At the start of the semester, teaching staff should run through the pre-semester checklist to ensure their Moodle Course meets all managerial and pedagogical guidelines. Many frequently asked questions relating to Moodle courses are also addressed within the checklist.
Managerial checks
Can you log in to UNSW Moodle?
Find out more about the system requirements, username and password required to access Moodle:
Can you see and access your course/s?
If not, contact your School Administration support person to check the Moodle roles and courses assigned to you in myUNSW. If you are not sure who can assist you, contact your Faculty/School office or check the list of TELT Administrators. If this does not resolve the problem contact [email protected].
Can your tutors log in to UNSW Moodle?
If your tutors cannot log in to Moodle, check that they are enrolled in the relevant courses. Contact your School Administration support person to check your tutors' Moodle role assignment in myUNSW. If you are not sure who can assist you, contact your Faculty/School office or check the list of TELT Administrators.
Do you and your tutors or teaching assistants have access to relevant tools in the course?
See the description of user roles and access rights to understand the privileges and tools available to each Moodle role. If you have the necessary authority, you can manage staff enrolments yourself. If not, contact your TELT Administrators or School Administrators if you want new roles to be assigned to staff members. If you believe that tools that should be allowed for the role that you have are missing, contact support with a description of the issue and your zID.
Have you provided contact information for students?
For example: facilitator's name, contact information, preferred communication method, expected response times and contact details for the faculty/school enquiry office. All of this information can be placed in a Moodle Text block, making it always visible and easily accessible to students.
Have you provided support information for students?
For example: information on how to use Moodle tools, technical support, student support and academic support information. Direct your students to the student support resources here on this UNSW Moodle support site.
Have you checked the accuracy of important dates?
Check that all assessments in your course/s have the correct availability and submission dates and that these are consistent with the dates in the course outline.
Have you made your course available?
Find out more about releasing courses to students...
Have you sent information to students regarding Moodle login and contacts for technical assistance?
Direct your students to the Student Support pages on the UNSW Moodle support site:
Pedagogical checks
Have you checked the course structure and accuracy of the course content?
Your course website structure should reflect how you want your students to use the site, and be consistent with your course outline. Check that you have edited your course menu and updated your course material in consistence with your course outline.
Have you used Universal Design principles when adding content to your course?
For maximum accessibility of your material to students of all degrees of ability, including those with a sensory or cognitive disability, keep all elements of your online course simple, concise and consistent within the course. Check the Accessibility Tips page for information on how to make your Moodle course accessible.
Have you informed your students how you expect them to use the course website?
Your students need clear guidance from you about what is the purpose of the course site and your expectations about how they should use the resources and participate in any online activities.
Have you checked for spelling or grammatical errors in the content?
The Moodle text editor highlights words it does not recognise by underlining them in red. We strongly advise that you read through all new text to catch typographical and grammatical errors that the built-in spelling checker will not identify as errors.
Have you checked that all media files display properly?
Log in to your course using the test students block and open all the linked media files to check that they all display correctly.
Have you checked all hyperlinks and linked files?
Log in to your course using the test students block and open all external website links and links to files.
Have you checked the Gradebook settings, if you are allowing students to view their grades?
Log in to your course using the test students block and check that the Gradebook is consistent with your assessment design.
Have you checked the Group settings?
Log in to your course using the test students block and check the settings for the group. You will need to enrol a test student into each group, then log in and out and back in to check each individual group.
Have you checked Restrict Access criteria?
Errors in Restrict Access settings are very easy to make. Carefully check the logic of your rules and the criteria you have used.
Have you enabled Tracking?
Check the Activity completion page for information on how to enable statistics tracking for a content item.
Have you checked all your quiz content, settings and release dates ?
Turn editing off and test each quiz to ensure that there are no errors in the questions and answers.
Have you checked your assignment submission dates and instructions?
Provide your students with easily found instructions about due dates and method of submission. You can add links to the student support pages on this site for uploading assignments or submitting Turnitin assignments.
Have you recreated the Turnitin assignment activities for Turinitin assignments that you have rolled over?
If you have rolled over your course from a previous semester it is important that you setup new Turnitin submission activities. Turnitin submission activities rolled over from previous courses will link to the same assignment on the Turnitin system. You can easily identify these by a warning message "Duplicate copies of the same Turnitin assignments were found..." when you click the Turnitin activity. For more information please see the Turnitin FAQ.
Have you provided your students with guidelines about how you expect them to use the discussion forums?
Participation guidelines and clearly stated objectives for each forum will lead to better outcomes and help to avoid unrealistic expectations from students about how frequently you will respond to questions.