries are always editable or whether students can only edit their entries during a configured editing time (usually 30 minutes).
• "Duplicate entries allowed" - Toggles whether or not multiple entries can have the same concept name.
• "Allow comments on entries" - Toggles whether or not all participants with permission to create comments will be able to add comments to glossary entries.
• "Automatically link glossary entries" - Toggles whether or not the “Add a new entry” form includes the option to automatically link the entry wherever the concept words and phrases appear throughout the rest of the course, provided that site-wide glossary auto-linking has been enabled by an administrator.

Appearance

• "Display format" - There are 7 display formats:
  • 'Continuous without author' - Entries are displayed one after another without any separation apart from editing icons.
  • 'Encyclopedia' - As for 'Full with author', but attached images are shown inline.
  • 'Entry list' - Concepts are listed as links.
  • 'FAQ' - the words QUESTION and ANSWER are appended to the concept and definition respectively.
  • 'Full with author' - A forum-like display format showing the author’s data and with attachments shown as links.
  • 'Full without author' - A forum-like display format without authors and with attachments shown as links.
  • 'Simple, dictionary style' - No authors are displayed and attachments are shown as links.
• "Approval display format"  - Toggles the way in which you see glossary entries during the approval process. This is useful for those who want to see the names of students who submitted the term behind the scenes but did not publish this information to the rest of the class.
• "Entries shown per page" - Determines how many entries are shown on each page of the glossary.
• "Show alphabet links" - Toggles whether or not participants can browse the glossary by letters of the alphabet.
• "Show 'ALL' link" - Toggles whether or not participants can browse all entries at once.
• "Show 'Special' link" - Toggles whether or not participants can browse the glossary by special characters, such as @ and #.
• "Allow print view" - Toggles whether or not students are provided with a link to a printer-friendly version of the glossary. The link is always available to teachers.

Note: When the Appearance > Display format setting is changed, the change is global for the Glossary. For example, if the setting was "Simple, dictionary style" where no authors were visible, and the setting is changed to "Full with author," then all users -- Instructors, TAs, Students and Auditors -- will see the author's name.

Ratings

• See this article.

Common module settings

• "Availability" - This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number" - An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.

Restrict access

• See this article.

Activity completion

• Please note that you will not see the activity completion options until activity completion is enabled for your course. The steps to enable activity completion tracking can be found in our article on Completion Tracking.

• "Completion tracking" - Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.

• "Require view"
  • Student must view this activity to complete it - A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
• "Require grade"
  • Student must receive a grade to complete this activity - A tick will only appear once the students receives a grade in this activity.
• "Require entries"
  • Student must create entries - If enabled, you must specify the number of entries the student is required to create.
• "Expect completed on" - This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags

• See this article.

Notes

Glossaries will not be rolled forward from year to year along with the rest of your course content owing to privacy concerns as it is not possible to anonymize entries or strip student information from entries.

If you are using the glossary tool as a more static object where you create all the entries, you will need to contact IST eClass Support to have the glossary content copied forward into your new term courses. This article outlines this question in more detail.

New in 2023 The label activity has been replaced with "Text and media area", which better describes the function of the activity. These can be added anywhere in your eClass course and are commonly used as headers to organize content, callouts drawing attention to specific areas, etc.  A text and media area can consist of simple text, horizontal bars, images, videos or even more complex HTML code. Anything that you want to display on the main page of your course can be added this way. An additional benefit of using labels is that once added, they can be moved around your course home page however you need.

Adding a Label

1. Enable Edit mode, near the top right side:
   
2. Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc.) and click on the Add an Activity or Resource button.
3. Select Text and media area:
   
   
4. A new page will appear to add content and adjust settings.

• Text: This is where you enter your content.

• "Availability": This setting only has 2 options for this activity:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of instructor or non-editing instructor).

Restrict access

• See this article.

•  1 General
•  2 Appearance
•  3 Availability
•  4 Flow control
•  5 Grade
•  6 Common module settings
•  7 Restrict access
•  8 Activity completion
•  9 Tags
• 10 Basic Lesson Setup (example)

• Click on Edit mode, at the top right of your course page.
• Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc…), and click on the Add an activity or resource link.
• Click on the Lesson icon, and a settings page will open.

