I have two relate problems. I have looked through the system for a solution, but do not see an answer. (Maybe I haven't looked hard enough).
1. It would be really nice to set individual due dates for students. Usually one date will work for all students, but I occasionally get a student who gives me a letter from the accessibility office requiring accomodation. I have one this semester who needs extra time occasionally on homework sets. I would like to extend time for him without affecting the other students. Is this possible? If not, could I put it in as a request?
2. I plan to use WeBWorK in the future for an independent study class. It would be nice if I could set closing dates per student based on when the student first looks at the assignment. I know this is a lot harder than #1, but what do you think?
Thanks for all of your thoughts on this issue.
Steven McKay
I have a manual answer for #1, though maybe you are looking for a preference you set once for a particular student at the beginning of the semester. I don't know how to do that.
Anyway, after a HW set is made and it is assigned to the student, go to "Hmwk Sets Editor." Then click on the appropriate link in the "Edit Assigned Users" column. Then click on "Edit data for (studentID)". You'll see a place to assign an individual Open Date, Due Date, and Answers Date.
No idea about #2. -Dennis
Anyway, after a HW set is made and it is assigned to the student, go to "Hmwk Sets Editor." Then click on the appropriate link in the "Edit Assigned Users" column. Then click on "Edit data for (studentID)". You'll see a place to assign an individual Open Date, Due Date, and Answers Date.
No idea about #2. -Dennis
On a related note, is there any way to change the due date of an entire section (recitation?) without changing each student one by one?
is there any way to change the due date of an entire section (recitation?) without changing each student one by one?Yes. Use the Instructor tools and filter the student list by the section number (one of the display criteria should be "Display section 01" or something like that). Then select all the students in the list (there should be a keyboard shortcut for that), which will be everyone in section 01, and select the problem set in the other list. Finally, use the "Edit" button near the bottom that edits the selected set for the selected users. You can set the date for all of them at once.
Davide
I can't seem to make any of this work. Well, I can select all the students in a given section via the classlist editor, but at that point a) I have to select all the students manually, and b) having selected them I can only change their problem set data individually. Am I missing something here? Was this functionality only added recently? As always, any (further) advice would be appreciated.
This functionality is found by clicking on "Instructor Tools" instead of "Classlist Editor." You'll get a list of all students, which can be sorted by section or recitation. Then a range of students can be selected by Shift-Clicking (on Mac Firefox) or non-contiguous students can be selected by Command-Clicking. You can then operate on only the selected students.
I don't mean to use the classlists editor, but to use Instructor Tools link (at the top of the instructor functions in the sidebar on the left). That should get you to a page that has the student list on the left, the homework set list on the right and collections of buttons below them.
The student list can be filtered to show specific subsets of students, and one of the filters should be by section so that you can select the section you want. You will have to press the "Change display settings" button below the filter menu in order for it to take effect.
That should cause the selection box to list only the students in the selected section. Then you should be able to select them all at once. Most browsers have a means of selecting the full contents of a selection list. On the Mac, it is via command-A, but for IE it might be something like CTRL-A (I don't use IE, so I don't know for sure). You might also be able to select the top one, scroll to the bottom and SHIFT-click the last one to extend the selection from the top to the bottom.
Once that is done, you can then select one of the homework sets in the list on the right. Now all the students in the section are selected and one homework set is selected (I attach an image showing what this looks like).
Below the student list are buttons that act on the selected students, and below the homework sets are buttons that act on the selected homework sets. In the middle are buttons that act one both. One of these is "Edit one set for users". Clicking that should get you the homework set editor for all the students in your selection, and no other students.
I hope that clarifies it for you. I suspect you might not have been aware of the Instructor Tools panel, which is really the best place to work from, most of the time. In fact, at Union, I have disabled the other menu options for most faculty, and they use the Instructor Tools exclusively.
Davide
The student list can be filtered to show specific subsets of students, and one of the filters should be by section so that you can select the section you want. You will have to press the "Change display settings" button below the filter menu in order for it to take effect.
That should cause the selection box to list only the students in the selected section. Then you should be able to select them all at once. Most browsers have a means of selecting the full contents of a selection list. On the Mac, it is via command-A, but for IE it might be something like CTRL-A (I don't use IE, so I don't know for sure). You might also be able to select the top one, scroll to the bottom and SHIFT-click the last one to extend the selection from the top to the bottom.
Once that is done, you can then select one of the homework sets in the list on the right. Now all the students in the section are selected and one homework set is selected (I attach an image showing what this looks like).
Below the student list are buttons that act on the selected students, and below the homework sets are buttons that act on the selected homework sets. In the middle are buttons that act one both. One of these is "Edit one set for users". Clicking that should get you the homework set editor for all the students in your selection, and no other students.
I hope that clarifies it for you. I suspect you might not have been aware of the Instructor Tools panel, which is really the best place to work from, most of the time. In fact, at Union, I have disabled the other menu options for most faculty, and they use the Instructor Tools exclusively.
Davide
Ah, that worked perfectly, thanks. [I had to shift-click to select all the students, since for some reason I couldn't get Ctrl-A focus inside that list, but whatever.] I was aware of Instructor Tools but insufficiently so; that'll change ASAP.
This does, however, raise another important question: can one set the permissions in such a way as to only allow someone to change due dates of their sections, rather than (say) the whole lecture? [In particular, I'd like to prevent section instructors from setting their availabilities prior to the availability of the lecture.] There's a whole lot of firepower on that Instructor Tools page and I'd rather not have TAs blowing up the problem set for the entire lecture... as I, uh, inadvertently did.
This does, however, raise another important question: can one set the permissions in such a way as to only allow someone to change due dates of their sections, rather than (say) the whole lecture? [In particular, I'd like to prevent section instructors from setting their availabilities prior to the availability of the lecture.] There's a whole lot of firepower on that Instructor Tools page and I'd rather not have TAs blowing up the problem set for the entire lecture... as I, uh, inadvertently did.
I think the authorization system is tied only to the class, and does not include section information at all. I understand the desire for what you ask for, but it is a subtler problem than just using course information. For course-based authorization, you simply check once before the page is generated, but for section-based authorization, you would have to check for each action performed to see if it is for a student in the correct section. Not that that can't be done, but it means a substantial change in the paradigm currently in use, and it would take a while to get it worked out.
I'm not really involved with the coding of the interface, so I'll let others comment on its feasibility, and how likely it is that someone will work on it.
Davide
I'm not really involved with the coding of the interface, so I'll let others comment on its feasibility, and how likely it is that someone will work on it.
Davide
This was some code written into WeBWorK whose purpose was to restrict access to section data to only certain Profs and TA's. However I don't think that code was ever tested (except by maybe one person) and it certainly hasn't been maintained. At this point it's dormant code lingering in the system.
Probably the best thing to do is not to give TA's (or instructors) any more privileges than they require to do what you want them to do. If that's not sufficient for your purposes, then you probably should consider running each section as a separate course. If separate sections have different due dates, etc that would probably be the way to go.
Arnie
Probably the best thing to do is not to give TA's (or instructors) any more privileges than they require to do what you want them to do. If that's not sufficient for your purposes, then you probably should consider running each section as a separate course. If separate sections have different due dates, etc that would probably be the way to go.
Arnie