File upload (homework or exam) in the TeachCenter (Exam)
In the TeachCenter (Exam), you can set up exams where students can download a sheet with questions, solve the exam on paper and/or PDF and upload it as a file.
With the same activity, you can also set up an open-book exam where students can use their notes or books while answering the questions.
Creating an exam with file upload
There are two options :
- Assignment in “normal” TeachCenter
(direct synchronization with students registered for the course on TUGRAZonline) - Assignment in TeachCenter Exam
(direct synchronization with students registered for the exam on TUGRAZonline)
Which platform should I choose for my take-home-exams?
- If your take-home-exam is an officially registered exam on TUGRAZonline (students registered for the exam ≠ students registered for the course): on TeachCenter Exam
- If your take-home-exam is NOT an officially registered exam (e.g. self-assessment, exercise) and should be completed by all course participants: on “normal” TeachCenter
- Activate the editing mode, using the slider at the top right of the course.
- In the desired section, click on Add an activity or resource.
- Select Assignment from the list and click on Add.
- Write a title for the assignment
- If necessary, add a description (shown on the course page) or activity instructions (shown only in the upload area)
- Under Additional files, you can add the documents that your students will need for the take-home-exam.
Be aware that these files are visible as soon as the activity is visible to students! If you want to give your students instructions that are only relevant during the exam, use the activity instructions. - Under Availability, you can set the time by which the exam should be uploaded. We recommend enabling the Due date but NOT the Cut-off date. In this way, even late submissions (e.g. because of slow internet access by students) will be accepted. Late submissions will be highlighted in the system.
Availability settings of an assignment
- Under Submission types, you can find the option Maximum number of uploaded files. Under Accepted file types, you have the option to restrict the file types, e.g. only to PDFs. If the field is left empty, all file types are allowed.
Setting the submission types, size and number of files
- Under Feedback types, you can set what kind of feedback students will receive. Enable feedback files, for example, if you want to upload files as a feedback for students.
- Under Submission settings, it is recommended to require students to click the submit button and select Yes. This gives students the opportunity to work on a draft until they decide to hand it in.
Require students to click the submit button
- Under Turnitin Integrity plugin settings, you can enable a similarity check. By ticking
Enable Turnitin, the plagiarism checker is activated.
Enabling the similarity check for an assignment
- In the section Grade you can set the Maximum Grade for the exam. The default value here is 100.
Setting maximum points for an assignment - Under Restrict access, you can restrict the access to your assignment, e.g. only to certain groups.
Students with a disability or illness are entitled to an extended exam time depending on their situation. As long as no cut-off date is set in an assignment, students can make late submissions.
If you are using a cutoff date, you may have to overwrite it for certain students.
- To do this, click on the assignment.
- In the menu, click on More - Overrides.
Setting a user override - Click on the Add User Override button.
- Search for the name of the student who should get an extended test time.
- Change the cutoff date or due date accordingly.
N.B. Cutoff date means it is not possible to submit anything after this date. - Click on Save.
In the following overview, you can still edit (gear icon) or delete (recycle bin) the user override.
Conducting and grading exams with file upload
From the teachers' perspective:
A step-by-step guide on how to upload a document can also be found on this website.
In the settings of the assignment, in the section Feedback types, you can select how to give feedback:
- commenting directly in the submitted document
- providing general written feedback or
- uploading an assignment feedback file
In the section Grade, you can define how many points can be obtained.
When you click on the assignment activity in your TC course, you will see an overview of how many students have already submitted their assignments and how many still need to be graded.
Click on View all submissions to get to the overview.
In this overview, a textbox Submitted for grading indicates which students have already submitted a document to be graded.
To edit the document locally on your computer, download it by clicking on it.
To grade the submission directly in the TC, click on the button Grade.
A new interface will open where you can now grade the assignment.
Here you can:
- move to the next page, if the document is comprised of more than one page.
- select tools from the toolbar in order to insert comments in the document, add stamps or write comments with your tablet and stylus.
- enter the grade for the student’s submission. You defined the maximum points in the settings of the assignment.
- provide feedback by adding a comment as general feedback or uploading a feedback file. You can only do this if you selected these options in the settings of the assignment.
- save changes, reset or save and show the next submission.
Once you save the changes, the status in the overview changes to Submitted for grading - Marking completed. You will see the points entered and possibly the feedback comment or the feedback files. You may have to scroll to the right to see this.
Once the assessment has been saved and students open the assignment activity, they will see their scores, the file you annotated, the feedback files and the feedback comments.
Please note that that for the students to see their grades, the assignment must not be hidden. If you want all corrections to be visible to students at the same time, follow the steps in the "Hiding grades until a set date" section on this page or use the marking workflow.
The marking workflow is particularly useful when several people correct the submissions at the same time or you want to make all grades visible at the same time, as it divides your grading process into several stages.
This option can be activated in the settings of the assignment activity (open the activity > Settings tab > Grade > Use marking workflow > Yes.)
This will give you an additional drop-down menu in the submission overview (click on Grade) with various marking workflow states.
With the marking workflow, you also have the possibility to publish the results to students later, thus making them visible to everyone at the same time at the very end of the grading process: To do this, select all participants in the overview and set the marking workflow state to released.
Help & Contact
For questions on TeachCenter / TeachCenter Exam: tc@tugraz.at
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