• 'Name' is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• 'Description' - Optionally provides explanation and instructions for students.
• 'Display description on course page' - If selected, the description of your assignment will be displayed on the course page below the link to the assignment.

Appearance

• 'Linked media' - A media file may be uploaded here for use in the lesson. A 'Click here to view' link will then be displayed in a block called 'Linked media' on each page of the lesson.
• 'Display ongoing score' - Toggles whether or not each page will display the student's current points earned out of the total possible thus far.
• 'Minimum grade to display menu' - Determines whether a student must obtain a certain grade before viewing the lesson menu. This forces the student to go through the entire lesson on their first attempt, then after obtaining the required grade, they can use the menu for review.
• 'Slideshow' - Toggles whether the lesson is displayed as a slideshow, with a fixed width and height.
• 'Maximum number of answers' - Specifies the maximum number of answers that may be used in the lesson. If only true/false questions are used, it can be set to 2. This setting may be changed at any time since it only affects what the teacher sees, not the data.
• 'Use default feedback' - Toggles whether or not the default response 'That's the correct answer.' or 'That's the wrong answer.' will be shown when a response is not found for a particular question.
• 'Link to next activity' - Provides a link at the end of the lesson to another activity in the course if an activity is selected from the drop-down list.
• 'Progress bar' - Enables a progress bar at the bottom of lessons which will indicate percentage completion.
• 'Display menu' - Allows students to see a menu for navigating between pages in the lesson.

Availability

• 'Available from' and 'Deadline' -  These settings allow instructors to specify a time frame in which the feedback tool is accessible. Leave the boxes unchecked if there are no time limitations.
• 'Time limit' - If enabled, a warning about the time limit is displayed at the beginning of the lesson and a countdown timer is displayed. Any answers given after the time has elapsed are not graded.
• 'Password protected lesson' - Toggles whether a password is required in order to access the lesson.
• 'Password' - You may enter a password to access the lesson here, provided that 'Password protected lesson' is enabled.
• 'Allow lesson to be attempted offline using the mobile app' - If enabled, a mobile app user can download the lesson and attempt it offline. All the possible answers and correct responses will be downloaded as well. Note: It is not possible for a lesson to be attempted offline if it has a time limit.

Flow control

• 'Allow student review' - Allows students to navigate again through the lesson from the start.
• 'Provide option to try a question again' - Lets a student try a question again without credit.
• 'Maximum number of attempts per question' - Specifies how many times a student can attempt each question.
• 'Action after correct answer' - There are three options for the pages after answering a question correctly:
  
  • 'Normal' - Follow the lesson path.
  • 'Show an unseen path' - Pages are shown in random order with no page shown twice.
  • 'Show an unanswered page' - Pages are shown in a random order, with pages containing unanswered questions shown again.
• 'Number of pages to show' - Specifies the number of pages shown in a lesson. It is only applicable for lessons with pages shown in a random order. If set to zero, then all pages are shown.
  

Grade

• 'Grade' - Allows you to select the type of grading used for the assignment. If “scale” is chosen, you can then choose the scale from the 'scale' dropdown. If 'point' is used, you can then enter the maximum grade for the assignment.
• 'Grade category' - Allows you to choose which category it will be assigned to in the gradebook.
• 'Grade to pass' - Determines the minimum required grade to pass. The value is used in activity or course completion, and in the gradebook, where pass grades are highlighted in green and fail grades in red.
• 'Practice Lesson' - Toggles whether or not the lesson appears in the gradebook.
• Click 'Show more' to see 'Custom scoring' - If enabled, then each answer may be given a numerical point value (positive or negative).
  
• 'Re-takes allowed' - If enabled, students can attempt the lesson more than once.
  
• 'Handling of re-takes' - If re-takes are allowed, this setting specifies whether the grade for the lesson is the mean or maximum of all attempts.
  
• 'Minimum number of questions' - Specifies the minimum number of questions that will be used to calculate a grade for the activity.

Common module settings

• 'Availability' - This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• “ID number' - An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• 'Group mode' - The group mode defined at the course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at the course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • No groups - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • Separate groups - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • Visible groups - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• 'Grouping' - A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• “Add group/grouping access restriction” - Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access

• See this article.

