The Assignment activity is essentially a file drop-box for students to send you files. Often these files are Word Documents or PDFs but you can request any file type from your students and optionally limit what types of files student can submit.
Follow these directions to create an assignment in your course. We have included some the common and suggested settings for this type of activity. You can also refer to the Moodle documentation on the Assignment activity.
Enter your course and turn Edit mode on.
Scroll to where you want to add the Assignment activity.
Click the plus symbol to access the Add content drop-down menu.
NOTE: If you want to add between two existing activities or resources you will need to hover over the dashed line to have the Add content link appear.
Select Activity or resource option from the drop down.
Select Assignment from the Activity Chooser.
Set up the basics for your assignment under the General section:
NOTE: if you want students to fill out a form provide that form as DOCX, do NOT give students a fillable PDF as the grading interface in Moodle may not display their responses and would require a manual download to grade.
OPTIONAL: Expand and populate the Availability section:
All availability restrictions are optional and you can enable as many or as few of these as possible.
All times are are set in Military (24 hour clock instead of 12).
NOTE: This date and its function is NOT communicated to students. If you want to prevent late work from being submitted ensure Due-Date and Cut-off dates match.
Expand and populate the Submission types section:
This section is all about what students can submit to you.
NOTE: If this section is empty, all file types are allowed. If you want to restrict or expand the accepted file types, you can enter or remove the individual file extensions.
Expand and populate the Feedback types section:
This section is how you provide feedback to students when grading their submissions.
Expand and populate the Notifications section:
This section determines who gets emails about submissions and feedback.
Expand and populate the Grade section:
Make any other changes desired on this page.
Scroll to the bottom of this page.
Click the Save and display button.
It is important to grade and provide timely feedback to all your students for assignment submissions. The following directions will walk you through how to grade the assignment activity in Moodle.
You also have the ability to grade assignment submissions in bulk offline.
Enter the course you wish to grade in.
Click the Assignment link.
Click the Grade button.
Click the funnel button if you wish to filter the students:
NOTE: This is ideal for detecting those who have resubmitted an assignment after you have graded their first submission!
Review the student’s submission:
OR
If the view is too narrow you can toggle which pane dominates the screen.
NOTE: On a smaller screens the PDF editor pane will appear at the top and the submission information pane will be below.
Enter a grade in the Grade out of … text box.
NOTE: If you mark down for late work and have Due Dates set in the Assignment Settings there will be notes about the time the work was submitted by the student.
If you wish you provide feedback and have it enabled in your Assignment Settings you can:
When satisfied, click the Save and show next button.
NOTE: If you do not want the student to receive an email notification of the grade change un-check the Notify student checkbox at the bottom.
It will automatically move you to the next student.
NOTE: If you have it set to filter the assignments that Require grading you will get an error message when you reach the last student because there are no more students that require grading.
If you need instructions to give your students to guide them in using the Assignment Activity you might direct students to our article on Turning in Homework with Moodle.
A common request from the DRC is added time for students to submit an assignment. If you are asked to extend a due date for a student you can use these steps to accomplish this.
NOTE: These directions are specifically for the Assignment activity. Extensions for Quiz activities are set up differently.
Enter the Assignment you wish to add a Due date extension for.
Click the View all submissions button.
Select the students you wish to give a due-date extension to.
From the With selected… drop-down menu select the Grant extension option.
Click the Go button.
Set the Extension due date to the new date and time.
Click the Save changes button.
Here are some articles to help you troubleshoot some of the common issues faculty have experienced with the Assignment Activity: