This blog is used to share my interests in elearning, largely around things like OER, Social Media and Digital Literacies. I might also use this blog to discuss things related to my role, which as of March 2013, is a Lecturer (Learning Technology) at the University of Liverpool.
A while back I was asked by a lecturer if Moodle could be used to somehow allow students to sign up to specific tutorial time slots. To be honest, I had to go away, have a play about and ask other colleagues, as Moodle doesn't have a straight-forward 'sign up sheet' tool.
However, having discussed this with a few colleagues, we quickly realised that the Moodle 'Choice Activity' is the perfect solution. The tool simply enables you to create a number of 'choices', and allows you to restrict the number of responses to say, one.
Sounds interesting right?
Catherine Wasiuk, the eLearning Support Officer at Hollings has created a short (5 min) video on setting up a tutorial booking system using the Choice activity, however this tool could easily be used for many other purposes. One that springs to mind would be the management of student projects. The various options could be listed and students could simply sign up to the project they are interested in. As it can be locked down to just one response, it's a first-come first-served basis...
Have a look at the video below and use the comments to leave any other suggestions for how the Choice activity might be used. As always, if you want to discuss the use of any technology in your teaching (not just Moodle), feel free to give me a shout...
Over the past few months, academic staff have been getting to grips with a range of features within Moodle, and it is apparent that the Groups features are of particular interest. At the same time, the group tools can be a little confusing as they work slightly different to the WebCT equivalent.
So this post hopes to introduce you to the Moodle terminology: Groups and Groupings, as well as what can be achieved and how.
What are Groups & Groupings?
Firstly, it's important to clarify the difference between Groups and Groupings:
Group release applies to the options within the 'Add an Activity' drop down menu, such as Forums, Assignments and Quizzes, etc. When releasing an activity, for example a discussion forum, you have two options in the groups section:
Separate Groups: each group has their own private forum
Visible Groups: each group has their own forum but they can still view other group's forums.
Groupings allow specific content to be hidden from particular students and released to others. Anything from within the 'Add a Resource' drop down menu can be released to a particular set of students within a grouping. For example, you might have a quiz that all students will complete, but you might want to release a separate quiz that is only visible to those students who are entitled to extra time. This is where Groupings come in handy.
The only confusing aspect related to Groupings is that you first have to create at least one group of students, and then add that group to the grouping (don't worry though, we'll run through the steps below)
Creating Groups & Groupings
Now we have clarified what the Groups and Groupings tools can do, it's time to look at how we create them - luckily it's pretty straightforward, and the short video below runs through the steps involved.
Putting Groups and Groupings into Practice
So now we have created two groups and one grouping, it's now time to put them into practice. These two videos demonstrate releasing a forum to separate groups and releasing a quiz to a particular grouping.
Creating a Forum for Separate Groups
As a tutor you can easily see the different group forums, along with the number of replies, etc.
It's also possible to toggle between Separate Groups and Visible Groups from the course page in Moodle. When you hover over the silhouette, the tool-tip confirms which group mode you are currently in, and clicking on it allows you to change.
Releasing a Quiz to a Grouping
For more information, the CeLT Moodle Training Guides page contains a guide on 'Creating and Managing Groups in Moodle', but of course if you are having difficulty implementing groups and/or groupings, feel free to get in touch.
Also, if you are doing anything interesting with the Groups/Groupings tools, why not share them in the comments....
