Scott Carter's Technology Blog

Due to unforeseen changes in the recent upgrade of Moodle, there's now a new way to delete courses you're no longer using:

1. Login to the course you want to delete.

2. Click on "Settings" in your Administration area.

3. Change the course category (found at the top of the page) to "X - Delete Courses." It's at the bottom of the list.

4. Click "Save changes" at the bottom of the page.

Once a week or so, I'll clear out the courses in this category. If you'd like to remove the course immediately from your list, do one of the following *after* moving the course to the "X-Delete Courses" category:

1. Click "Unenroll me from _____" in your Administration area.

2. If that's not available, click on "Assign Roles" in your Administration area. Click on "Teacher." Click on your name in the left column. Click the remove button.

Any questions, let me know. Spring students should begin loading into courses toward the middle of next week. Remember to include "2010" in front of your CRN for this term. Starting summer term, put "2011" in front of the CRN.

Hi all,

This has come up a number of times recently, so I thought I'd give you some tips on how you can see what students are doing in your course. This is especially useful when a student claims they weren't able to login or had other technical issues.

1. Click on your Participants link (usually in the upper left). Here you'll see a complete list of students, as well as the last time the student logged into your course.

2. Click on a student's name.

3. If you have instructor access to the course -- students will not be able to see this -- you will have an "Activity Reports" tab at the top. Select this.

4. As a default, usually the "Outline report" is displayed, which shows you the number of times they clicked on various items in their course, as well as the last time they looked at each particular item.

5. If you click on "Complete report," you will see every item, whether they've looked at it or not.

6. Perhaps the most useful, though, is the "All logs" link, which gives you a list of everything your student has done in the course, including the time it was done.

As a side note, you will most likely find that there is a distinct correlation between the amount of time a student spends in a course and their grade. Imagine that. :)

Any questions, let me know.

Cheers,
Scott

I've had a number of Instructors ask me lately if it's possible to create a backup of a Moodle course. The answer is yes, it's actually surprisingly easy, and it's something I recommend all instructors do at least once a term. Moodle can create a .zip file that will be stored in your course's Files area in case you ever want to restore your course back to an earlier version -- or even restore it to a new version of the course, which is incredibly helpful if you want to teach a course again but don't want to erase old student content. You can even download this file to your computer so you can upload this to Moodle later. (It doesn't even have to be the Moodle here at WOU.)

Here's how you do it:

1. When looking at your course homepage, click on Backup on the left, under your Administration links.

2. The next screen will allow you to select what parts of your course you want included in your backup file. As a default, the backup file will include everything -- including student content (grades, forum posts, etc.) -- unless you tell it otherwise.

3. When you've got everything set the way you want, scroll to the bottom and click Continue. The next screen will show you a list of what it's going to do. After reviewing it to make sure it's what you want, click Continue again.

4. Depending on the size of your course,* it could take a few minutes for Moodle to generate the backup file. When it's finished, it will show you a message that reads, "Backup completed successfully." Click Continue.

5. You will be shown the "backupdata" folder in your Files area. Any backups you've created will be listed. From here, you can click on a file to save it to your own computer or click on "Restore" when you're ready to restore a backup over an existing course or to a new course. One note: The restore process defaults to a new course shell unless you tell it otherwise.

* Some large courses (such as those containing video files) have had issues lately with Moodle's backup tool. We're working on resolving this.

Upcoming One-Hour Workshops

All workshops are free for Western Oregon University faculty and staff. Although drop-ins are always welcome, space permitting, you may reserve your space in the class by emailing the instructor. Individual instruction is also offered on many other topics.

Thursday, February 4: Moodle Solutions - Getting Started with Online Course Tools
By now, most of you have probably heard about Moodle. Already more than 150 faculty members are making use of this great online learning management system to share documents in a password-protected environment, communicate with students via forums, deliver quizzes, and share grades, among other things. In this introductory workshop, you will get a chance to create your own course shell and learn how to use the most popular tools. Location: HL108. Instructor: Scott Carter (carters@wou.edu). Workshop: 8:30 a.m. - 9:30 a.m.

Friday, February 5: Moodle Solutions - Getting Started with Online Course Tools
By now, most of you have probably heard about Moodle. Already more than 150 faculty members are making use of this great online learning management system to share documents in a password-protected environment, communicate with students via forums, deliver quizzes, and share grades, among other things. In this introductory workshop, you will get a chance to create your own course shell and learn how to use the most popular tools. Location: HL108. Instructor: Scott Carter (carters@wou.edu). Workshop: 8:30 a.m. - 9:30 a.m.

Monday, February 8: Moodle Q & A
If you're already using Moodle, you've probably accumulated questions on some of the best ways to use it -- whether it's on the gradebook, on quizzes, or some other tool. This one hour Q&A session will give you an opportunity to get your questions answered. If I don't know it, then it's highly likely someone in the room might. Location: HL108. Instructor: Scott Carter (carters@wou.edu). Workshop: 12:00 p.m. - 1 p.m.

