Month: November 2018

Continuous Delivery Updates for July 2018

Students and Instructors

Dropbox – New Text Submission Type

Instructors can now create Text Submission Dropbox type in CourseLink. The new Text Submission type allows learners to create text documents for submission directly in Dropbox using a rich text editor, eliminating the need to attach a file.

My Courses widget – Course Groupings

Courses that appear in the My Courses widget can now be grouped by Department, Semester Name or Role when the Update Sort Logic view is enabled. Once a course grouping option is selected, the courses are separated into tabs within the widget for easy viewing and selection.

Instructors Only

Quizzes – Removal of Image and Text Information Items

As images and text can be included in any type of question using the features of the HTML editor, there is no longer a need for image and text information items. Image and text information items in existing quizzes or question libraries convert into sections, and are still displayed to learners attempting the quiz. One section is created for each existing image or text information item. Once the conversion of existing image and text information items is complete, the ability to create new image and text information items is no longer available.

During the question conversion process the following actions occur:

  • Each image and text information item is converted to an individual section
  • If the information item included a title, that is used for the section title
  • If the information item did not include a title, one is automatically generated using the format: Untitled [converted from a Text Information Item], or Untitled [converted from an Image Information Item]
  • The setting to show the Section title to learners is set to off
  • The setting to show Section text to students is set to on
  • For text information items, the Question Text field is set as the Section Text field
  • For image information items, the Section Text consist of an image tag, followed by the Caption text. If there was a Description for the image, it is included as the alt text of the image.

Turnitin – Improvements to the Turnitin Integration

The following improvements have been made to the Turnitin (TII) integration:

  • Updates have been made to automate date management in TII. Start and End dates are no longer managed separately or prohibitive when learners make a submission in CourseLink and the TII dates are not set correctly. Previously, dates were managed in both CourseLink and TII, which often led to dates being misaligned. As a result, it caused issues with learners getting access to their feedback or being able to successfully submit their assignments. This improvement will reduce the number of errors seen because there will no longer be issues with the TII assignment submission folder having different date restrictions than what is in the Assignments tool.
  • Learners have access to formative feedback left in GradeMark (even if there is no score, which can be found in the assignment submission folder, in User Progress, or in Grades).
  • Feedback on Group Assignments is now provided to all learners in the group. Previously, feedback was only provided to the individual learner that made the submission.
  • Submissions made to a TII enabled assignment submission folder are pre-validated at time of submission to ensure they are within the file type and size requirements enforced by TII. Previously, upon submission in CourseLink, learners immediately received their receipt of submission and the pre-validation was done after the fact. As a result, the submission might have not been accepted by TII at all, forcing instructors to analyze and, in some cases, request another submission. This improvement will reduce the number of submissions that were previously rejected by TII. It is also now obvious that the learner is making a submission to TII.
  • The version of HTTPS communications has been updated from TLS 1.0 to TLS 1.2.
  • Previously, when instructors used GradeMark to score or provide feedback, they had to sync each submission one by one to copy the score to CourseLink. The new GrademarkAutoTransferDefault configuration variable (which is set to on) allows scores to be copied automatically to CourseLink as a draft. The Auto copy as draft option can also be set within the Edit Assignment Folder page for each individual assignment folder.

If you have any questions about the updates, please contact CourseLink Support at:

courselink@uoguelph.ca
519-824-4120 ext. 56939

Continuous Delivery Updates for June 2018

Students and Instructors

Removing App Support for Android 4.4

For security reasons, as of June 30, 2018, CourseLink will no longer support TLS 1.0, which is used on devices running Android 4.4 and below. Google does not have plans to update TLS on these devices. This change will impact mobile apps, including Binder, Pulse, ePortfolio, and Assignment Grader.

HTML Editor – Emoticons

Emoticons are now available across CourseLink in the HTML Editor. Use them to express feelings or mood in announcements, discussion posts, and anywhere esle the HTML Editor is available. There are currently 30 emoticons available.

Rubrics – Improvements to Rubric Feedback for Learners

To provide learners with a more detailed feedback on activities, this release includes the following improvements:

  • Rubrics are now using a responsive display for desktops and mobile devices.
  • The Overall Score row is removed and replaced by a Total row for the entire rubric.
  • Discussion Topics will show the overall feedback at the top of the page.

Rubrics – Display Graded Rubric Feedback in Gradebook

For a consistent and simplified user experience, learners can now view their graded rubric feedback in the Gradebook for discussions, dropbox submissions, and quizzes.

For instructors, this change impacts how they use rubrics with activites. They can assess discussions, dropbox submissions, or quizzes from the corresponding tool, and the completed rubric will display in the Gradebook (if the activity is linked).

Instructors Only

Copy Course Components – Date Offset

When instructors copy the content of one course to another, old course dates are also copied over. This feature enables instructors to offset those old dates to dates relative to the new semester. This feature also eliminates the burden of tweaking delivery and due dates for their learners. When instructors copy course components in bulk, they can enable the offset to occur to the items copied into the course by days or hours.

