Track Learner Progress: Activity & Course Completion

This article will focus on how you can set up learner progress through activity and course completion tracking.

TOPICS

• STEP 1: ENABLE SITE COMPLETION TRACKING
• STEP 2: ENABLE COURSE COMPLETION TRACKING
• STEP 3: ENABLE ACTIVITY COMPLETION TRACKING
• STEP 4: ACTIVITY COMPLETION TRACKING CONDITIONS

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Completion Tracking  allows instructors to set up a course site so that learners are easily able to see their progress. This feature allows for two main types of completion indicators: Activity Completion (for individual activities, such as assignments) and an overall Course Completion.

Course completion can be set up so that when students complete a series of requirements with the course they are marked as having completed the course.  The criteria can include meeting an activity's grade level or a manual checking "complete" by either the student and/or teacher. The report can also show if the student has completed another course(s) that is marked as a "completion dependent" course.

Activity completion is used to show students which activities or resources they have interacted with and which they still need to.  This can be particularly beneficial for students as a visual reminder of what they have already completed and what they still need to complete.  If a course site has a lot of information and activities and resources throughout it can be confusing to know what needs to be done and what has already been completed. Activity Completion gives students a single place to see what is done, overdue, and coming up.

STEP 1: ENABLE SITE COMPLETION TRACKING

To use course and activity completion tracking, the functionality must be enabled at the site level. An administrator can enable course completion for the site by ticking the 'Enable completion tracking' checkbox in Administration > Site administration > Advanced features.

You can set Completion tracking as 'On' or 'Off' in new courses as a course default in Site administration > Courses > Course default settings.

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STEP 2: ENABLE COURSE COMPLETION TRACKING

Once completion tracking is enabled on the site level, a teacher can then enable course completion for their course by setting Enable completion tracking to 'Yes' in the Edit course settings page for their course.

An Edit course completion  settings link will then appear in the course's Course Management page under Course Settings. 

 

Selecting this link will open the "Edit course completion settings" page with 3 tabs:

1. Course completion
2. Default activity completion
3. Bulk edit activity completion

Course Completion Settings

General	Choose here how you wish to mark the course complete -whether you want Any or All of the requirements that follow to count towards completion.
Condition: Activity Completion	Select the boxes of the activities you wish to count towards completion of the course. You need to have Activity completion enabled to be able to do this. You can decide whether ALL of the activities must be completed or ANY one of them.
Condition: Completion of other courses	This setting allows you to make "the completion of another course" as a condition for completing the course you are currently working in. This does not block the student from your current course; it simply means that the current course will not be marked complete until the first course has been marked complete. Thus, completion of the current course is dependent upon completion of an earlier course. Just select one or more courses in the "Courses available box". Note: To remove a course from the list if it is not required, press CTRL+click on the highlighted course and it will be deselected.
Condition: Date	If you select the Enable box you can then set a date after which the course will be declared complete.
Condition: Enrolment duration	If you select the Enable box you can then choose a number of days after enrolment upon which the course will be marked complete.
Condition: Unenrolment	If you select "Enable" here then the course will be marked complete once the student is unenroled.
Condition: Course grade	If you select the Enable box, you can set a passing grade for the course. Please note that course grade in Completion status is looking at total of points (rawgrade) rather than a percentage.
Condition: Manual self-completion	If this is enabled then a student can mark the course complete themselves from the Self completion block.
Condition: Manual completion by others	Users with selected roles may mark the course as complete if their role is selected here. The roles listed are ones for which the capability Mark users as complete in course completion is allowed. ALL means that each role must mark the course complete before; ANY means that it will be classed as complete once one role has marked it complete.

Default Activity Completion

Default activity completion allows you to select one or more course activities or resources and change their default settings (usually 'manual') to a setting of your choice. For example, if you always want your quizzes to be completed with a specific passing grade, you can specify this here. If you always want assignments to be completed when submitted, you can specify this here. Note that the altered settings only apply to items added after the change, not to existing items on the course page.

Bulk Edit Activity Completion

Bulk edit activity completion allows you to change the completion requirements of one or several existing activities in one step. For example, if you have four quizzes with manual activity completion, you can bulk edit them so that all four require a grade to be marked complete.

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STEP 3: ENABLE ACTIVITY COMPLETION

One of the most useful parts of Course Completion is the ability to add Activity Completion to your course. You have the ability to set up what is considered "completed" for all activities and resources. When turned on, your learner will also see a check-box next to each included activity or resource. When the activity completion criteria has been met, the box will be checked.

Activity completion allows the teacher to set completion criteria in a specific activity's settings. A check (tick)  appears against the activity when the learner meets this criterion. The criterion might be viewing, receiving a certain score or a student marking it as complete.

Depending on the type of activity, there are different completion requirements. For example, a Page might have the requirement to require view; a Quiz might have the requirement to require grade, while a Forum might have the requirement to require posts/discussions/replies.

To add completion tracking to your activities:

1. Navigate to the course you want to track for completion.
2. Click 'Turn editing on'.
3. Either add a new activity or enter the settings of an already existing assignment.
4. At the bottom of the activity's settings, expand the "Activity completion" section.
5. Add completion settings as desired depending on what you want to be considered "completed." There are three options:

• • Do not indicate activity completion - this will not show checks (ticks) next to the activity
  • Students can manually mark the activity as completed - students press the check the completion box to change it. (Note: they can do this even without doing the activity!)
  • Show activity as complete when conditions are met - the selected completion criteria must be met before the check mark appears in the completion box.

 

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STEP 4: ACTIVITY COMPLETION TRACKING CONDITIONS

Activity completion allows the course creator (CC) or instructional designer (ID) to set completion criteria in a specific activity's settings. A check (tick)  appears against the activity when the learner meets this criterion. The criterion might be viewing, receiving a certain score or a student marking it as complete. For a summary of the completion tracking settings you can use for the standard activities included in Lambda Learn,  download Table of Activity Completion Conditions.

A teacher may mark an activity complete on behalf of a student from the Activity completion report if they have the capability Override activity completion (which is enabled by default.)

There are three options for activity completion tracking:

1. Do not indicate activity completion - this will not show checks (ticks) next to the activity
2. Students can manually mark the activity as completed - students press the check (tick) to change it. (Note: they can do this even without doing the activity!)
3. Show activity as complete when conditions are met - the selected completion criteria must be met before the check (tick) will change style

Conditions for "Show activity as complete" Setting

Require View	When this option is selected for resources such as Files, Pages, Links, etc, learners are required to view the activity i.e. click the link in order to complete it.
Require Grade	If you have set up a grade setting for your activity, you can require your learners to either receive any grade to get a completion check, or to receive a passing grade (if it has been determined).
Require Submission	This condition can be used in a variety of activities, like Assignment, Quiz, Forum, and Feedback. Though it may mean different things in each context, it effectively means that the user must provide some sort of interaction with the activity. An example might be a user submitting a document, posting a reply to a forum, or providing their feedback.

 

Expect Completed On

When a date is entered here for a Forum activity, or for a resource, such as a Page or Folder, the expected completion date will be displayed on the new Course overview block.