Hello, (this is about Moodle 3.5.2)
We are creating a course for an ESL speaking program at our university. We started with a basic course for the fall term and are now working on flushing it out for the spring term, with different students...step by step...
We use groups with enrolment keys so when the students enrol, they are automatically entered into groups based on their class (we expect about 60 classes with about 25 students in each, with 6-7 teachers). These groups are useful so teachers can see grades etc separately for their own students.
As part of the speaking course, students will be doing small group presentations, working as 3-4 students in groups that they select from among their classmates (not across classes, in case that matters). Let's call these small presentation groups "scoops" for the sake of semantic clarity. These scoops are created in the class setting, not online.
There are some assignments related to the presentations, because as part of teaching them presentation skills, we want them to submit some work showing their presentation preparations. Herein lies the dilemma - if we create an assignment based on groups, how can we make it based on scoops and still have the class groups? We would like each scoop to be able to make one scoop submission that would get graded/feedback for the whole scoop, just like the assignment functionality allows.
I know we can create additional groups that would have the names of the scoops and put students into them manually, but we are talking about doing that for about 1500 students, and then changing them for the ones who change groups, join late, etc. We are hoping for some other way to get the assignments to perhaps pull from an uploaded spreadsheet (columns would be maybe student name, group name, scoop name?) or some other magical method that someone can tell me about.
I read about some plug-ins that let students self-choose groups, but I couldn't figure out the documentation enough to know whether these would work with the existing assignment activity, or how it would interact with the existing groups.
I thought perhaps of using groupings for the classes, but you can't have students auto-enrol into a grouping, just a group.
If anyone has done something like this before, I would be thrilled to hear about your experience and ideas.