Getting Started with

Exeter Learning Environment

A guide for teachers
_________________________________________________________________________

Exeter Learning Environment (ELE) is the virtual learning environment

supported by the University of Exeter and which replaces WebCT. As well as
allowing you to organise and present course materials, ELE makes it easy to
provide students with a range of learning tools – such as discussion forums and
assessments.

This guide is for tutors, teaching assistants and staff involved with the creation and
maintenance of modules on ELE. It is designed to support training and as a quick
reference for most common tasks. A comparison table is included to help users of
WebCT find the equivalent tool in ELE.

ELE is based on the popular and widely used learning environment software called
Moodle. Moodle help and resources will be applicable to ELE.
Contents

Section Page
Part 1
1 Logging in to ELE 2
2 Module page layout 2
3 Editing your module 2
4 Adding a title or text to your module’s homepage 3
5 Adding a block tool (calendar) 5
6 Uploading material 6
7 Create a web page 8
8 Cleaning up your homepage and reorganising content 8
9 Adding links to web sites 9
10 Adding forums and discussion topics 10
11 Inserting media content (images, audio, video) 10
12 ELE settings 11

Part 2
Assessments and Assignments
13 Adding a quiz 13
14 Assignments (essays and presentations) 17

Part 3
Collaborative tools
15 Groups and roles 21
16 Adding a choice activity (poll) 22
17 Wikis (from Teaching with Moodle) -
18 Databases 23

Reference
19 WebCT/ELE tool comparison table 29
20 Help and online ELE/Moodle resources 31

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Part 1
_________________________________________________________________________

1. Logging in to ELE

• Open a web browser (Mozilla Firefox or Internet Explorer)

• In the address bar near the top of the browser window enter the link:
http://vle.exeter.ac.uk/ and press return.
• Navigate to the department and module you require using the lists. Or type in part of
the course name or module code in search box at the bottom of the screen.
• Select the module and if requested enter your University username and password.

Tip: Bookmark or add to favourites before entering details on the log-in

page.

2. Module page layout

A module page is divided into three columns; a wide central pane and two narrower side
columns. The narrow outer columns contain blocks. Blocks are small panels that contain
tools or information like the calendar or news feeds.

The central column is the main area, to which documents, links to web resources, and
activities such as assessments, may be added.

The centre column is divided horizontally into series of boxes. The first box is intended as
a header to put a title or any introductory text, and below this are numbered boxes for
‘topics’ into which the module’s materials can be organised.

3. Editing your module

In order to make changes to your module you need to click the Turn Editing On button at
the top right of the screen

When editing is enabled, two drop-down menus appear in each topic area. From these
you can choose to add either resources or activities.

Resources may be: links to materials that have been uploaded from your computer to the
ELE server; web pages that have created within ELE itself; or links to external web pages.

Activities include: posting to a forum; submitting an assignment, completing a quiz; or

submitting a database entry – they are usually interactive.

Tip: Click on the Help icon to find out more about a setting or feature

Tip: Switch your Role using the drop-down box. Selecting ‘Student’ lets
you view the module as a student to check what they can see.

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The tables below lists the icons used to change the layout of your ELE page and control
what is visible to students.

4. Adding a title or text to your module’s homepage

There are two ways you can add text to your homepage; by choosing Insert a label from
the Choose a Resource… drop-down list, or by using the pencil icon to edit the default
label located at the top of each topic area.

The difference between the two methods is that you can move the label you added
yourself to another topic area, whereas the existing label must remain at the top of the
topic area and cannot be hidden. For this reason, it is best to include topic headings and
descriptions in the existing topic label and add any other text to a new label.

Inserting a new label

• Turn editing on.
• From the Add a resource… drop down menu (located in each topic area)
choose Insert a label.
• Type or paste your text in the text box.
• Click Save and return to course.

Using the pencil icon to edit the label of a topic area

• Turn editing on.
• Click the pencil icon to add some text.
• In the editor provided (see the screenshot below), add your text and format as
required.
• Click Save and return to course.

You can edit the label by clicking on the pencil icon beneath the text

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You can copy and paste text from other programs (email, Word etc.) into ELE. But if you
do, select the text and use the Clean Word HTML icon in the text editor to remove
unnecessary formatting that may affect the way your page displays.

You can include pictures in the label to create a more interesting look to the topic. The
insert image icon . The image browser window is shown below with the steps to upload
the file and create the link to the image. They are:

• Click the Browse button (1). Locate the file on you own computer and click
Open
• A link should appear in the box to the right of the Browse button. Click on
the Upload button (2)
• The file then appears in the File Browser window. Click on the link (3) and
the URL will appear in the bar at the top (4). Click OK to finish.

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5. Adding a block tool (calendar)

The calendar block displays course and group events and also allows users to add their
own events.

To add the calendar block to your course page

• Turn editing on.
• Scroll to the bottom right of the page. The last block in the third column will
allow you to add new blocks.
• In the Blocks block, choose Calendar from the drop-down menu.
• The Calendar will appear at the bottom of the right-hand column, just above the
Blocks block.

To add events to your course calendar

• Turn editing on.
• Scroll to the Calendar block and click on the month and year link to view the
calendar.
• Click on the New Event button in the top, right of the page.
• Choose whether the event is a User event (can only be seen by you) or a
Course event (can be seen by all course members).
• Enter the name for the link that will appear on your course page.
• Enter the (optional) description.
• Choose the date and time.
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 • Add an optional duration.

