Add a Learning Catalytics module

1. Open the course and click Create module.

2. On the Create Module page, enter a module Name (students will see) and Date (used to sort modules in the list you see).

   This date doesn't affect when you deliver the module or when it's due.

   More about start and end dates and times

   For in-class sessions, you manually start and stop a session that delivers the module. For Automated Synchronous modules, you set one or more start times that students can choose from to participate. Learning Catalytics handles pacing of question delivery, grouping for peer chat discussion, and ending the session. For Self-Paced and Self-Test modules, you also have the option to set a start and end date and time.

3. Select the Response Type for this module (described above).
4. Click Save and Continue.

You can add questions and customize the module now, or you can return later to edit the module.

You can always copy a module to deliver the same content multiple times in separate sessions, each with a new session ID. You might use the same module content for several sections of the same course, for different courses, or even in a later term.

Procedure:

1. Open the course into which you want to add a copied module.

2. Do one of the following:

   • Click to be able to select a module from another course. Then select the module to copy from the drop-down list in the dialog box that opens, and click OK.
   • Click the gear icon for a module in this course, and then click Copy module from the menu.

   The copied module is added at the bottom of the list of modules in this course.

3. Edit the module name and customize it in other ways, if necessary (see the next section).

   If you copy the module within the same course, you'll want to remove "Copy of" and give the module a distinctive name.

Immediately after you create or copy a module, or if you open a module later to edit it, you can change the Name, Date, and Response Type that you specified for the module.

On the Add Questions and Customize Module page, you also set other options specific to each response type. When you are done, be sure to click Save and Finish.

Instructor-Led Synchronous

• Hide sessions for this module from students, used primarily for quizzes. When you select this option, any active sessions for the module aren't visible to students when they open Learning Catalytics. Instead, students must enter the Session ID that you reveal to all students in the class simultaneously. That way you can ensure that everyone starts the sessions at the same time.

• Do not allow students to review their performance on this module. If checked, students do not see sessions for this module in the list of older sessions that they can review.

  (You also set the Allow review after delay period in the Learning Catalytics course settings. Until the specified period has elapsed, questions and answers for any delivered module are not available for review.)

Automated Synchronous

• Start times. Click in the field to display the date/time calendar where you can select a date and time for automatically starting a session. Or leave blank if you want to start the session manually.

  To give students a number of options for when to participate in a session, click + Add start time and repeat the previous step. Students get to choose which session to join.

  Be careful not to schedule the sessions too close together. A session is automatically terminated when another session begins, so allow plenty of time between sessions to avoid ending any automatically paced session prematurely.

  Important: When you add multiple start times, the Learning Catalytics Gradebook creates a column for each one. For example, if you create three start times, there will be three columns in the Learning Catalytics Gradebook. A student's score is in the column for the session in which the student completed the module; the other columns display 0 (zero) for the student's score. If you plan to download the scores, you may want to edit the .csv file to remove the zero scores.

• Hide sessions for this module from students, used primarily for quizzes in instructor-led sessions. When you select this option, any active sessions for the module aren't visible to students when they open Learning Catalytics. Instead, students must enter the Session ID that you reveal to all students in the class simultaneously. That way you can ensure that everyone starts the session at the same time.
• Start first question after. Accept the default (5 minutes), or change the length of the time allowed to let students join the session.
• Present correct answer for. Accept the default (1 minute), or change the length of time each correct answer and explanation are displayed before the next question is displayed.
• Lower bound for grouping and Upper bound for grouping establish the percentage range of correct answers for each question that will trigger automatic peer grouping. The default values of 30 and 70 are can be edited, but are generally suitable because:
  • If less than 30% of responses are correct, students might not be able to learn more in peer discussion because misunderstanding is too widespread.
  • If more than 70% of responses are correct, the material is understood by enough students to move on to the next question. Remediation can occur later through other means.

  Tip: If grouping doesn't occur, it's particularly important for each question to have an explanation of the answer. Students see the correct answer and explanation at the end of each question.

