Drop Box Assignments
By adding a drop box to an existing gradebook assessment you can allow learners to upload assignments, and allow faculty to view and mark those assignments in Elentra. If a form is attached to a gradebook assessment, faculty can use the form and view the submitted assignment simultaneously.
Assignment due dates can optionally be displayed on the learner dashboard calendar. You need a developer to enable the calendar_assignments_enabled setting if you want learners to see assignment due dates on their calendars.
Adding a Drop Box to an Assessment
Navigate to a course gradebook and ensure you are in the correct curriculum period.
Search for or create a new assessment.
Click 'Add Drop Box' under the Assignment column for the assessment.
Complete the required information, noting the following:
Assignment Drop Box
Set submission options**.**
Allowing students to upload more than one file can be useful if students are submitting pictures or documentation of an experience. The maximum number of files a student can upload also limits how many files can be handed back.
Adding a dashboard notice will automatically generate a dashboard notice including assessment due date and a link to the drop box and display it to the learners responsible for the assessment. If you select a dashboard notice, the default release is immediately. To modify the release date, click “Release notice on a custom defined date” and set the release date (this section applies to the dashboard notice only, not the availability of the drop box).
Allow learners to upload new revisions will allow students to replace an existing file with a newer one.
Allow graders to see the name of the learner they are grading can be unchecked if you wish graders to work without knowing the names of the learners assigned to them. Note that they will still have access to student numbers on any downloaded files. Student names will also be available to users with administrative access to the gradebook (e.g. Curriculum Coorindators, Course Directors).
Submission due date: If you have set an assessment due date, the submission due date for the drop box will match it. If you change the assessment due date, the assignment submission due date will automatically be adjusted. Please note that they system does allow learners to upload files after the submission due date so that late work can be submitted without additional hassle to administrative staff. If you wish to track late submissions, it is recommended that you make that selection on the edit assessment screen.
Time Release Options: Set the time release for a viewable start and finish which will control when the drop box will be visible to users. The default setting causes the drop box to be immediately visible to learners and does not set a finish date.
Click “Save” at bottom right.
Viewing an Existing Drop Box
Navigate to Admin > Manage Courses > *course* > Gradebook.
For an existing assessment that has an existing drop box, click 'View Drop Box'.
You will see a list of learners, their student number, any existing grades, initial submission date for existing assignments (red means it was late), and a timestamp showing last activity on the drop box.
The Last Activity column will show the date/time of a file upload or comment from a learner or grader.
From this page you can click on a learner name to view their drop box submission, or download the submission.
Bulk Uploading and Downloading Assignments in a Drop Box
If learners have submitted hard copies of assignments or have emailed their assignments to a staff member, those files can quickly be added to the drop box using the bulk upload tool.
Navigate to a course gradebook.
Ensure you are in the correct curriculum period.
Search for the assessment if required.
Click View Drop Box under the Assignment column for the required assessment.
Click Upload Zip of Submissions.
Where the instruction says that each uploaded file must contain the user's email address, please use the user's email address as the file title (e.g., johnsmith@email.com.doc)
Attach a file by dragging and dropping it in place or browsing your computer, and click Submit.
You can also bulk download all submitted assignments from this same page. This can be useful if you have faculty who wish to grade hard copies of an assignment.
Submitting a Drop Box Assignment as a Learner
In the top right corner click on the user name to open the personal menu options.
Click 'My Assignments'.
On the My Assignments screen, learners can see all required assignments and their due dates as well as any grades already assigned.
Click on an assignment title and then click 'Add File'.
In the popup window that opens, drag and drop or browse for a file to upload.
Provide a file title and comment (optional).
Click 'Upload'. The uploaded file will display on the Assignment Submissions list.
Depending on how the drop box was set up learners may be able to upload additional files or revised files.
Learners can also add comments to the assignment submission page by clicking 'Add Assignment Comment'.
If an organization has enabled the setting to allow learners to view assignments from their dashboard calendar learners can also access the specific assignment submission page or view My Assignments from there.
How faculty can grade drop box assessments
Make sure that faculty have been added to an assessment as a grader for them to use this process.
From the user icon, faculty click 'Grading Tasks'.
Click on the appropriate course.
Click on the appropriate assessment.
Scroll down to view the list of learners; click in the Grade column beside a student name.
If a form has been attached to the drop box assessment the user will see a split screen with the assessment form on one half and the assignment on one half. Use the assessment form and click 'Save and Close' to just grade this one assignment, or 'Save and Go to Next' to continue grading additional assignments. (Note that the system progresses to each learner whether or not an assessment has been submitted to the drop box.)
If no form has been attached to the drop box assessment, the user can enter grades directly into the Grade column.
A note on anonymous grading: If you do not want graders to view the names of learners when they grade their dropbox assignments, make sure you uncheck "Allow graders to see name of learners they are grading" on the dropbox setup page.
Course directors who are additionally assigned as graders can access their Grading Tasks to view anonymous assignments. Note that this is supported when course directors are grading inline by clicking on the grading cell to enter a grade. If a course director clicks View in the Dropbox submission column, they will be redirected to the admin. view of the gradebook which will NOT be anonymous.
Note that the ability to assign a custom grade or to adjust the points per form item is restricted to administrators and course directors grading in a course gradebook. We are working on introducing the ability for faculty graders to also use these tools.
Handing Back Graded Assignments to Learners
If graders have downloaded assignments and annotated the files to return to leaners, admin users may return assignments to learners using the Hand Back Response tool.
Navigate to a course gradebook.
Click View Drop Box.
Click on a learner name.
Click Hand Back Response and drag and drop or browse your computer for a file to attach and then click Upload.
If a revised response file needs to be added follow the same steps.\
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