Some activity dates (such as assignment due dates) will appear automatically in the
calendar.

Tip: When viewing the calendar, hovering the mouse over a highlighted
date for which there is an entry will bring up the time and description of
the event.

6. Uploading material

File types

You can add a variety of file types to your module.

Icon File type How the file is displayed

In the current browser window; includes ELE

PDF (.pdf)
Powerpoint (.ppt)
Web pages (.html)
Word documents (.doc)
navigation at top of page. Print and download
options included in PDF viewer.
Asks user to open or download to own computer
In the current browser window. Browser back button
to return to ELE.
Asks user to open or download to own computer

Excel spreadsheets (.xls) Asks user to open or download to own computer

In the current browser window. Browser back button
Plain text (.txt)
to return to ELE.
In the current browser window; includes ELE
Images (.jpg)
navigation at top of page.

While it is possible to upload many different file formats, we recommend converting

documents and uploading them as pdf.

Converting to pdf will often reduce the file size significantly; so documents are more
manageable and download quicker.

Documents can be converted to pdf in the following ways:

• Adobe Acrobat (when installed right clicking on the file will provide the option to
convert to PDF).
• The latest version of Word allows you to save a document as a pdf via the ‘Save
As’ menu option.
• PrimoPDF. A free pdf converter available via http://www.primopdf.com/ On offer
are a free version and a trial version – download the free version. Install the
program. Open the file you wish to convert in its usual program and select ‘Print’
from the File menu. Choose PrimoPDF from the list of printers and decide where to
save the new pdf file.

If students will need to download and edit a Word document or an Excel spreadsheet; or if
a ppt contains notes or an animation then the original format should be used.

Please contact ELE support for advice regarding audio and video

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Adding files

You can either upload a file and create the links as you go along, or add all the files you
need to your module’s file area first, and then link to them on your course page later.

To add a file

• Turn editing on.

• Click the Add a resource… drop-down menu
• Choose Link to a file or web site.
• Enter the name for the link that will appear on your course page.
• Enter the (optional) summary.
• Click Choose or upload a file.
o A pop-up window will appear showing your file area in ELE. Click Upload a
file to upload a file from your computer.
o Click Browse at the next screen and navigate to the file you want to
upload, select it and click Open.
o The location of the file has been put into the filename field.
o Click Upload this file. Your file is now in your file area.
o To choose the file click Choose under the actions.
o The location of the file has been put into the Location field.
• Window: Choose Same window.
• Click Save and display.

To add a folder/file to your ELE files area

You may want to add files to your ELE course for future use, without adding them
individually to your course page. It is a good idea to upload your files to the file area.
Organising files in the files areas then makes it easy to display multiple files by creating a
link on the homepage to the folder (see below: Linking to a Folder).

• Click the Files link in the Administration block.

• Click Make a folder to create a new folder in which to store your files.
• Enter a name for your folder and click Create.
• Click on the new folder name to navigate to your folder.
• Click Upload a file.
o Click Browse at the next screen and navigate to the file you want to
upload, select it and click Open.
o The location of the file has been put into the filename field.
o Click Upload this file.
o Your file is now in your file area, ready to be added to your course page.

If you link to individual files from the course page and then move the files to another folder
in your ELE files area, the links to the files will break. Therefore, you should attempt to
organise your files in folders to avoid having to manually re-link files in future.

Tip: You can only upload one file at a time. To upload multiple files you must
use ZIP files. You can then unzip the files in ELE so you can link to individual
files.

Uploading multiple files (using compressed ‘ZIP’ files)

• On your computer put the files to upload in a folder.

• Right-click on the folder and select Send to > Compressed (zipped) Folder. A
new file will be created with the name of the folder, ending in .zip.
• In ELE, go to ‘files’ in the Administration block and upload the .zip file.
• Select the unzip link that appears to the right of the filename. This will unzip the file
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 and recreate your folder with all the files inside.

Linking to a folder

The WebCT Learning Module doesn’t have an equivalent in ELE; topics are used
instead. However, you may have a series of files you’d like to link to without having
to add them individually.

• From the Add a Resource drop-down menu, choose the Display a directory link.
• Enter a name to label the link, and a summary if you wish.
• Choose the directory to display from the drop-down list.
• Click Save and return to the course

Back on the main page, clicking on the folder icon you will now see all the files in the folder
arranged by name.

When you need to add a file to the list, upload it to the relevant folder in the Files area, and
the link will automatically display it to the students. Bear in mind that you can only display
these files sorted by name, and that you cannot hide individual files.

Tip: Take care, and be consistent when naming your files- as these names
will be used as the links.

7. Create a Web page

For small amounts of text that need to be added quickly, it is very straightforward to add
material to a web page. Pages created like this are easier for your students to view. Word
document added to your course, need to be downloaded before they can be viewed by
your students, whereas web pages are viewed instantly.

• Turn editing on.

• Click Add a resource… then select Compose a web page within the topic you
wish to add a web page.
• Type a Name for the web page.
• Optionally, add a Summary. The summary is displayed on the Resources index
page.
• Type or paste your text in the Full text box.
• Choose whether you want this resource to open in the same window or a new
window.
• Click Save and display to view the web page.