Activity completion

• Please note that you will not see the activity completion options until activity completion is enabled for your course. The steps to enable activity completion tracking can be found in our article on Completion Tracking.

• 'Completion tracking' - Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.
• 'Require view':
  • 'Student must view this activity to complete it' - A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
• 'Require grade':
  • 'Student must receive a grade to complete this activity' - A tick will only appear once the student receives a grade for the activity.
• 'Require end reached'
  • 'Student must reach the end of lesson page to complete this activity' - A tick will only appear once the student reaches the end of the lesson page.
• 'Require time spent'
  • 'Student must do this activity at least for ...' - A tick will only appear once the students spends time on this activity for at least the specified time.
• 'Expect completed on' - This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags

• See this article.
  

Basic Lesson Setup

Now that the lesson activity has been created, navigating to your lesson will show the following screen:

There are three types of content you can add:

• Content page: Pages which can be filled with text, images, and videos. Commonly used for notes.
• Cluster: A grouping of questions which can be randomly cycled through.
• Question page: A question which can be administered to students. These items allow for grading.

In this example, the lesson will be used to make a simple set of interactive lecture notes for an online course on art. Students will need to answer a comprehension verification question about each slide before they can proceed.

1. First, add a content page.
   
   
   
   The first content page will cover Lesson 1. Here you can enter a title, as well as the contents of the page.

   Content 1 through Content 4 are used to set up links to other pages. Typically only one link is needed, so for this example, Content 1 will be used to link to our first Quiz. The description will be Quiz and the Jump link will be Next Page.
   
   

2. When saving, you will be brought to the following page. Click on the dropdown menu shown above and select Question.
   
   
   
   
3. On the next page, there will be a dropdown menu to select the question type. There are six types of questions available in lessons:
   • Essay
   • Matching
   • Multichoice
   • Numerical
   • Short Answer
   • True/false
     
     
   For this example, the Multichoice question type will be used:
   
   
   
   
4. Next, fill in the name of the question, as well as the question description:
   
   
   
   
   
5. There will be four answer sections which allow you to enter an answer, as well as a response. In this example the incorrect answer has been placed in position 3 with incorrect answers in the other three slots.:
   
   
   
   Notice that there is a Jump option for both for each answer. This allows you to have the lesson respond differently based on the student’s responses. For this example, Answer 3 will jump to “Next Page” and all other answers will jump to “This Question”, returning students to the question in case they answered the question incorrectly.
   
   
6. Once completed, there should be two items in the lesson:
   
   
   
   

From this point, you can add additional content pages and questions that branch out using different Jumps as shown here. For example, the next content page might focus on colour contrast and shading with another quiz page for verification. If you need more content to cover a particular topic, you can link several pages with jumps and then have a quiz page every few slides or so.

This lesson setup is a basic example and does not cover all possibilities. If you require assistance with more complex use cases or with clusters, please do not hesitate to contact the eClass support team by email at eclass@ualberta.ca or by phone at 780-492-9372.

• 1 Standard forum for general use
• 2 Standard Forum displayed in a blog-like format
• 3 Q&A Forum
• 4 Each person posts one discussion
• 5 Single discussion

Adding a folder

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right of your course page.
2. Choose a topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc…) and click on the Add an activity or resource button.
3. Click on the Folder icon, and a settings page will open

General

• "Name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• "Description" is optional. You may provide an explanation or instructions here for your students.
• "Display description on course page": Toggles whether or not the description of your folder will be displayed on the course page below the link to your folder.

Content

• "Files": This is where you select the file(s) to add to your folder.  Either click on the 'Add' link or drag-and-drop your folder or zipped file here. Note that you can embed folders for more complex structures.
• "Display folder contents": You may choose to display the folder contents:
  • 'On a separate page'
  • 'Inline on a course page': There will be no link to a separate page.
• "Show subfolders expanded": If enabled, subfolders are shown by default. Otherwise, they are shown collapsed.
• "Show download folder button": If enabled, a button will be displayed allowing the contents of the folder to be downloaded as a zip file.
• "Force download of files" is selected by default. Disabling this setting allows files to be displayed in the web browser rather than downloading/saving them. 

