Parent Role

Template:Roles and capabilities The Parent Role is created and used as a way of bringing a student's parents into a closer and more constant reviewing position over the academic progress of their child.

:Note: In this page, the terms "Permissions" and "Capabilties" are used as interchangable terms. Please bear in mind that they are in fact a pair. A capability is an editable behaviour and a permission is the value given that capability.

Using a Custom Role

In the page Create Custom Roles, a generic Role was created and given the name of Parent. In this part, the Role is going to be linked to a Student Role, which is why the role was called "Parent". (By now there should be two additional Users in the User Accounts, say, "Perant Test" and "Stedunt Test".) Return to the Role list and see if the Role has been properly created, then click on it to start reviewing capabilities.

Returning to the Parent Role

Changing Capabilities

 TIP: Take a note of all changes made and keep a record. This role may need to be created whenever required.

Next the capabilities of this Role need to be determined. What is different in this Role that required the Role be created in the first place? As the Role has already had a Context selected for it, User, it is that area of the Capabilities that need existing permissions altered. Turn editing on and scroll down to the section named "User", look for the fields listed below and reset the values on these capabilities:

Viewing the structure of the Parent Role and turning editing on

 moodle/user:readuserblogs
 moodle/user:viewdetails
 moodle/user:readuserposts
 moodle/user:viewuseractivitiesreport
 moodle/user:editprofile

Some permissions may already be set to "Allow", or the permissions granted here may not be the ones required for that Role. This set of Permissions mean that this Role allows anyone assigned to a Parent Role, then linked to the Student Role, to edit the profile or read the blogs of that Student - not everyone's profile or blogs.

Assigning permissions to the Parent Role

Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on "Save changes"

Saving Changes to the Parent Role

When saved, Moodle automatically return to the List of all Roles page.

This changes the capabilities of the Parent Role in Moodle 2, but the Role now has to be directly linked to a Student Role to allow it to be used as it was designed to be.

Linking the Parent Role

To link one Role to another, in this case a Parent Role to a Student Role, open the Student's profile. Go to the Users in Users > Accounts > Browse list of users and open the records of the student who's Role is going to be linked.

Selecting the Student's Role

When there, the left column should display a block called "Settings" and the first line should read "Profile for [this student]". Under that it will read Edit profile and under that it should read "Roles". There should be a right arrow sign so when you click on"Roles" it should open with another menu structure that should have as a second option "Assign roles relative to this user".

File:CustomRole09.png

Setting an assignment to that Student's Role

Click that and it should take you to a page that is entitled as "Assign roles in User: [student name]" and under that it has the line "Please chose a role to assign"

Setting an assignment to that Student's Role

Below that is a table with a list of roles, and one of them should be "Parent". Click on that line and it should take you to the "Assign a Role" page. This should already be familiar so just select the parent you want to assign to that student and click the "Add" button.

At this point you can return to the "Assign roles in user:" page and you should see that the parent name is now in the "Users with Role" column.

Setting an assignment to that Student's Role

Make sure everything is saved where it needs to be and then return to the Front Page.

Adding the Mentee Block

NOTE: This demonstrates how a block can be added to the Front Page, but it may be a better option to place the Parent block inside each course. the principles will be the same, but this method means only one Parent Block be placed on the site. Roles can still be assigned at the Course level.

Click on "Turn editing on" and the menu should change to read "Turn editing off".

Turn editing on in the Front Page

Click on the drop down list of the "Add a block" block and select "Mentees".

Selecting the Mentees Block

The Mentee block allows you to rename it to anything you like, but to keep track of these things you may want to call this block "Parents".

Renaming the Mentee Block to Parents

Remember here Moodle Admins and owners have a lot of different interests and may want Parents to check on what their children are doing. At the same time, a Community Mentor may have a to have a similar role for a User, or a Guidance Counselor to keep an eye on a promising/troublesome student. Moodle allows more than one instance of the block on a page, and as long as they have different names. The title of each block should clearly reflect what the role connected to it is for.

Once at this point, a User or Users can now be assigned into the Parents block in the same manner as it is done elsewhere in Moodle.

File:CustomRole15.png

Assigning Roles to the Parent Block

Testing the Role

At this point you need to test the efficacy of what you have done - so log out and then log back in as Perant Test. You should then be able to navigate to the student's course via the Parent's block.

NOTE: The order that adding a Mentee by the name of Parent to a specific student then putting a Mentee block, renaming it as Parent and assigning Users to it, seems odd, but it works.

See Also

• Create Custom Roles
• Development:Role archetypes for more information about the development of roles
• Front Page Roles, Capabilities/Permissions