If you choose New Window, you can choose what attributes the new window will have.
Make sure you allow the window to be resized and scrolled; otherwise your students
might not be able to read to the bottom of the page! We recommend that unless there is a
specific need, that pages are displayed in the same window. This avoids creating a
cluttered desktop and helps the student focus on the material.

8. Cleaning up your course page and reorganising content

Deleting items
• Turn editing on.
• Click the icon to delete an item from the module.
• You will be asked to confirm that you want to delete the item.
• Once deleted the item cannot be recovered.

Tip: This does not delete files from your ELE file area; these must be deleted
from the Files section.

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Hiding items
• If you have materials that you do not want students to access until a later date, you
can hide the item.
• To hide an item, make sure you have turned editing on, then click the icon. This
link will still appear in your view, but will be greyed out. Switch your role to Student
if you want to check how your module looks to students.
• To reveal an item, click the icon.
• You can hide either individual items, or entire topic areas.

Moving items
• Turn editing on.
• Click the icon next to the item you want to move. On the page that then
appears, click on the symbol where you want the item to move
the item and drag the item to a new position. Items can moved about within topics,
and between topics. The order of the topics can be changed using the up/down
arrows at the right hand side of each topic.

Indenting items
• Turn editing on.
• You can indent items under the label by clicking the icon.
• To undo the indent click the icon.

9. Adding links to web sites

There are two ways to add links to websites; one is to use the ‘Link to a file or web site’
which creates a new resource link on your ELE course page. The other is to create a text
hyperlink within a page using the WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editor.

Link to a web site

• Turn editing on.
• From the Add a resource… drop-down menu choose Link to a file or web site.
• Enter a Name that describes the website you are linking to.
• Optionally, add a Summary (The summary is displayed on the Resources index
page).
• Enter the full location for the site including the http://
• From the Window drop-down menu choose New window. This means the student
can close the window and return to ELE easily.
• Scroll down and click Save and display.

Using the WYSIWYG editor to add a link to a web site

These steps apply wherever you see the WYSIWYG editor (shown below).

• Enter your text into the WYSIWYG editor.

• Select the text that will become the link.
• Click the chain icon (circled above).
o Enter the full location for the site including the ‘http://’ part of the address
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 o Choose a Target, such as New Window.
o Click OK.
• Scroll down and click Save changes.

Tip: To add the address of a website, click [Search for web page….] This will
open up a new browser window. Find the site you wish to link to and
highlight the address. Copy (Ctrl + C) and paste (Ctrl + V) it into the location
box. This will minimise the chance of you entering an incorrect web address.

10. Adding Forums and Discussion Topics

New modules have, by default, a News Forum to which all participants are subscribed;
and can be used to email all participants. When you post a message in the News
Forum it will be emailed to your students’ email accounts.

The News Forum is intended for tutor use and does not allow students to post items. You
can add additional forums to your course that can be set to allow students to post
discussion topics and reply to others.

You may wish to change the name of the News Forum to ‘Important Announcements’ and
use it announce exam dates, timetable alterations etc.

Adding a new forum to your course

• Turn editing on.
• Click the Add an activity… drop-down menu of the top topic.
• Choose Forum.
• Give the forum a name that will be meaningful to your students.
• Keep the forum type as: Standard forum for general use.
• Provide a Forum introduction for your students.
• Click the Save and display button.

You will now see the description for your forum and can start adding discussion topics.

Creating a new discussion topic

• Turn editing on.
• Click Add a new discussion topic.
• Give your topic a subject.
• Write and format your message.
• Click the Post to forum button

Once posted, you will have 30 minutes to edit your message, unless you click Mail now in
which case your message will be sent within a few minutes and can not be edited.

11. Inserting Media Content

ELE makes it easy to add media content to your course, automatically recognising your
media type and adding the right sort of link to your web page so students can access it.
Media content is added using the same steps as for adding a link to a file (section 6).

Images

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Can be uploaded to the section or added to a web page using the WYSIWYG Editor’s
Insert Image (circled below).

Video

Please contact the e-Learning Team (e-learning@ex.ac.uk) who will advise; often videos
need to be processed and uploaded to a university server. If, however, you are simply
adding a link to a video hosted on, for example, YouTube, you can add a link as you would
for any website.

12. ELE Settings

You’re unlikely to need to change the majority of the default settings. However if you want
to add a description or change the way your content is organised, this is done in via the
Settings link found in the Administration block on your module’s page.

Module description

Using the WYSIWYG editor near the top of the page you can add a description of your
module. Bear in mind that the module description will appear along with the course name,
on any list of courses. If the module description is too long it will crowd the page.

Module format

To switch from Topic to Collapsed Topic or Weekly format. Go to the course settings page
(Settings button in the Administration Block). Below the WYSIWYG editor select from
the options the format you want then scroll down to bottom of the page and click Save
changes.

The different formats are:

• Topics whereby content is organised into a series of numbered sections which can
also be labelled with a header. The advantage of this format is its flexibility, and it
is particularly suited to shorter courses that don’t contain a large amount of content
or need to be divided by week. If you organise your content by theme or by type,
then Topics is best format to use.

