How to set up a Moodle Assignment
Daunted by the number of settings? There's good news on several fronts. Though we explain the settings here at length here so that you know what's possible and most likely to help you, you'll probably find that you leave most on their defaults. Moreover, when you've created one Assignment you can duplicate it to save time with the next one. And to cap it all, at roll-over time if you reset your course you get to keep all the Assignments you've set up. So we think it's worth taking a little time up front.
- To add a Moodle assignment, click the Turn editing on button in the top-right of your page.
- In the topic where you want the assignment to appear, click on the link to Add an activity or resource
- Select Assignments and then click the Add button; a new Assignment settings page displays. Let's look at each setting in turn.
General
See further down for particular Assignment settings for group submissions.
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- Feedback comments - Yes will allow markers to type or paste summary comments on each piece of work directly into Moodle.
- Feedback files - Yes gives markers the option to upload a file of feedback for any student individually; these might be the student's original work with comments added using eg the Adobe Reader, iAnnotate, or MS Word comment function. Nb if you find you're repeating yourself and are worrying about your time, consider giving the whole cohort a single file of general feedback, made available elsewhere eg as a Page.
Offline grading worksheet - Yes gives markers the option to download a spreadsheet into which they can enter a numeric mark and/or feedback comments - uploading the completed marksheet will update the Gradebook for each student.
Want to give feedback first i.e. before you release numeric marks? First upload your Feedback Files, then follow after an appropriate interval with the Offline Grading Worksheet containing numeric marks. More on this in the M27 Moodle Gradebook miniguide.
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- Require students to click submit button - probably No. Enabling it can be useful where there's no particular deadline (Due Date) - it can signal to staff that they can start marking. But in practice there usually is a deadline, and moreover there's a tendency for students to overlook the Submit button and assume that uploading is the same as submitting. In any case, when the Due Date passes, the submission is effectively finalised - which, in combination with staff being discouraged from starting marking before the Due Date, usually means that this setting can be safely left at No.Or if Yes, then you really do need to let students know about it in your instructions. If you are using groups in the assignment, setting 'submit' to No forces 'Require all group members submit' to be set to Yes, which in practice means that after the first student has submitted, the others have to confirm the submission by submitting a piece of work. The current file is made available by default, but it is possible to overwrite it with another file!
- Require that students accept the submission statement - if you're using Groups, then No because it contains phrases like 'own work'.
- Attempts reopened – probably Manually. Determines how student submission attempts are reopened. The available options are; Never - the submission cannot be reopened, Manually - the submission can be reopened by a tutor or Automatically until pass - the 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 submissions 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.
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- Notify graders about submissions - probably No. Enable only in the unlikely case that Tutors want an email every time any student uploads work. However, see the next setting:
- Notify graders about late submissions - probably Yes. Enabling this will alert markers to newly submitted work after the deadline, which saves you having to check for it.
- Default setting for "Notify students" - probably No. Enabling this will notify students as they are marked and given feedback. Notify students in bulk instead when uploading feedback.
Grade
- Grade - select from the dropdown menu (note there is a No grade setting if you want to give feedback only). If the scale you need isn't there, contact ele@ucl.ac.uk about adding it.
- Grading method - you can have; Simple direct grading i.e. a mark and summary feedback, Marking guide - sets out criteria but omits the Rubric's levels of achievement; allows a comment and mark for each criterion or Rubric - sets out criteria and levels to which each has been met, and allocates marks to each level, generating an overall mark at the end.
- Grade category - if you've set up any categories (ways of grouping assignment grades) in your Moodle Gradebook, you'll be able to select one here.
Blind marking - enable usually No. Enable if you want to mark work with the students' identities hidden, and revealed after the marking period.
MS Office documents contain information that can identify the author. To remove this
Open the document. Click on "File" (on the menu bar), and then "Info"
If there is one present, right click on the Author, and select "Remove Person"
Save the document- Use marking workflow – probably yes. If enabled, 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.
- Use marking allocation - probably yes. If enabled together with marking workflow, markers can be allocated to particular students.
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