Yacapaca

Some of these updates, particularly those relating to due dates, are tripping up both teachers and students at the moment. So, please, take note!

1. Due dates are real! Many students are not used to the idea that work really does have to be handed in when you say it does. Assignments are locked after the due date; please make your students aware of that! The default due date is 7 days from the assignment date, but you can change it to anything up to a whole term ahead.
2. Only stuff that needs to be done is in the to-do list. Students’ to-do lists now show only work that is current, sorted by due date with the most urgent items at the top. Completed or out-of-date items are moved to their Archive. Students can manually archive or unarchive any item at any time.
3. Old, undated, assignments now have due dates. Work set some time ago was cluttering up students’ to-do lists, so we added due dates of [assignment date + 100 days]. For a few users of ePortfolios, this turned out to be too aggressive and live tasks got locked and archived. You can easily re-date those assignments; see below.
4. Edit due dates at any time. Select ‘Edit’ from the Action dropdown in the Assignments list.
5. Allow extra quiz attempts. If students lose quiz attempts due to system crashes etc, you can allow additional attempts. As above, use ‘Edit’ from the Action dropdown. You will only see the additional controls for students who have somehow lost attempts.
6. Quickly duplicate an assignment. If you regularly re-set the same assignment, or set the same assignment to multiple student sets, you can now do it in two clicks from the Assignments Page. Choose ‘Assign Again’ from the Action dropdown.
7. Progress charts screencast. Teachers who use the Progress Charts love them; here’s the 4-minute guide to how they work.