Grades – Linked Discussion Threads

When assessing a discussion post in the Assess Student pop-up, an instructor can now see a link to the original discussion post. This allows instructors to see more information about why the user posted that reply, or what other learners replied to their post. Previously, there was no hyperlink, and instructors had to open Discussions and manually find the information.

Quizzes – Question Pools replace Random Sections

Question pools are now available to improve the process of creating quizzes with randomized questions, and are an effective way of preventing cheating on quizzes. All the functionality random sections provided is now located on a single screen, with a simplified workflow. When creating a question pool, instructors enter a title, the number of questions to select, and the points per question. On the same page, they can browse the Question Library to select the desired questions to add to the pool. Instructors are also able to edit or delete questions in place.

Rubrics – Control Rubric Visibility for Learners

This release introduces the ability to control rubric visibility for learners. This is useful for preventing learners from using preview rubrics as answer keys for activities. For example, an instructor can now describe assessment expectations in assignment instructions, hiding the associated preview rubric. Once the assignment is graded, the instructor releases the graded rubric as part of the learner’s assessment details.

 

If you have any questions about the updates, please contact CourseLink Support at:

courselink@uoguelph.ca
519-824-4120 ext. 56939

Continuous Delivery Updates for April 2018

Instructors Only

Dropbox – Rubric dialog pop-ups

All rubric dialog boxes used when grading assignments in the Dropbox now automatically open as pop-up windows. This change will allow instructors to move the rubric window to view the submitted document.

Course image library now includes images with increased diversity and educational context

Hundreds of new images will be available in the course image library. Instructors will be able to select from images that are more diverse in terms of age, gender, ethnicity, and culture. Images are also available that relate to educational subjects, such as communication or engineering.

Visual indicators of role switch on the navbar

Users who switch roles can see a visual indicator of the role state on the navbar. Having a visual reminder ensures that users do not make changes or perform tasks erroneously while signed into another role.

Discussions – Grading discussions

This feature updates the discussions grading experience for instructors. Now, when an instructor is grading a discussion, the Assess Student dialog box opens as a pop-up window regardless of the dialog box option the instructor had set under Account Settings. As a result, the instructor can move the Assess Student dialog box to another screen and continue reading discussions or navigating through a learner’s discussions on a different screen without closing the Assess Student dialog box.

Grades – Adding feedback in bulk

This feature enables instructors to add generic feedback on learners’ grades in bulk. Instructors can use replacement strings to personalize their feedback. Instructors can also sort the Feedback column in the Gradebook and quickly determine which learners require feedback.

Groups and Sections – Create sub-groups from sections and groups

Users can now create sub-groups, based on Section or Group enrollment, within the Groups tool. When creating a new Group category, the Restrict Enrollments To option allows the user to restrict Group enrollment by course sections and all course-level groups. Users can only apply one enrollment restriction, and when selected populates the Group Prefix area with a relevant title.

Please note: After creating the new group category, it will be independent from the original group category or section. Any students added to the original group category or section will not automatically transfer to the new sub-group category.

Manage Dates – Improvements to the Manage Dates tool

This feature includes the following improvements to the Manage Dates tool:

Dates can be changed for the following activities:

  • Quiz submission view names and dates
  • Quiz report names and dates
  • Topic unlock dates
  • Forum unlock dates
  • Checklists
  • Surveys

The Status column on the Manage Dates page now reads as Visibility Status.

The Status options have been updated from Hidden, Limited, and Visible to Hidden, Visible, Visible with conditions, and Hidden. Conditions are inactive.

The following objects have been renamed:

  • Grade Object reads as Grade Item or Grade Category
  • Module reads as Content Module
  • Topic reads as Content Topic

The Discussion Forum icon has been changed to reflect that it is a container of other things.

The Grade Category icon has been changed to reflect that it is a container of other things.

Dates in the Due, Start, and End columns are clickable and instructors can launch the Edit dialog box to make any changes.

From the Manage Dates page, instructors can now edit, offset, and bulk offset the start, end, and display in calendar options for surveys.

SCORM – Updates and improvements to the new SCORM

The New SCORM is the foundational platform piece that is a collection of standards that outlines how online learning materials and learning management systems should interact with one another. The New SCORM also tracks interaction data.

To increase the benefit of the new SCORM, the following features have been developed. (Note: these features do not apply to the legacy SCORM solution)

  • When learners who have completed a SCORM object go back into that object, they are now prompted whether they want to re-take (removes their existing score and completion flag), or just review (does not remove the existing score and completion flag).
  • SCORM objects can now be bulk uploaded to the Content Service. From there, instructors can link the objects to one or more courses.
  • By default, the Content Player navigation used by SCORM objects is turned off, however, it can be turned on for SCORM objects that do not have built-in navigation.
  • Completion tracking now ensures that the ILP Core check mark appears after a learner has completed the SCORM content. Note: The check mark only appears if the SCORM object is programmed with a Completion Event.
  • The new SCORM solution provides an option to align Grades with a score choice, such as the highest score or the most recent score.
  • In the new SCORM solution, when a user links a SCORM object to a course, they have the option of also creating a grade item. In the legacy SCORM solution, grade items were created when the SCORM object was opened.

