This guide is for staff setting up Campus Pack blogs for study sets. 

Briefly the scenario is that students each have their own individual CP Blog, configure that blog’s banner, title and description, and share this with just the members of their Moodle group as viewers. 

On this page:

Before you start, create your Moodle groups (and Turnitin?)

To make sharing much easier later on, in Moodle (i.e. not Campus Pack) create Groups corresponding to the study sets, and put students and any associated tutors into them. Note that for large numbers you can do this using a spreadsheet. Memorable names for groups work best because unlike letters or numbers students can remember them.

If you are asking students to run the typographic part of their work through Turnitin, then also set up the Turnitin assignment.

How do staff set up the student blogs?

To create a blog for each student, a single member of staff with edit access in Moodle:

1. In your Moodle editor role go to your Moodle space and Turn Editing On.
2. In the section where you want the link to the CP activity to appear, pull down its Add An Activity or Resource menu and from it select CP Blog; a page of settings displays.
3. Complete the settings as follows:
   1. Title - enter the title as you want it to appear on your Moodle space page.
   2. Description - enter a brief overview which students will see.
   3. Deployment - since students blog individually and receive an individual mark, set this to One Per Person, and then deselect all but the Student Moodle role from the list (unless you need other roles to be blogging).
   4. Create Grade Book Entry - don't do this (we will set up a Grade Book Entry separately - reasons for this on request).

4. Scroll down and Save; a dashboard displays containing Active Assignments and Unstarted Assignments for each student (and/or other role) on the Moodle space.

How do staff give the Author Role Permissions so that students can manage their own blog settings?

To allow each student in your Moodle space to allow selected other students to view their blogs. Assuming no bloggers have begun blogging yet, you can configure the permissions of all future new bloggers in one go as follows.

1. In your Tutor role go to the front page of the blog, which for you displays as a dashboard.
2. Via the Cog icon on the dashboard, access the Assignment Template; the activity template's front page displays.
3. Next click on the Settings button; a menu displays from which you select Permissions; the Permissions settings page displays defaulted to the Authors tab.
4. With the Authors tab enabled, click the link to Customize; a list of configurable settings for that role displays.
5. Click the Manage Blog checkbox. This gives the Author role control over their own blog (but not of others').
6. Save without adding any students to the Author role - this would give each student too much power over other blogs; students gain the Author role you've just customised for just their own blog automatically when they enter it for the first time.

How do staff make the blog available to students?

As things stand the blogs are still unavailable.To make it available:

1. Navigate back to the blog's dashboard e.g. from the link to it on your Moodle course space's front page.
2. Click the link Click here to make it available; a small green tick icon appears next to the confirmation message: 'This content is available'.
3. So next we will need to let students know how to access them, and how to make them viewable by their Moodle group.

What should staff tell students?

How can staff find and keep abreast of student work?

By default all in a Moodle editing or Tutor role (e.g. Tutor, Non-Editing Tutor or Administrator) have access to a dashboard. Clicking on an 'Assignee' name takes you to the blog.

Reach this dashboard by clicking the name of the blog wherever you see it as a link.

Where is the history of edits?

On each post the date of the last edit appears as a link; clicking this will take you to a history of edits.

How can a deadline be applied?

The way to do this currently is to note the date and time of the most recent post. This cannot be edited, so if it falls before the deadline it is a reliable indicator that the student has met the deadline.

How can I give feedback to students?

This is something to decide. Options are:

• Leave comments. These will appear publicly to all with View permissions.
• Create a Moodle Gradebook item - this will enable you to give private feedback as text or uploaded file.

Help!

If you run into trouble or there is something you'd like to do but are struggling, please contact the UCL ISD Service Desk. Please also copy in Dr Mira Vogel (m.vogel@ucl.ac.uk - the Digital Education Advisor working with Archaeology) but don't contact her only, since she is employed in a different job role and cannot guarantee a quick response to service requests.

A Campus Pack Moodle Users guide is available on the Campus Pack community site.