• Weekly format organises the course into topics by week, with the date at the top of
each block, beginning with the module’s start-date. This format is excellent for
courses where the majority of the content is presented on a week-by-week basis.
Used in conjunction with the Calendar tool, can turn the course page into an
effective organiser for both students and staff. The disadvantage of this format is
that it requires all the modules content to be included in either a weekly topic or the
header topic. Be aware also that week dates are counted from the from course
start date in seven day blocks. The course start date is easily changed on the
module settings page.

• Collapsed Topics is the same as the standard topics format, but it turns each
topic into a collapsing box, so that the who page takes up less screen space when
all the topics are ‘collapsed’. This format is best used for modules which present
very large amounts of content on their top page.

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Part 2
_________________________________________________________________________

Creating Assessments and Assignments in ELE

These notes explain how to create on-line assessments and assignments in ELE,
the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) currently supported by the University of
Exeter. As well as guiding you through the process of setting up assessments and
assignments, there is information on how to organise your materials and process
and export the results.

Assessments and Assignments

In ELE an assessment, is termed a ‘quiz’. Tutors can create questions for online
quizzes in a variety of formats (short answer, multiple choice etc) and these are
stored in a database so that they can be re-used within the modules and
between other ELE modules. Most question types are marked automatically, and
the marks are recorded in the module’s grade book.

An ELE 'assignment' is a piece of work such as an essay or presentation.

Assignments can be completed on-line, typed directly into the browser, but it is
recommended they’re completed outside ELE then uploaded to the module,
where it will become available to the tutor.

13. Adding a quiz

1. Turn editing on
2. An ELE quiz is an activity. Add a quiz using the Add an activity drop down
menu from the desired topic/section.
3. On the assessment creation page enter a name a name, and some introduction
text (optional).
4. Look at the options available. The help icon (?) will tell you more about each
of these.

Timing: set the dates and times of availability, how long the student has
(in minutes) to complete the quiz, how long they may take between the
first, second, and subsequent attempts.

Display: determine how many questions to show on an individual page,

and how the questions should be delivered (sequential or random order for
example) and how potential answers should be arranged.

Attempts: set the number of attempts allowed.

Grading: the recorded grade can be set as: the highest grade (best result),
the average grade (across multiple attempts), or the first or last attempt.

Review options: controls the release of information to the student after

they have taken the quiz.

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 Security: offers several ways to help reduce cheating, including the
requirement for an invigilator password, and by using a secure window
restricting some of the things that students can do with their browsers.
However please bear in mind that these cannot prevent determined
efforts to cheat.

Common Module settings: allow you to assign the quiz to a particular

group of students, or to show/hide the quiz.

Overall Feedback: text that is shown to a student after they have

completed an attempt at the quiz. Set the grade boundaries and enter
text to deliver messages based on student’s score.

When you have finished with these settings, scroll to the bottom of the page and
click the Save and display button. You are then taken to your quiz.

Questions

With the quiz created, you now need to add some questions. You have several
options for doing this:

• Add existing questions from ELE.

• Import questions: ELE supports questions in several formats. For help and
advice on how to do this and getting questions from WebCT/Blackboard,
contact your ELE migration support person.
• Create questions using ELE

To create a new question, select a question type from the Create new question
drop—down menu:

Multiple Choice
Embedded Answers (Cloze)
Short Answer
Random Short Answer Matching
Numerical
Random
True/False
Calculated
Matching
Essay

The most commonly used type of question for formative tests are multiple choice
so we’ll use that as our example. For other types the process is the same, but
with slightly different the options. To access detailed information on how a
question type works, click the help icon next to the question type's title.

When creating a multiple choice question you are presented with the following
options:

Category: a default category is available but if you plan to use the

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 question in several quizzes it's a good idea to categorise them. You might
decide to categorise questions by theme or by difficulty. This can be done
later on.

Question name: You must provide a name for the question. This will not
be visible to students.

Question text: You can enter any text you wish in the Question text box,
and add links, pictures, or any web-compatible formatting. HTML is the
default format for questions.

Default Question Grade: You must provide a point value for the question.
This can be overridden for each quiz.

Penalty factor: You must specify what fraction of the achieved score
should be subtracted for each wrong response. This is only relevant if the
quiz has been set to adaptive mode and is allowing a learner to re-take a
question within the same quiz. The penalty factor should be a number
between 0 and 1. A penalty factor of 1 means that the student has to get
the answer right in his first response to get any credit for it at all. A
penalty factor of 0 means the student can try as often as he likes and still
get the full marks.

General Feedback: This is feedback that is given in response to any

answer, right or wrong. This could be used to give details about the
subject of the question.

Choices: You can provide as many choices to a multiple choice question as

you like, with specific feedback for each possible answer. You can supply
an answer, a grade, and detailed feedback. To add more choices, click
the Blanks for 3 more choices button. If you don’t need additional
choices, leave the remainder blank and they will be ignored.

Overall Feedback: Feedback can be provided for responses given, based on

their being correct, partially correct, or incorrect.

When you have finished, click the Save changes button to save the question. The
question will now appear in the question bank.

If you have set up a quiz previously or want to add questions to an existing quiz:

• select Quizzes from the Activity block on the homepage

• choose the quiz you want to update
• from the row of card-index style tabs at the top of the page, select edit

Managing Questions

Next to each question in the Action column, the following icons allow you to
change, move the questions or add them to the current quiz.