Widgets – Custom widget rendering in iFrame

Instructors or administrators creating a custom widget now have an option to render the custom widget in iFrame. This will enable users to use header information in their widgets, without needing to specifically code in an iFrame to do so.

If you have any questions about the updates, please contact CourseLink Support at:

courselink@uoguelph.ca
519-824-4120 ext. 56939

Continuous Delivery Updates for February 2018

Students and Instructors

New changes for the My Courses Widget

The My Courses widget no longer automatically pins future courses; rather, the widget displays results by current enrollments or last activity in a non-pinned state. Users can continue to manually pin courses as appropriate for their purposes.

  • The My Courses widget shows manually pinned courses followed by current enrollments, then future enrollments (if they are available or visible to the user) for a total of 12 enrollments. Note that more than 12 if all the course enrollments might appear if they are all manually pinned.
  • The Course Selector drop-down menu shows manually pinned courses, followed by current enrollments, then future enrollments (if they are available and visible to the user), and finally, past enrollments (if they are visible to the user).
  • The View All Courses navigation drills down into the courses by showing manually pinned courses, followed by current enrollments, then future enrollments (if available and visible to the user), then past enrollments (if available or visible to the user) as the default sort. If the user changes the sort order, the filter does not separate pinned courses from other courses based on sort order, filters, and search terms.

In addition, there are interface improvements, including:

  • Pinned courses now have a visible pin icon on the course title in the My Courses widget, similar to the Course Selector visible state.
  • The Course Starts message now includes a time as well as a date. In addition, the Course Starts lang term has been updated to Opens On, and the Course Ends lang term has been updated to Closed to better reflect discrepancies between course dates and LMS availability.
  • Newly-pinned courses are added to the bottom of the pinned list.

For more information, please see our support documentation for the My Courses widget.

HTML Editor – Advanced Image Editing

This feature updates the HTML Editor to include expanded image editing capabilities for the WYSIWYG editor where PowerPaste is enabled. Users can now edit images in place (including flipping, rotating, and adjusting brightness, sharpness, and color), edit the image description, and edit the size of the image. Users with access to Manage Files can save image edits to the Manage Files area, while users without access to Manage Files can save images as attachments.

This update is currently exclusive to creating discussion posts, announcements, and content (excluding module descriptions).

Note: Image changes save to Manage Files, or, depending on user permissions, as new file attachments to the item (such as Discussions) every time a change is made. Multiple edits will create multiple items.

Instructors Only

Navigation and Themes aligned with Daylight Standard

Create Navbar and Edit Navbar pages now include only fields applicable in the Daylight Experience. Changes include the following:

  • Simplified link builder interface and create/edit link workflow.
  • New option to edit the navbar title regardless of the theme you are using. Previously, this was restricted to the Classic theme only.

Quizzes – Due Dates Available

To improve the consistency of dates across tools in Brightspace Learning Environment, due dates are available for quizzes.

This allows instructors to better communicate when quizzes are due, and better identify when a learner submits a quiz late. This change impacts when quizzes are marked as late. A quiz is now considered late if it is submitted after the due date is reached. Previously, ‘late’ referred to attempts submitted after the time limit of an ‘enforced time limit’ quiz was exceeded. Quizzes submitted after the due date are labeled ‘submitted late’. Quizzes submitted after the time limit is reached are now labeled as ‘exceeded time limit’.

Groups – Quicklinks for Self-Enrollment Groups

Instructors can now insert a Quicklink to self-enrolling groups. This update provides learners a direct path to sign up for their group and a new Group Self-Enrollment screen.

Features recently released in previous versions:

Grade Exemptions – Grade book workflow and updated calculations

Instructors can now use an exemption as a reason why a learner has not completed a grade item. Previously, a blank grade could mean the learner hasn’t submitted the item, and a zero (0) could mean either exempt, ungraded, or failure. Having a specific exemption setting supports the differentiation for learners. Instructors can now exempt numeric, selectbox, pass/fail, calculated, formula, and text item types; however, instructors cannot exempt a learner from a final calculated grade or a final adjusted grade.

For more information, please see our support documentation for grade exemptions.

Open topic vs. Group or section topic

Instructors can now select the new Group or section topic option instead of the original standard Open topic. Once you create and save the topic, you cannot change the topic type. If you selected the topic type as open, you can access the original Group Restrictions area on the Restrictions tab.

The new Group or section topic option allows students to post to the same Discussion topic as every other group. Instructors can filter that topic by group or view all group posts at once.

Note: If you are assessing (grading) group discussions, using the Group or section topic option helps streamline the grading process.

 

If you have any questions about the updates, please contact CourseLink Support at:

courselink@uoguelph.ca
519-824-4120 ext. 56939