Creating an assignment submission area

An assignment is an activity for students to work on and submit to the teacher. This can be done by hand or electronically. The teacher can comment upon the assignment and award a grade. Teachers may also comment and return it to students before accepting the assignment for grading.

Select assignment activity

• Make sure you click on Turn editing on in the top right hand corner if it is not already done.
• From the Add an activity drop down list (in the area/week you want it), select the Assignment type.
  • Assignment type: Important - there are three types of assignments here (all useful)
    • Offline activity - If they cannot submit electronically you can examin their work in another way, but you can then use Moodle to award the marks and to send feedback. This facilitates fast communication back to the learner, but possibly even more importantly - keeps a record of the mark and feedback
    • Upload a single file - if you want them to submit a file electronically (on the next page in a minute you will have to specify the maximum size, whether you want to be emailed for every submission and whether you will allow them to resubmit more than once)
    • Online Text - if you just want them to type their submission directly into Moodle (instead of using a Word Processor). This is useful for shorter assignments, or where they are constantly making small changes. It also allows you to insert comments in the middle of their assignments. (on the next page in a minute you will have to specify whether they can resubmit more than once, whether you want to be emailed for every submission made and whether you want to be able to insert comments inside their submission "inline comments")

Fill in assignment settings

Fill in the form that comes up as follows:

• Assignment name: a meaningful short description of the assignment that will appear in the area/week you put the assignment. (This should contain as much information as possible in a very terse form eg. "Assignment Submission area: NO. 3: A powerpoint presentation" - it can stretch over more than one line if necessary)
• Description: you can specify the activity to be carried out here.
  • If it is a very long specifications that you may already have prepared in another format (eg. MS Word), you can upload and link to the full description elsewhere (Add a resource.. Link to file or website) and just write a few words here telling them where to find it.
  • If you want to write a longer explanation here you can, or you can copy and paste from a Word document.
  • If this is one of the first times your students have had to make an electronic submission you may wish to include a description of how to do it. you can copy and paste in these instructions if you like:
    • "To submit your document electronically, use the Browse button below, find the document form on your PC (you may have to select the correct drive and folder), click on it and then click on Open, then select Upload this file."
• Grade: set the maximum mark for the assignment. You can have No grade if you just want to provide feedback only.
• Available from and Due date: make sure it is realistic, students tend to take this seriously. **It won't allow them upload after the due date - unless
• Prevent late assignments: check this box if they can (in which case you will be informed that the submission was late and can mark accordingly)
• Select Next to move on to some other settings as described in the section immediately above.
• Save or Cancel