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 Icon
Add question to the current quiz
Move question to another category (context = category)
Edit the question or question settings
Preview question
Delete question

Select questions by checking the tick boxes. By then clicking you can to add
multiple questions to the quiz, or by clicking you can move a set of questions
to another group.

Questions added the quiz are listed on the left. If you need to reorder the
questions use the up and down arrows next to the question to move it up or
down. You can also change the grade for each question, and specify a maximum
grade for the quiz.

Before making the quiz available to students it is a good idea to preview all
questions, and to test the quiz making sure everything works as expected/ To do
this select the Preview tab in the quiz editor.

Adding Random Questions to a Quiz

A very useful feature is the ability to add a certain number of random questions.
Select a number of random questions to add from the drop-down box at the
bottom of the question bank and click the Add button. A different question will
be assigned each time from the category, making quizzes more challenging and
interesting where multiple attempts are allowed, and slightly more secure if
used in more formal exam conditions.

If you are adding random questions it is recommend that you create a category
for each set of questions.

Categories

On the Editing quiz page (where questions are added) you can move questions
from the category currently being viewed to another category, however to
create new categories you need to go to the Categories section under the edit
tab.

In the Categories section you can also edit category titles and organise your
category structure. ELE allows you to create sub categories so you could for
example create categories for topics and sub categories below these for sub-
topics, or question difficulty for example.

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Results

Selecting the Results tab brings up a list of students in the module who have
taken the quiz, along with grades for each attempt. The final grade is
highlighted in green. This may be the result of one attempt, or several,
depending on the settings chosen for the quiz. Additional options are:

Regrade

Resubmits all previous attempts for automatic marking. This is useful when you
have edited individual questions after attempts have been made. This can take a
long time if there are many attempts to process.

Manual Grading

The grade of any question in a quiz can be manually overridden, and a comment
added. Click on the mark (circled in the screenshot below) to see the question
detail and then follow the link make comment or override grade.

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There are also some question types that ELE does not grade automatically (for
example essay questions). Select the manual grading link, below the tabs at the
top of the page. The resulting report helps you grade questions of these types by
listing just the questions that still need to be graded.

Item analysis

This tab presents processed quiz data in a table, suitable for analysing the
performance of each question to evaluate the effectiveness of the quiz.

16. Assignments

ELE has several different types of assignment:

Online Text: the student types a passage of text directly into the
browser. It is recommended that longer pieces of text are composed and
saved on the student’s own computer and copied and pasted into the text
window.

Upload a single file: the student uploads once file, usually a Word
document though other file types are accepted.

Advanced uploading of files: the student can upload more than one file,
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 up to a limit set by the teacher.

Offline Activity: useful for setting tasks for your students which require
no online interaction, such as finding an item to bring to a seminar. This
type of assignment can still be marked online and feedback given.

Creating an assignment

An assignment is an activity, so you can add it to any section (i.e. week or topic)
in your module.

1. With editing switched on go to the Add an activity... drop-down list and

select Advanced uploading of files.
2. Enter the a name for the assignment and a description – the instructions for
the student.
3. Choose a maximum grade for the assignment.
4. Set availability dates.
5. Select a maximum upload size for submissions. This can be increased up to the
maximum upload size as specified in the settings page for your module, so you
may need to change that first if the maximum is insufficient.
6. Review and change any of the other options as required. Clicking the help icon
if you are not sure about any of these.
8. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click the Save and return to module
button.

To test the assignment: select Student from the Switch role to... drop-down list
on the main module page (next to the Turn editing on button at the top right of
the screen).

To submit an assignment the student needs to:

1. Click on the assignment link (within the topic or via the Assignment link in the
activities block). The assignment description will appear along with submission
options.
2. Click the Choose File button.
3. Select the file and click Open.
4. Click the Upload this file button.
5. Repeat the process (steps 2-4) to attach additional files up to the assignment’s
limit. If you have enabled Send for marking in the assignment settings, the files
will exist in the "submission draft" and are visible to the tutors. At this stage the
student still has the option to delete any of the uploaded files. They can do this
by clicking the delete icon (X) next to the filename.
6. Click Send for marking button. After sending for marking the student can no
longer delete, or upload more files.

Note: The date and time of the submission is recorded when the files are sent for
marking, not when they are first uploaded.

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Viewing Submitted Assignments

Once assignments are submitted you can download the submissions and, if
required, give a grade to each submission and provide formative feedback
through ELE.

1. Click the assignment name in the relevant section (within the topic or via the
Assignment link in the activities block)
2. Click on View submitted assignments
3. On the resulting page you will find a table with a row for each student. If they
have Draft submitted, you will see a link to a file. If you click on the file name it
will either open in a new browser window capable of viewing the document), or
it will ask you if you wish to save or open.

Providing Feedback

In the Status column to the right of the table, click the Update link. A form will
appear with an area for comments, and via a drop down list a the top allow you
to grade the assignment.

Feedback can be provided by entering text attaching a ‘response file’ if you have
annotated work or want to write feedback offline.

lf you wish to upload a response file you’ll need to do this first, as attaching the
file erases any unsaved text in the feedback area. When finished, click the save
changes button, or the save and show next button to continue marking.

Once the assignment has been graded the student can see their mark your
feedback, and any response files when they visit the assignment submission
page.