Self-Paced

• Start at. Click in the field to display the date/time calendar where you can select a date and time to automatically start the session. Or leave blank if you want to start the session manually. For an in-class quiz, this would be the time when the questions become available to all students to begin work.

  Next to this field you can also click Change my time zone to check or change the time zone associated with your Learning Catalytics account.

• End at. Click in the field to display the date/time calendar where you can select a date and time to automatically end the session up to two years in the future. Or leave blank if you want to terminate the session manually.

  If you leave this value blank, the session is automatically terminated after 28 days. If you want the session to remain open for more than 28 days, you must specify an End date/time. Note that until a session ends, scores are not sent to the Learning Catalytics Gradebook, and students cannot review the session for study.)

  For an in-class quiz, this would be the time when the questions are no longer available to students. Thus, the Start at and End at values can serve as a start and stop timer for all students at once. Outside of class, these values should span a longer, more flexible period (1 or more days, perhaps) during which students can work at a time that suits them, but must finish by a deadline. This deadline isn't visible to students, so you should tell them about it.

  Both in class and outside of class, students can access and change their responses at any time up until the session is stopped—either manually, when you click the Stop Session button, or automatically, based on the End at value or 28 days after the session starts.

• Students should be asked to select a seat when logging in. Clear this check box if you plan for students to complete this assignment outside of the classroom.
• Hide sessions for this module from students, used primarily for quizzes. When you select this option, any active sessions for the module aren't visible to students when they open Learning Catalytics. Instead, students must enter the Session ID that you reveal to all students in the class simultaneously. That way you can ensure that everyone starts the sessions at the same time.

• Do not allow students to review their performance on this module. If checked, students do not see sessions for this module in the list of older sessions that they can review.

  (You also set the Allow review after delay period in the Learning Catalytics course settings. Until the specified period has elapsed, questions and answers for any delivered module are not available for review.)

Self-Test

• Start at. Click in the field to display the date/time calendar where you can select a date and time to automatically start the session. Or leave blank if you want to start the session manually. For an in-class worksheet, this would be the time when the questions become available to all students to begin work.

  Next to this field you can also click Change my time zone to check or change the time zone associated with your Learning Catalytics account.

• End at. Click in the field to display the date/time calendar where you can select a date and time to automatically end the session up to two years in the future. Or leave blank if you want to terminate the session manually.

  (If you leave this value blank, the session is automatically terminated after 28 days. If you want the session to remain open for more than 28 days, you must specify an End date/time. Note that until a session ends, scores are not sent to the Learning Catalytics Gradebook, and students cannot review the session for study.)

  For an in-class worksheet, this would be the time when the questions are no longer available to students. Thus, the Start at and End at values can serve as a start and stop timer for all students at once. Outside of class, these values should span a longer, more flexible period (1 or more days, perhaps) during which students can work at a time that suits them, but must finish by a deadline. This deadline isn't visible to students, so you should tell them about it.

  Both in class and outside of class, students can access and change their responses at any time up until the session is stopped—either manually, when you click the Stop Session button, or automatically, based on the End at value or 28 days after the session starts.

• Allow students to respond to each question multiple times. If selected, students will be allowed to answer each question as many times as they wish. Students will not receive feedback, and only the last response before the session ends will be recorded.

• Do not allow students to review their performance on this module. If checked, students do not see sessions for this module in the list of older sessions that they can review.

  (You also set the Allow review after delay period in the Learning Catalytics course settings. Until the specified period has elapsed, questions and answers for any delivered module are not available for review.)

Team-Based Assessment

• Team assignment. Select whether to use the permanent teams from the course or let students assign themselves to new teams.
• Points. Specify the number of team rounds and the number of points a correct answer is worth in each team round.
• Weighting. Use the slider to determine the proportional scores for individual vs. team work in the module.
• Hide sessions for this module from students. When you select this option, any active sessions for the module aren't visible to students when they open Learning Catalytics. Instead, students must enter the Session ID that you reveal to all students in the class simultaneously. That way you can ensure that everyone starts the sessions at the same time.