Common module settings

• "Availability": This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• “ID number": An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.

Restrict access

• See this article.

Activity completion

• Please note that you will not see the activity completion options until activity completion is enabled for your course. The steps to enable activity completion tracking can be found in our article on Completion Tracking.
• "Completion tracking": Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.
• "Require view":
• Student must view this activity to complete it: A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
• Student must submit to this activity to complete it: A tick will only appear once there is a submission from the student.
• "Expect completed on": This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Folder display:

Here is the folder display with an expanded file tree:

Tags

• See this article.

Notes

• Files within a folder can only be sorted alphabetically.

• 1 Adding a SCORM package activity
• 2 General
• 3 Package
• 4 Appearance
• 5 Grade
• 6 Attempts management
• 7 Compatibility settings

Adding the Tab Display Resource

1. With Edit mode on, click on Add an Activity or Resource to the desired topic location and choose Tab Display.
2. Complete all required fields.

Tab section details - Here you will enter details pertaining to the tabs being created as well as in what sequence you want them to appear in.

Display tab menu

Menus can also be added to the left of the tabs to enhance course organizational structure and navigation.  These menus are particularly useful if your course contains several Tab Display Resources or if you want students to be able to jump from one module to the next without having to return to the main course page. To add a menu in a tab display:

1. While editing the Tab Display settings, navigate to the Display tab menu option and add click/check beside Check if you would like to display menu.
2. Edit the following settings:
   • Tab display activity order within menu: Type in the order you would like this resource to appear in the menu. For example, if the tab display is Lesson 1, type the number one (1).  For all subsequent tab displays, continue numbering the tabs.
   • Menu name: Add the name of the menu to be displayed (e.g. Main Menu). Tab display resources are displayed according to the corresponding menu name so if required, you could have multiple menus within the same course, each containing tabs identified by the specific name.  

Restrict access

• See this article.

Tags

• See this article.

Notes

• To add files into a tab, please see the article Uploading files as links. It is no longer possible to display the file contents as the tab content.
• To add links to web pages into a tab, please see the article Adding a clickable link into eClass content
• If your web page allows it, you may also be able to embed the webpage in the tab content using the article Embedding videos in eClass

Adding a Survey

1. Click on Edit mode at the top right corner of your class page.
2. Move to the topic area where you wish to add content (the week, unit, etc…) and click on the Add an activity or resource link.
3. Click the Survey icon, and a settings page will open.

General

• "Name" is required. Make this as meaningful as possible for your students.
• "Survey type" is required. There are 3 available types of survey:
  • 'Attitudes to Thinking and Learning Survey (ATTLS)' - For measuring the extent to which a person is:
    • a 'connected knower' who tends to find learning more enjoyable, and is often more cooperative, congenial and more willing to build on the ideas of others, or
    • a 'separate knower' who tends to take a more critical and argumentative stance towards learning.
  • 'Critical incidents survey'
  • 'Constructivist On-line Learning Environment Survey (COLLES)' - For monitoring the extent to which the interactive capacity of the World Wide Web may be exploited for engaging students in dynamic learning practices.
  • For more information about survey types, see this article.
• "Description": Optionally provides explanation and instructions for students.
• "Display description on course page": Toggles whether or not the description of your survey will be displayed on the course page below the link to your survey.

Common module settings

• "Availability": This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number": An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Group mode": The group mode defined at the course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at the course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • 'No groups' - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • 'Separate groups' - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • 'Visible groups' - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping": A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• '"Add group/grouping access restriction": Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access

• See this article.

Activity completion

• Please note that you will not see the activity completion options until activity completion is enabled for your course. The steps to enable activity completion tracking can be found in our article on Completion Tracking.

• "Completion tracking": Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.

• "Require view":
  • Student must view this activity to complete it: A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
  • Student must submit to this activity to complete it: A tick will only appear once there is a submission from the student.
• "Expect completed on": This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags

• See this article.