Managing Submissions

On the view submissions page, click the Update button next to the relevant
assignment. At the bottom of the resulting window you will see the submission
details.

If a student sends their files for marking before they are ready you have the
option to delete the file (X).

Or you may wish to lock the submissions and not allow further files to be added
before the deadline by clicking No more submissions. If you change your mind
you can click Revert to Draft.

Grades

All assessed activity in ELE is recorded in Grades. This provides an at-a-glance

view of the assessment pattern of each student. From the main module page
click the Grades link in the Administration block.

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A table appears, with rows representing each student and columns representing
each assessed activity. This is known as the Grader report. A total appears at the
far right and category subtotals appear if activities have been assigned to
categories. Several options are available:

Hover over a grade in any column and you will see the feedback given.
Click the name of an activity to be taken to its main page.
Click the reorder icon next to an activity name to sort the table by its grades.
If you need to change a grade click the Turn Editing on Button.
Click the Choose an action drop—down list to view other grade reports and
export (see below).

Exporting grades (Assessments or Assignments)

lf you decide to use ELE to record marks for assignments, or if you use ELE
quizzes for formal (summative) assessment, you may well need to export grades.
This is done via the Grader Report:

1. On the submissions page click the link See all course grades
2. In the Choose an action drop-down list, select any of the options under
Export to. If in doubt, choose Excel Spreadsheet.
3. Make any necessary changes in the Options section.
4. Check you are only exporting the grades you need.
5. Click the Submit button. The resulting page shows a preview of the grades
exported.
8. Click the Download button and save the file to your computer.

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Part 3
_________________________________________________________________________

Collaborative tools

15. Groups and Roles

It is possible to put students into groups to undertake collaborative work or small group
discussions.

The group editor available via the Administration panel is where groups can be created
and students allocated to a group. When you have set up your groups return to the
Homepage locate the activity you want to set for group work and click the group mode icon
(none/visible/separate). You can either specify an activities group mode individually like
this or via the ELE settings page change the default group setting for the entire module if
group work is particularly frequent and required for many different activities.

No groups: the students on the module are ungrouped.

Separate groups: each group can only see their own group, others are invisible.

Visible groups: each group works in their own group, but can also see other groups. (The
other groups' work is read-only.)

Assign roles

Some activity blocks allow you to assign a role. For example, it is possible to grant a
student teacher administration rights for an activity you may wish them to be responsible
for.

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16. Adding a Choice activity

The Choice activity allows students to select one option from a list. You can set the choice
to only allow a certain number of students to make a particular choice. This can be used to
facilitate student tutorial sign-ups.

To add a new choice activity to your course page

• Turn editing on.
• Click the Add an activity… drop-down menu of the top topic.
• Choose Choice.
• Give the choice a name that will be meaningful to your students.
• Provide instructions for your students in the Choice text area.
• Choose whether or not to limit the number of choices allowed for a particular item.
• Label each choice and set a limit if appropriate.
• Click the Save and display button.

A popular tool in WebCT is the sign-up sheet – this is not automatic to groups

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18. Databases

The database activity is a powerful, highly customizable, and yet easy to use
database. There are enormous creative possibilities for its use, ranging from
straightforward tutor use to store data, or present information, to fully
interactive student use for project or group work; whereby students contribute
to a database established by the tutor or design and build their own. Alongside
the wiki and forum activities, the database is an extremely useful collaborative
tool.

A database can be used to survey the members of the group and obtain student
feedback, share references to books, articles, URLs, and other resources, store
experimental or other research data, or collate fieldwork results that
incorporate image and geographical data: latitude and longitude data can be
used to link to Google Earth and Maps

A database is made up of fields and templates. Fields define the type of data the
database will store: text, dates, checkboxes, files, URLs, etc. Templates allow
you to control the visual layout of information when listing, viewing, or editing
database entries.

The basic process of setting up a database involves: adding the database activity
to the appropriate section of your course, setting the database options, creating
the fields for the data, editing database templates (if necessary), enter the data.

To create a database activity:

1. Select Database from the Add an activity drop-down menu in the course
section where you would like to add the activity.
2. On the Adding a new database page give the database a name and a
description.
3. Select the general options:

• Available from/to
• Viewable from/to: the dates the database is available for viewing, but not
open for data entry).
• Required entries: the number of entries each student is required to enter
before the database activity can be considered complete. The student will
see a reminder message if they haven’t submitted the required number of
entries.
• Entries required before viewing: the number of entries the student needs
to submit before they can see entries by other students. lf the student has
not submitted the required number of entries, he will only see the entry
page and not the list or single view pages.
• Maximum entries: the maximum number of entries the student can submit
before she is blocked.
• Comments: enables commenting on entries. The comments field appears
on the single view template when this is enabled.
• Require approval: allows you to require each entry to be approved by
someone with the appropriate role before other users can view it.
• RSS articles: enables you to publish an RSS feed of entries in the database.
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 The option here sets the number of entries available in the feed. RSS
feeds need to be enabled by your system administrator.
• Allow posts to be rated: lets you allow posts to be rated, which will enter
a score in the gradebook for the student’s submissions in the database.
The grade is set using the drop-down menu below this option.
• Group mode This is another location in which to set the group mode for
the activity. If group mode is forced in the course settings then this
setting will be ignored.
• Visible This determines whether students may view the activity or not.

