Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Create @Computhink -
Number of replies: 10

Hi,

My site has recently been updated to 3.11, and the new changes for Student Activity Completion has been deployed. Is there a way that we can disable or hide the labels e.g. "To do: View" ? Or do we need to go into the css to change things?

Student Activity Completion is a good feature, but the UI implementation is quite unsightly, as it adds quite a bit of space for each activity, and it takes a lot of scrolls to look through each activity in the course. Better design would have given it a better UX

Average of ratings: -
In reply to Create @Computhink

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Mary Cooch -
Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Moodle HQ Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers Picture of Translators
If you want to keep activity completion on but hide it on the course page, then click the cog icon Edit settings top right of your course and scroll down to Completion tracking - and change completion conditions to No. That way they won't be shown on the course page (but will still be shown when students click into an activity so they do know what they are supposed to do to complete it.) See Using Activity completion for more information.
Average of ratings: Useful (1)
In reply to Mary Cooch

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Michelle Doherty -
Hi Mary,

Can you please tell me how to turn this off within an activity as well. From the video on student activity completion in moodle 3 11 (
) it appears that it is now compulsory that it is there for the activity - if there is completion tracking.

We have lesson activities that require students to watch videos and answer questions correctly to receive a certificate at the end of the lesson.

An example of the 'To do' that is showing for one of these is:

To do: Spend at least 55 mins on this activity To do: Receive a grade

As you can imagine this is pretty pointless for our students and it also encourages them to just 'spend time' in the activity as opposed to watching all the videos and answering all the questions correctly. These requirements are made clear on the first screen of the lesson. As far as I am aware (and I do bumble along a bit), there is no way to force students to watch a video - other than setting a time limit for the activity. I'm really hoping that we are not forced to have the 'To do:' showing for every activity.

Looking forward to a solution for this.

Michelle
Average of ratings: -
In reply to Michelle Doherty

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Michelle Doherty -
I just realised I should add that we are hosted on MoodleCloud

Regards

Michelle
Average of ratings: -
In reply to Michelle Doherty

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Kelly Howell -
Hi Michelle,
Have you considered using H5P for your videos? The content type Interactive Video? This allows users to add multiple choice and fill in the blank questions, pop-up text and other types of interactions to their videos using only a web browse. Have a look at the demo here: https://h5p.org/interactive-video
If you wish to just turn off completion tracking for just an Activity - 
  • Go to Activity 
  • Actions Menu 
  • Edit Settings 
  • Scroll down to Activity Completion
  • Change to 'Do not indicate activity completion'
  • Click Save and display (that Activity will no longer display in the Edit course completion settings - Condition: Activity completion).
I hope that this helps.
Cheers
Kelly
Average of ratings: -
In reply to Kelly Howell

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Michelle Doherty -
Hi Kelly,

Thanks for trying but unfortunately it doesn't help.

I've been playing around with H5P already, but the lesson format has been set for 40+ courses and it was all working perfectly prior to the update to MoodleCloud last Friday. We have students in cohorts that are already working in these courses - to change content is not possible.

For students to receive a certificate of completion they have to have 100% for the questions and they have to have spent the required amount of time in the activity. If I do not indicate activity completion then I can no longer have these restrictions for the issue of certificates. As mentioned previously - the time indicator is behind the scenes - they are told they have to watch all videos. We don't want them to focus on time in the lesson but on tasks.

Is it really that the 'To do:...' is compulsory if you have any Activity Completion requirements set?

I'm surprised that it seems to be all or nothing.

Is there no way around this?

Regards

Michelle
Average of ratings: -
In reply to Michelle Doherty

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Mary Cooch -
Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Moodle HQ Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers Picture of Translators
You mean that you want them to spend (eg 55 minutes ) on the video but you don't want them to actually know that they have to spend 55 minutes on the videos? Before the 3.11 upgrade, did you use the "Time required" activity completion condition in your Lesson activities? Is it not an option to simply remove that required time completion condition?
Average of ratings: -
In reply to Mary Cooch

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Michelle Doherty -
Hi Mary,

It is not an option to remove the required time completion.

We put the time restriction on because people were skipping the video and completing the lesson in 5 minutes by jumping to the question pages of the lesson. As far as I'm aware I can't put a time restriction on a content page in a lesson to prevent them moving on to the questions. I know I could use H5P to control the watching of the video but the content has already been created and the students are already working on the lessons.

To further add to this issue - it's not just the time being mentioned that's the issue. The option in the lesson is to say that a grade is required and I can also set the pass grade and then in the certificate activity I get to set the requirement that it be a pass grade. To display the 'to do' as a grade being required is misleading. I have already had students calling about it.

Yours and Kelly's answers and your video about this new feature, all indicate that it is now an all or nothing situation.

Can you please confirm that the this new feature cannot be hidden from the activity if there are completion requirements set? Can you also confirm that the wording of these 'to do' statements cannot be adjusted (e.g. the 'receive a grade').

If my understanding is correct and I now have no choice but to display the preset 'to do' if I have completion requirements on activities, then is there any way that moodle users could be surveyed so that if others would like this to be an optional feature it could be adjusted in the 4.0 release?

Alternatively, if the issue with it being compulsory is because we are a hosted MoodleCloud user and if I moved to a private host it could be turned off, please let me know.

Kind regards

Michelle
Average of ratings: -
In reply to Michelle Doherty

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Mary Cooch -
Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Moodle HQ Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers Picture of Translators
Hello Michelle. Here are a few pointers:
  • It's not possible with the new 3.11 activity completion to hide it completely but still have it activated - it will always show within the activity even if it doesn't show on the course page. 
  • There is a long discussion on this subject in another forum here, which might interest you: How to use checkbox as student activity completion? (However, some of the suggestions won't work on a MoodleCloud site, for example using different plugins. Equally the wording of the 'to do' statements can be changed on non-MoodleCloud sites via Site administration >Language customisation)
  • I very much recommend staying with MoodleCloud because of the reliablity of the service, but making your voice heard/opinion felt by, for example, voting in favour of supporting the pre-3.11 activity completion method in this tracker ticket : MDL-71856 and also joining the discussions on Moodle 4.0 features (where I believe improvement to activity completion will be made) in the User experience community.
Average of ratings: Useful (1)
In reply to Mary Cooch

Re: Moodle 3.11 Activity Completion

by Michelle Doherty -
Hi Mary,

Thank you for your quick response and for highlighting those very useful links. I wasn't aware of the user experience community. I just needed to find the time to explore further (I know).

I have been very happy with MoodleCloud and can usually work out a way to get it to do what I'd prefer. This is my first real - arrgh moment with it.

All the best

Michelle
Average of ratings: -