Friday, February 12: Dreamweaver Level I: The Basics of Creating a Personal Web Page at WOU
Learn to use Dreamweaver to create and update Web pages located in your "public_html" folder. It's much easier than you think. Location: HL108. Instructor: Scott Carter (carters@wou.edu). Time: 8:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m.

Monday, February 15: Excel Basics: Formulas, Formatting, and Charts
Learn how to use formulas to automate the more tedious tasks, as well as how to use Excel's powerful chart wizard. Location: HL108. Instructor: Scott Carter (carters@wou.edu). Time: 8:30 a.m.. to 9:30 a.m.

Welcome to Winter 2010!

Here's a quick tip that might prove helpful. Did you know that everyone with a PawPrint account at WOU -- meaning all students, staff, and faculty -- have access to their own Web space?

It's called the P: drive, or your public_html area. It shows up when you login on campus, or via Remote Desktop. Anything you save into your P: drive is automatically available on the Internet.

How does it work? It's simple. Just save a file into your P: drive, then open your Internet browser and type your Web address:

http://www.wou.edu/~username09

Of course, you'd replace "username09" with your own PawPrint login. If you don't have an index.html file, then your browser will just list the files in your P: drive. Anyone can then open or copy these files -- though no one can change the originals via the Web.

You can also create real Web pages of course, but this is an easy way to share files with others without having to use a Web editor.

Note: This is an update of an earlier post, since creating courses on WOU Online has changed a bit.

For Instructors New to the Moodle Environment:

If you want a new Moodle course shell, just email me, Scott Carter, at carters@wou.edu. Please give me the full title, the CRN, and your preferred enrollment key (course password). When the course has been created, I'll email you to let you know. You will have "teacher" access to your course, meaning you're all set to start working on it. When it's ready, all you have to do is give your students the address (http://online.wou.edu) and let them know that they login with their Pawprint credentials (in other words, their network/email login).

For Instructors Familiar with the Moodle Environment:

If you get to the point where you'd like to create your own courses without waiting on me, then I'm happy to give you "course creator" access. Just contact me (caters@wou.edu) and we can discus it.

Assuming I've given you this access, here's what you do:

1. Login to WOU Online (http://online.wou.edu).

2. Under "My Courses" on the left, click on the "All courses" link.

3. Scroll to the bottom and click "Add a new course."

4. On the Settings page, change the category to the appropriate category for your course.

5. Type the name of your course. If possible, follow this protocol: Let's say your name is John Jones. If the name of your course was ENG104: Introduction to Literature," the CRN was 12345, and you were teaching it in Fall 2007, then you type the following as the full name: "ENG104: Introduction to Literature (Fall 2007, Jones, CRN12345)". Short name would be ENG104_Jones_12345". We realize that this method may not fit all circumstances, but if you have questions, just contact me. We're trying to keep the courses as organized as possible.

6. Since students are now automatically loaded into the courses by CRN, you need to enter a CRN in the Course ID field preceded by the academic year. Don't enter the letters "CRN." Just enter the number. The students are added each night for the first two weeks of the term.*

If your CRN was 12345, then you would put the following in the Course ID field: 201012345

*Please note: You must continue to put 2010 in front of the CRN until Summer 2011. We are in the 2010 academic year until then.

7. The rest of the options are customizable, and you'll have to experiment with them -- though if you're unsure what an option does, it's best to leave it alone. However, you still need to assign an enrollment key. Even though students are loaded automatically by CRN, you need an enrollment key to prevent anyone in the system from getting into your course. Enter that towards the bottom of that same Settings page.

Any questions, please contact me.

Below is a short video (three minutes) demonstrating how to create a course if you have been given course creator access. Please note: The video has not been updated to include the recent change requiring you to put the academic year (2010) in front of the CRN.

(Direct link to full size video)

Since there's been a few changes to the way we handle the Moodle classes, and because there are so many new folks starting to use Moodle (about sixty of you attended one of the four recent Moodle workshops), I thought you could use a few reminders:

1. Don't forget to enter the CRN for your course. This should be entered in the Course ID box in your Settings menu.

2. Students are now automatically loaded by CRN. You no longer need to give them the enrollment key. This will happen at 2 a.m. on Monday and then every night for the next two weeks. When they login, they will simply see the courses pop up on their WOU Online homepage. They just click the course link and away they go. Important: If you do not enter a CRN, your students will not be automatically added to your course.

3. You must still enter an enrollment key (also found in the Settings menu); otherwise any student in the system will be able to enter your course.

4. The Online Classes page has been updated to help students. If they're having trouble getting in, please direct them to this page:
http://www.wou.edu/provost/online/