4. Click the “Save changes” button and you will be taken to the database setup
page,

Designing the database

With careful planning creating the database itself will be easier and will reduce
the need to go back and alter or add fields later, although this is possible should
you need to.

The field definitions create the basic structure of the database and determine
what kind of information students can enter into your database.

To create the fields for your database:

On the database setup page, select the field type you want to add from the
Create a new field drop-down menu. Enter a field name and a field description.
The field name is used to create the templates, so make it unique and long
enough to be descriptive, but not too long to retype. If necessary, add/select the
options for each field type. For example, you can set the height and width of the
text area generated by the text area field,

You are provided with a choice of 12 data field types:

• Checkbox: to select one or more checkboxes. To add multiple checkboxes,

enter each option on a different line in the options text field. (lf you want
to ensure that a student actively selects only one of the options it’s better
to use the radio buttons field.
• Date: for students to enter a date by picking the day, month, and year
from a drop-down list.
• File: upload a file of any type from their computer (if you want students
to upload images it’s better to use the picture field.
• Latitude/longitude: enter a geographic location by specifying the
location’s latitude and longitude. When students view the entry, links are
automatically generated to geographic data services such as Google Maps,
Google Earth, or Multimap.
• Menu: to select an option from a drop-down menu. Enter each option on a
different line in the options text field.
• Menu (multi select): to select multiple options from a drop-down menu (by
holding down the Control or Shift key as they click).
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 • Number: enter a number (positive, negative, or zero).
• Picture: to upload an image file from their computer.
• Radio buttons to select just one option from a list. If used, the button is a
required field; a student may only submit his database entry after
selecting an option.
• Text: enter text up to 60 characters in length, for longer text, or for text
that requires formatting—such as headers and bullet points—the text area
field should be used.
• Textarea: to enter text longer than 60 characters in length and/or include
formatting such as headers and bullet points.
• URL For students to enter a URL. Selecting Autolink the URL will make
the URL a clickable link, and entering a forced name for the link means
that the name will be used for the hyperlink.

When all the desired fields have been added your database is ready. Test the
database by adding some data and check the add view and the list view. It is a
good idea to switch roles and check the database from the student’s perspective.

Editing Templates

After the fields have been defined for a database it is then possible to edit the
database templates. The templates are in the form of a web page with tags that
the database module interprets- calling up the data to display.

There are three main templates: List, Single, and Add. The three other
templates: RSS, CSS, and JavaScript aren’t necessary for basic database use.

The default List, Single and Add templates may well suffice, but in some cases it
could be desirable to modify the template to make the data entry form clearer,
perhaps by grouping certain items or altering the layout. Or, you may wish to
control what appears on the list view (the view used for browsing the records).
For example, if the data base was to be used as an image gallery, including a the
database entry as a small thumbnail image on this template would be probably
be useful.

It is not difficult to edit the template to improve upon the default settings and
create a customized interface.

To edit a template:

1. On the database page, click the Templates tab.

2. Click one of the template links below the row of tabs.
3. When you are done, click the Save template button.

The Add template is used to create and edit new entries. In this template, data
tags are replaced with the form element for the field in square brackets eg:
[[Item]].

With the cursor positioned on the main window, clicking on one of the available
tags in the left hand list will add it to the form. Commands are enclosed by has

25
signs eg: ##comment##. Use the WYSIWYG editor to modify the form.

It’s important to list every field you want the user to fill in on this template. If a
field is missing the user won’t be able to add or edit that item of data.

Entering and managing data

When the database is set up you and your students can begin to enter data. It is
still possible to change the database settings, structure and templates, but this
could lead to inconsistency in the data, or confusion for users.

The Teaching with Moodle book says that it is a good idea to monitor the data
and suggests the following ways to maintain the quality of the entries:

Comments
Encouragement and feedback could also be given by adding the comment
function to the database to encourage students to improve their entries.

Require approval
This option hides an entry from the rest of the group until the tutor or someone
granted with approval permission on that activity checks and approves it.

Grades for entries

Numerical grades, or an alternative custom scale (to assign a qualitative
grade) to an entry to mark work. When you rate an entry, the grade is added to
the gradebook, in the same way as a rated forum post. The comments box will
enable you to provide more explicit feedback.

If you need to allow students to comment or rate entries:

• From the homepage, and with editing switched on, click on the Update
icon next to the database.
• Under the Settings tab make sure that Comments is enabled.
• Select the Override tab, select Student from the list then change the
comment/rate permission to Allow.

The roles and groups facilities can used together to give additional flexibility to a
module’s database project. Using the Assign roles tab students can be given
teacher status on that activity to allow them to build and fully modify a
database. If you then put the activity into separate groups mode, groups of
students can create their own database and submit it at the end for grading.

Export

To use the data elsewhere: to analyse or share the data you can export it as a
csv, Excel or ODS (open office) file.

Correctly formatted data can be imported to another course or ELE site’s

database.

26
1. Select the export tab
2. choose format (csv, Excel or ODS).
3. choose the fields to export (pictures cannot be exported)
4. click Export database records and save the file to your computer.

