The Assignment activity allows instructors to communicate tasks, set due dates, collect submitted work, and provide feedback and grades. Assignments in general are graded activities in Moodle in which students typically submit something for a grade, but Assignments can be configured in a variety of ways. Some typical uses of assignments are essays, projects or homework activities.

This article will provide instructions for creating Assignments, and details for some of the common settings to engage with as part of building the activity.

Creating Assignments

To create an Assignment:

1. In the top right corner of the Moodle window, enable Edit mode.
2. In the main Moodle course page, locate the section to add an Assignment to.
3. At the bottom of that section click on the Add content icon which looks like a plus sign.
4. Select the Activity or resource option.
5. In the activity chooser, find and select Assignment.
6. Enter a name for the Assignment.
7. Click the Save and return to course button.

The Assignment has now been created and is ready to be configured.

Configuring Assignment Settings

The Assignment name field is required, and all other settings are optional. To access the Assignment's settings page:

1. In the main Moodle course page, navigate to the Assignment.
2. In the activity menu at the top of the page, select the Settings tab.

For a full description of all Assignment settings, consult the Moodle's "Assignment settings" documentation.

Availability 

Enable or disable these settings using the checkboxes.

• Allow submissions from
  • This prevents students from submitting the assignment before the displayed date, but it does not hide the assignment or any included instructions or materials.
• Due date
  • Submissions are still allowed after this date but will be marked as late. Assignments without a due date will appear on the dashboard with "No Due Date" displayed.
• Cut-off date
  •  After this date, students will not be able to submit, and the submit button will disappear.
• Remind me to grade by
  • If a date is enabled, and if at least one student has submitted, the assignment displays on the instructor's Course overview block and in the Calendar.
• Always show description
  • If disabled, the assignment description will not be visible to students until the Allow submissions from date.

Disabling each of these options creates an Assignment that can be submitted to at any time.

Submission types

Enable or disable the options for what the student will submit in Moodle using the checkboxes. If students shouldn't submit to this Assignment, leave these disabled.

• Online text
  • Students type their responses directly in Moodle using the built-in text editor.
• Cloud Poodll
  • Students can submit audio files, video files, or images, as determined by the additional PoodLL settings that display when this option is selected.
  • For more information on this submission type, see Moodle's "Cloud Poodll Assignment Submission" plugin page.
• File submission
  • Students can upload one or more files. For many file types, the instructor can annotate uploaded files within the browser and return the annotated files to students.

Other settings will be enabled or disabled depending on the submission type(s) selected, and configure the enabled submission types with greater detail.

Feedback types

Check the box or boxes that represent what form the grader's feedback to the student will take.

• Feedback comments
  • The grader can enter feedback comments directly into Moodle.
• Feedback files
  • The grader can upload files as feedback, such as annotated student submissions or other files.
• Offline grading worksheet
  • The grader can download a file (such as a spreadsheet), enter the grades offline, and then upload them to the Moodle gradebook.
• Annotate PDF
  • The grader can enter comments and other annotations directly onto the student's submitted file.

Any enabled feedback type will be available when grading a student. It's recommended to enable Annotate PDF so the student's submission is visible during grading.

Submission settings

These are settings that determine how students submit their work.

• Require students to click the submit button
  
  • If enabled, students can make changes to their submission until they click the Submit button to finalize their submission. They cannot make changes after submitting without action from the instructor. 
  • If disabled, students can make changes to their submission at any time (up until the cut off date if one is set). 
• Require that students accept the submission statement
  • If enabled, students must agree to a statement that the work submitted is entirely their own before the submission can be finalized.
  • If disabled, students can submit to the Assignment without this statement.
• Allowed attempts
  • The maximum number of attempts a student can make on this Assignment.
  • If Require students to click the submit button is enabled, after clicking the Submit button, they will not be able to submit again without this being set to a number greater than 1.
• Grant attempts
  • This determines whether multiple attempts are granted manually or automatically.
  • This option is only available if Allowed attempts is set to a number greater than 1. 

For ease, it's recommended to disable Require students to click the submit button and Require that students accept the submission statement to ensure that the student can freely submit to and edit their submission until after the cut-off date.

For details on the states a students submission moves through, see the "Overview of Moodle Assignment Submission Status" article.

Notifications

For these settings, set them to the Yes or No option to enable or disable them respectively.

• Notify graders about submissions
  • If enabled, users with a grading role will be notified when a student submits to the Assignment.
• Notify graders about late submissions
  • If enabled, users with a grading role will be notified when a student submits to the Assignment after the due date.
• Default for 'Notify student'
  • Determines what the default behavior is for the Notify student feature as part of grading assignments. 
  • If yes, then Notify student will be enabled by default in the grading page.

These settings can be changed at any time.

Grade

For information on grading settings in the Assignment, see the "Grading Moodle Assignments" article.

For a full description of all Assignment settings, consult the Moodle's "Assignment settings" documentation.

Additional Resources

Assignment settings (Moodle Doc)

Overview of Moodle Assignments (DELTA Knowledge Base)

For additional assistance, please contact the LearnTech Help Desk at learntech@ncsu.edu or (919) 513-7094, or via the Get Help form on the DELTA Knowledge Base.