Assignments

An assignment is what makes one module available to a student. Without one the module is invisible to them: enrolling somebody in a course does not by itself give them anything to read. An assignment can also carry a schedule — a date the module opens, a deadline, a time limit — which is how a module becomes a piece of homework rather than something always there.

Assignments are made on a student's page, or granted to a whole group at once. Making, editing and removing them needs the course assignment permission; see Enrol students.

Assign all modules

The quickest arrangement is not an assignment at all. Each student has an Assign all modules toggle, captioned "Give this student access to every module in the course." While it is on, that student has every published module open, with no schedule and nothing to arrange, and the per-module assignment menu on their page is hidden.

Turn it off and the student falls back to whatever individual and group assignments they have — which may be none, in which case they see nothing.

Students who join a Public or Unlisted course themselves are created with this toggle already on.

Assigning one module

On a student's page, the Progress card lists the course's modules. Assign on a module row (or Edit on one already assigned) opens a dialog with three optional fields:

• Starting time — the module stays out of reach until this moment.

• Ending time — the module closes at this moment, whatever the student has done by then.

• Duration — a time limit. When it is set, the module does not open by itself: the student sees it as ready and starts it when they choose, which begins their own countdown.

Leaving all three empty assigns the module with no schedule: available immediately, and available indefinitely.

The three combine. A starting time with a duration gives a module that appears on Monday and then allows sixty minutes from whenever the student begins; a starting and ending time together give a window that is the same for everybody.

Assigning a module to a member who is not yet enrolled creates their student record as a side effect, so the assignment dialog is also a way of enrolling somebody.

Assignment status

The status shown against a module on the student's page is derived from the assignment and from what the student has done, in this order:

There is a sixth status, Upsolve, for a module that stays open for practice after its time is up with the grade already final. Nothing in the console sets it, so you will not see it.

Individual and group assignments

A module can be assigned to a group instead of to one person, in which case every member of the group inherits it — one deadline for a whole class. Group-level scheduling is available through the API; the course's Groups tab in the console offers only enrolling and removing a group.

Where both exist, an assignment made directly to the student always wins over anything inherited from a group. When a student is in several groups that each assign the same module, the assignment already in effect is kept; otherwise the first one is applied.

Taking an assignment away

Unassign on a module row asks for confirmation and removes the student's access to the module. Their progress and their grade for it are kept, so re-assigning it later brings the recorded work back with it.

Removing the last assignment a student had for a module also resets that module's schedule and start time for them — which matters for a timed module, because assigning it again gives them a fresh countdown. The recorded grade is left alone.

Removing a group from the course deletes the assignments that group granted. Students who could only reach a module through that group become Unassigned; their student records and grades stay.