Details September 2024
September 2024 – 3900.100 Release
- Student Activity Log
- View items that need grading and posting in the new Overview tab
- View late submissions that need grading
- Wiris upgrade and benefits
- Exclude attempt when grading
- Review instructor feedback on the student submission review page
- Access assignment feedback hidden by release conditions
- Course content page enhancements
Student Activity Log
Instructors often need to review student activity. Student activity helps inform decisions in academic disputes and aids in troubleshooting. You can also analyze the course participation of students at risk.
Instructors can use student participation to support financial aid decisions. For example, requests for tuition fee reimbursements if a student hasn’t participated in a course. Course participation records can also help with awarding scholarships.
Now the Student Overview page has a student activity log. Instructors and other higher roles can use the report to check what a particular student did in a course.
Image 1. Student activity log report located in the student overview page
The Activity log can be filtered by event type and can look to the past 120 days. Any information older than that won’t be stored in this report. The log can take up to 20 minutes to update from the last time a student performs an action.
The following events can be found in the report:
- Course Access
- Assessment Started
- Assessment Draft saved
- Assessment Submitted
- Assessment Auto-submitted
- Discussion Access
- Discussion Draft saved
- Discussion Edit
- Discussion Reply
- Discussion Response
- Document Access
- Journal Access
- LTI Item Access
- SCORM item Access
View items that need grading and posting in the new Overview tab
To help instructors stay on top of their grading workload, we added an indicator to the Gradebook tab to let you know when there are new submissions to grade. The indicator displays the number that needs grading. If the count goes higher than 99, it displays as 99+.
We also added a new gradebook Overview tab to improve task orientation and grading efficiency. This tab contains two sections: Needs Grading and Needs Posting.
Needs Grading section
If you face a substantial grading workload, the Needs Grading section is a useful tool for prioritizing your tasks. It allows you to see all items ready for grading and a count of the total number of outstanding grading tasks in your course.
This section displays up to five items at a time, ordered by the oldest ungraded submission. For an item, select Grade now to quickly access the submissions you need to grade. If your course has more than five items that need grading, you can use the buttons at the bottom of section to navigate through all pending tasks.
Needs Posting section
The Needs Posting section increases accessibility of assessments with grades that need posting. For an item, select Post now to its grade If there are more than five items that need posting, you can use the buttons at the bottom of section to navigate through the pending tasks.
Image 1. Instructor view of the new Needs Grading count on the Gradebook tab and the Needs Grading section on the new Overview page
Image 2. Instructor view of the new gradebook Overview page where the Needs Grading and Needs posting sections appear
View late submissions that need grading
When enabled, the Automatic Zeros gradebook setting gives a zero score to students who haven’t made a submission by the due date.
To help instructors to find and grade late assessment submissions, they are now indicated as Needs Grading on the Grades and Gradable Items gradebook pages.
Image 1. Instructor view of the updated Gradable Items page; the status the assignment now displays 1 to grade for a late submission that needs grading
Image 2. Instructor view of the updated Grades page; the column status displays 0 Graded | 0 Posted and a New Submission label indicating the late submission that needs grading
Wiris Upgrade and Benefits
We’ve upgraded the Wiris engine and equation editor to the latest versions to improve performance. Version 8.10.2 of the engine and version 7.23 of the editor improves rendering of subscript and superscript formulas. This upgrade provides a better experience for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics courses.
Image 1. Before the Wiris upgrade
Image 2. After the improvement
Exclude attempt when grading
Allowing students to submit multiple attempts for an assessment can help them stay on track. It can improve the quality of the assessment and boost student success.
However, there are some circumstances where an attempt doesn’t need to be graded. For example, the student may have submitted the wrong file, or their submission may be incomplete or an outlier.
We added a new option to help instructors remove submissions from the grading workflow without having to delete them. When grading a student, you can now select Exclude Attempt to remove it from the Needs Grading workflow.
If an attempt is excluded, the Excluded label appears above the attempt grade and in the attempt selector. If you need to remove the attempt exclusion, select from the menu.
Grade calculations ignore excluded attempts. Students aren’t automatically granted an additional attempt if an attempt is excluded. You can grant additional attempts to the student via the exception’s workflow.
You can exclude any submitted attempt by a student. If you exclude an attempt when the student has no remaining attempts, you receive a warning that their final grade can’t be calculated.
When students review their submissions, a banner notification appears on excluded attempts.
Image 1. Instructor view of the Exclude attempt menu option
Image 2. Instructor view of the Exclude label above the grade and in the attempt selector
Image 3. Warning that a student has no remaining attempts and the final grade can’t be calculated
Review instructor feedback on the student submission review page
Assessment feedback gives students insights into their strengths and weaknesses. It also helps them refine their skills and knowledge.
We are introducing a new student-facing submission review page for assignments. The new page makes all instructor feedback on a submission more accessible. We are planning to add this same feature for tests in a future release.
Students can access the new assignment submission review page from these locations:
- The gradebook feedback button for the assignment.
- The small panel that displays when students access an assignment from the Course Content page.
If a student submits multiple attempts, they can review each on the submission review page. By default, the student sees the appropriate graded attempt. The instructor defines which attempt to grade in the assignment’s final grade calculation setting.
The new assignment submission review page displays the following information and feedback formats:
- Assessment content
- Student submission with inline feedback
- Submission timestamp
- Submission receipt
- Final grade and calculation model
- Attempt grade and feedback
- Override grade and feedback (if applicable)
- Optimized display of rubrics information and criterion feedback
Image 1. The feedback button lets students access the new assignment review page from their gradebook
Image 2. Students can access the new assignment submission review page by selecting the “3 submitted” link and the “Your Grade” label on the assignment’s settings panel
Access assignment feedback hidden by release conditions
Students must access feedback on past submissions. Feedback review is vital for their academic growth. Now students can access all feedback on their submission, even if the assignment is hidden by a release condition. We are planning to ensure that students have access to all feedback on tests, discussions and journals in future releases.
Image 1. Instructor view of release conditions settings with a date/time release condition combined with the Hide state
Image 2. Student gradebook view of an assignment hidden by a release condition; the ‘Content isn’t available’ label indicates the student can’t make further submissions
Image 3: Student view of the assignment submission review page for the hidden assignment; all instructor feedback is displayed
Course Content Page Enhancements
User experience (UX) plays a vital role in student engagement and learning. We’re committed to continuous improvement of the Learn course view. It’s important to us that we meet the needs of our users—both educators and students. Several changes to the Course Content page are being delivered, based on feedback from the wider community.
The improvements include:
- Greater visual depth
- Improved page structure
- Differentiation among course elements
- An enhanced presentation of top-level and nested content
Greater Visual Depth and Content Page Structure
Creating a more appealing and engaging interface has been a key theme in client feedback. To support this, we’ve created greater visual depth to the Course Content page. This provides a more enjoyable and inviting experience for end users.
The new design incorporates:
- Subtle gradients and softer edges
- A more cohesive color palette with inviting, warmer tones
- More intuitive navigation, which reduces cognitive load and increases focus on the content
Image 1. Instructor view: Course Content page visual depth improvements
Image 2. Student view: Course Content page visual depth improvements
Content presentation enhancements
We’ve improved the differentiation among learning modules, folders, and content items. Currently, users sometimes find it challenging to distinguish among these elements. This can lead to confusion and inefficiency in navigating course materials.
Image 3. Instructor view: Content item presentation for a Learning Module
Image 4. Instructor view: Content item presentation for a Folder
Image 5. Student view: Content item presentation for a Learning Module
Image 6. Student view: Content item presentation for a Folder
These changes will look to create a more organised and improved user experience.
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