Notes

• Surveys in eClass are not anonymous. The students cannot see the responses, but the course instructor can view responses by course, by student or by question. Students should be made aware of the fact that surveys are not anonymous for ethical reasons. If you want anonymized feedback, you must use the Feedback tool - (this means you must construct your own feedback questions.)
• If you want to devise your own set of questions to survey students you can use the Feedback tool.

Adding a Choice:

With Edit mode on, click Add an activity or resource. and choose Choice.

General:

• "Choice name" (required field)
• "Description" You can enter your question or choice here to prompt students.
• "Display description on course page" - Toggles whether or not the description will be displayed on the course page below the link to your choice activity.
• "Display mode for the options" - You may choose whether you want the options to be displayed horizontally or vertically.

Options:

• "Allow choice to be updated" - Participant ability to change their responses.
• "Allow more than one choice to be selected" - To allow for multiple responses.
• "Limit the number of responses allowed" - When the limit to a response is reached, participants may no longer choose the item.
• "Option [n]" - Enter the name of a choice option.
• "Limit [n]" - Limit the number of participants allowed to choose the option. Limit the number of responses allowed must be enabled first to set this option.

Availability:

Set a time and date range for when the Choice activity will be available to users. "Show preview" allows students to preview the activity and see the options before the Choice activity is open for submission.

Results:

• "Publish results" - Toggles if you want results published.
• "Privacy of results" - If the previous option is enabled, results can be set to anonymous or not (show student names and their choices)
• "Show column for unanswered" - Toggles whether or not the column for unanswered choices will be displayed.
• "Include responses from inactive/suspended users" - Toggles whether or not responses from inactive/suspended users are included.

Students are shown how their selections are published/private before making their choice.

For example:

Common module settings

• "Availability" - This setting has 3 options:
  • 'Show on course page' - The activity is available to students (subject to any access restrictions which may be set).
  • 'Hide from students' - The activity is only available to users with permission to view hidden activities (by default, users with the role of teacher or non-editing teacher).
  • 'Make available but now shown on course page' - A link to the activity must be provided from elsewhere, such as from a page resource. The activity would still be listed in the gradebook and other reports.
• "ID number" - An ID number identifies the activity for grade calculation purposes.
• "Force language" - Force the activity to a particular language pack. Only English and French are available on eClass.
• "Group mode" - The group mode defined at course level is the default mode for all activities within the course. Each activity that supports groups can also define its own group mode, though if the group mode is forced at course level, the group mode setting for each activity is ignored. This setting has 3 options:
  • 'No groups' - Students are not segregated into groups.
  • 'Separate groups' - Only group members can see their own group while other groups remain invisible.
  • 'Visible groups' - Group members can see other groups but still work in their own group.
• "Grouping" - A grouping is a collection of groups within a course. If a grouping is selected, students assigned to groups within the grouping will be able to work together.
• "Add group/grouping access restriction" button - Allows access only to students who belong to a specified group, or all groups.

Restrict access:

• See this article.

Activity completion

• "Completion tracking" - Activity completion is tracked, either manually or automatically, based on certain conditions. Multiple conditions may be set if desired. If so, the activity will only be considered complete when ALL conditions are met. A tick next to the activity name on the course page indicates when the activity is complete.
• "Require view"
  • Student must view this activity to complete it - A tick will only appear once the student views the activity.
  • Show as complete when user makes a choice - A tick will only appear once the student makes a choice.
    
• "Expect completed on" - This setting specifies the date when the activity is expected to be completed. The date is not shown to students and is only displayed in the activity completion report.

Tags:

• See this article.

Notes

• Please consider carefully whether you want your choice to be anonymous or not. Choices can be anonymous to both students and instructors or to just students. Please indicate to students exactly who will be able to see their responses for ethical reasons.

In non-credit and training course situations, it may be desirable to allow students to receive and print a custom certificate upon completing any requirements set by the course instructor/designer. Certificates can also be added to credit courses, but it must be communicated clearly to students what the purpose of the certificate is and whether it has any academic weight or value.

• 1 Add an activity or resource
• 2 Settings
  •  - General
  •  - Options
  •  - Common module settings
  •  - Restrict access
• 3 Creating the certificate
• 4 Adding certificate elements
• 5 Reposition or arrange elements
• 6 Preview certificate
• 7 Notes