Spring 2021 Moodle Tips
Here are some useful Moodle Basics tips to help you get organized as the semester draws to a close!
Accessing Purchase College Moodle
Activate your Purchase College account (or to reset your password), if needed. Visit Online Account Activation/Password Reset and choose the appropriate “Activate” or “Reset” option.
Once your Purchase College account is active and working, you will have access to Moodle as well as Purchase College email, MyHeliotrope, Library resources, etc.
Login to Moodle with your Purchase College username (usually firstname.lastname) and your Purchase College account password. Detailed login directions are available at our Moodle Basics help guide.
If you are not yet associated with any course spaces on Moodle, please contact the Office of the Registrar to confirm that you are properly tagged as the instructor of record on your course(s).
Consult the COVID-19 Remote Teaching Resources Guide for information specific to remote instruction.
Working with Content & Documents
- Get to know the new and improved Moodle Activity Chooser
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Upload files into your Moodle course
- Improve accessibility of course documents using Ally
- Link to Library resources using EZproxy
- Reuse (import) previous content into another Moodle space
- Embed YouTube videos in your course
Course Views
- Set your course availability (show/hide)
- Add the ‘Activities’ and ‘People’ blocks to your course to improve navigation
- Combine Moodle course sections into one “meta course”
- View your course from the student perspective (switch role to Student)
- Make your Gradebook visible to enrolled students in your course
- Use Moodle on your mobile device (Moodle Mobile app)
Managing Participants
If you notice inconsistencies between your schedule / class lists in MyHeliotrope and enrollments in Moodle, you will need to create a ticket using the CTS Helpdesk Work Order System (WOT) to request that data be synced between the two systems. Please note that the TLTC cannot resolve enrollment issues.
- Add a learning assistant, course librarian, faculty member, senior auditor to your course
- Set up and take attendance in your course using the Attendance activity
Course Communication Tools
- Send an email (course announcement) to your entire class
- Use Moodle Messaging to communicate with individual or groups of students
- Manage your Moodle Notification preferences (when/how frequently you get Moodle-generated emails)
Creating Activities & Assignments
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Schedule and start Zoom sessions from within your Moodle course
- Make sure your Zoom account is using your Purchase College login
- Review the Using the Zoom Integration in Moodle video tutorial on YouTube
- Set up a basic Moodle assignment to collect work from students
- Set up an Annotate PDF assignment that you can markup
- Set up a Turnitin assignment to foster academic integrity
- Create a discussion forum to encourage conversation among students
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Use Perusall in your course to encourage social reading and annotation
- Review the Perusall Quick Start tutorial on YouTube
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Create a VoiceThread activity in your course
- Review the Using VoiceThread for Asynchronous, Interactive Lectures workshop recording and Building a VoiceThread Presentation tutorial on YouTube
- Check out how to use new assignment features in VoiceThread
- Add ThinkingStorm to connect your students with available tutoring services
Moodle Gradebook
- Set up your Moodle Gradebook with weighted categories
- Make your Gradebook visible to enrolled students in your course
- Review the Moodle Basics: Grading, Assessments, and Using the Gradebook workshop recording on YouTube
Student Projects
Please note that Student Projects (senior projects, capstone papers, and master’s theses) are no longer submitted in Moodle. All Student Projects submission and approval takes place in MyHeliotrope. Please consult the Student Projects guide for more information for students and Readers.
2021 Academic Calendar
Winter Session 2021 (4 weeks, 100% online)
- Classes begin: Monday, December 21, 2020
- Christmas Eve: Thursday, December 24, 2020–no classes
- Christmas Day: Friday, December 25, 2020–no classes
- New Year’s Day: Friday, January 1, 2021–no classes
- Martin Luther King Jr Day: Monday, January 18, 2021
- Classes end: Tuesday, January 19, 2021
Spring 2021
- Classes begin: Monday, February 1
- No Classes: Tuesday, March 23
- No Classes: Wednesday, April 14
- No Classes: Monday, May 3
- Final exam week: May 13–19
- Classes end: Wednesday, May 19
- Commencement: Friday, May 21
Summer Session 2021
Session I: Monday, June 7 - Friday, July 2
Session II: Monday, June 7 - Friday, July 30
Session III: Monday, July 5 - Friday, July 30