27
28
Reference Section
19. WebCT to ELE tool comparison

WebCT ELE Description/ quick comparison

COURSE TOOLS
Creates a News forum (if one doesn't
exist), and item is a forum post. A link
Announcements Latest news (Add new topic) appears on the homepage block.
Allows attachments. Posts accessible
via 'Forums'.
Like WebCT. Assessment set-up similar
and questions added from a 'bank'.
Assessments Quizzes (Activities) Allows similar question types. e.g.
multiple choice, short answer
questions.
Questions (Administration) Question bank.
Use database activity to create a
Survey no equivalent
survey.
Choices (Activities) Quick survey / poll.
Like WebCT. Allows students to submit
Assignments Assignments (Activities)
work as attachments
Adds thumbnail calendar to
homepage. Clicking on the month
Calendar Calendar (Blocks) brings up detailed month view and
allows new events to be added.
Students can add own events.
Like WebCT. Send messages in real
Chat Chats (Activities)
time to users currently on-line.
Similar to Chat but not limited to
Messages (Blocks) specific module. System-wide
messaging.
Like WebCT. View a list of people
Who's Online Online users (Blocks)
currently online.
Similar to WebCT. Allows nested or
threaded discussions, new topics, and
Discussions Forums (Activities) old/new-first arrangement. Can only
edit your own posts for thirty minutes
following posting.
Options- compose a text/web page
Goals no equivalent
(Resource)
Options- build on page under a topic
Learning Modules no equivalent heading or Display directory
(Resource)
Display a directory (Add a Provides a direct link for students to a
resource) folder
Local Content no equivalent
Send message to multiple uses (via
Participants). Settings can be used to
Mail Participants (People)
email messages when offline. Or, use
University email.
Media Library

29
 Functions in much the same way as
WebCT. Offers fully-editable HTML
with images etc. and neat
alphabetical arrangement. Possible to
Glossary Glossaries (Activities)
link to glossary terms throughout
entire course automatically. Can't add
single glossary entries as resources
though.
Options- create web pages? add-in tool
Image Gallery no equivalent
or link to site e.g. Picassa
Audio/Video no equivalent Options- create in web page
Like WebCT. View a list of people
Profile Participants (People)
currently enrolled on the module.
SCORM/AICC (Add an
SCORM
activity)
Add IMS Content Package
(Add a resource)
Finds keywords in text/html. Global
search requires that administrator
Global Search (Blocks) /
Search runs index tool after major
Search Forums (Blocks)
changes/additions (under Statistics
tab).
no equivalent Options- compose a text/web page
Syllabus
(Resource)
Similar to WebCT. Links opens in new
or same window (ELE navigation bar
Link to a file or website can be retained). No separate web
Web Links
(Add a resource) links page (accessed with other
resources from Activities block), but
could be grouped in a topic.
New. Tutor can create databases for
students to update. Field types
Databases (Activities)
include URL and decimal Lat/Long and
linking to Google Earth/Maps etc.
Wiki (add an Activity)
OU Wiki (add an Activity)
Journal (add an Allows student to make notes. Single
Activity/Activities) page.
New. Allows tutor to create lessons
Lesson with linked pages to provide a 'path'
and questions with feedback.

MY (STUDENT) TOOLS
Similar to WebCT; records students'
My Grades Grades (Administration)
progress
My Files no equivalent
My Progress no equivalent
Notes no equivalent Options- journal or blog activities.

DESIGNER/INSTRUCTOR TOOLS
Some things need to be managed at
Manage Course (Administration) site level e.g. permissions for auto-
linking.
File storage. Folder creation and file
File Manager
Files (Administration) organisation. Upload file allows a
single file to be uploaded.

30
Assessment Manager Quizzes (Activities) or
Grades (Administration)
Assignment Dropbox Assignments (Activities) or
Grades (Administration)
Grade Book
Grades (Administration)
Grading Forms no equivalent
Group Manager Groups (Administration)
Tracking
Reports (Administration)
Notes no equivalent
Selective Release no equivalent
Similar to WebCT.
Similar to WebCT.
Similar to WebCT. Columns created
automatically for quiz and assignment
items. Grades exportable.
Similar to WebCT. Manual /automatic
group creation. Sign-up sheets not
possible.
Similar to WebCT; options include
activity reports for the last hour, and
offer easy ways to find out if students
are looking at particular materials.
Possibly more intuitive to use.
Options- use labels or text and hide
Can hide sections but N.b. selective
release in WebCT was a bit hit-and-
miss anyway.

20. Help and Online ELE/Moodle resources

Help screens indicated by the icon are very useful to find out quickly what a tool does
or what a particular option means.

If you want to find out more about ELE: more about the tools, or about teaching with
ELE/Moodle, have a look at these online resources:

The ELE Module is the University’s on-line guide. As well as the Exeter training and
reference documents, there are Flash animations that demonstrate important ELE tasks,
and news and information about e-learning at Exeter.

Official Moodle documentation is available via:

• http://moodle.org (the main Moodle website; follow the link for Support)
• http://docs.moodle.org/en/Teacher_documentation (links to teaching support
documents and resources)
• http://docs.moodle.org/en/Using_Moodle_book (excellent downloadable
manual for teachers and designers)

For support and enquiries regarding the migration your module from WebCT and use of
Moodle please contact the Moodle team:
ee-moodle-team@ex.ac.uk

For general e-learning support and enquiries please contact the e-learning team:
e-learning@exeter.ac.uk

31