• Do not allow students to review their performance on this module. If checked, students do not see sessions for this module in the list of older sessions that they can review.

  (You also set the Allow review after delay period in the Learning Catalytics course settings. Until the specified period has elapsed, questions and answers for any delivered module are not available for review.)

See Learning Catalytics scores.

Immediately after you create or copy a module, or if you open a module later to edit it, you can add questions to the module. At the bottom of the Add Questions and Customize Module page, click either link:

For further instructions, see Create a new question for Learning Catalytics and Find Learning Catalytics questions.

As you are adding questions and allotting points for each question, you should also be aware of the implications of Learning Catalytics automatic and manual scoring.

Questions that you add are listed at the bottom of the page, where you can do all of the following:

• Click and drag a question to change the order of the list.
• Point to the question to see a preview.
• Assign points for answering the question, or for answering correctly, depending on whether you selected participation or correctness as the basis for scoring in this module.

  For students to get a participation score, they need to answer the question. If they simply join the Learning Catayltics session, they will not get a mark for participation.

• Click and select Edit to edit the question (allowed only for community-contributed content).

  Read before editing a question

  Think of editing a question like editing a Wikipedia page—you should edit a question when you think the original question author would believe that you are improving it (e.g., fixing typos, clarifying wording). However, if you are making substantive changes to the question, then you should copy it instead, to preserve the original version of the question in the library.

• Click and select x Remove to remove the question from this module. (It remains in the question library.)
• Click and select Copy this question to add a copy to the bottom of the list of questions (allowed only for community-contributed content). From there you can edit the copy to create a similar question.

When you copy questions, the original questions remain in the original module. When you move questions, the original questions are deleted from the original module.

1. Enter the Learning Catalytics course that has the module with the questions you want to copy or move.
2. Select the module with the questions you want to copy or move.
3. Select Edit.
4. Scroll down the page to the Questions.
5. Do one of the following to select the questions you want to copy or move:
   • To copy or move one question at a time, click the question's and select Move or copy to another module.
   • To copy or move multiple questions at once, select the questions. Then select Copy or move checked questions below the question list.

     

6. Select the Destination module you want to copy or move the question(s) to from the drop-down list.

   The drop-down lists the modules by course; select the course and module.

7. Select either Copy question or Move question. (Selecting Move question removes the question from the current module.)
8. Click OK.

   Learning Catalytics copies or moves the selected questions and returns to the Add Questions and Customize Module page for the module you entered at the beginning of this procedure.

Do one of the following:

• In the list of modules for the course, click for the module, and then select Edit from the menu.
• If the module is open, click Edit from the actions bar.

• In the list of modules for the course, click for the module, and then select x Delete module from the menu.
• If the module is open, click x Delete module from the actions bar.

Note: If a session for the module is in progress, you cannot delete the module.

Tip: Whenever you start a session, check the breadcrumbs at the top of the page to confirm that you are delivering the module from the correct course.

See helpful details for different response types:

Use a module in class (Instructor-Led Synchronous)

Provide a module for asynchronous online students (Automated Synchronous)

Assign a module outside of class, or in class as a quiz or worksheet (Self-Paced or Self-Test)

Deliver an individual-and-team module (Team-Based)

To deliver a session using a mobile device, see:

Use a mobile device to deliver a session

When a session is stopped, either manually or because the End time has arrived, it cannot be restarted. You can, however, start another session to redeliver the same module or a copy of the module.

Note: If you want to preserve the graphical display of results for each session, consider copying the module. See the next section for details.

When you stop a session, you return to the list of modules, with pie-chart icons that give a quick look at results for the module session you just delivered, along with other modules in the same course.

Each pie represents a question in the module, with responses coded by color and size. For details, see Review session results.

Your module list always shows pie charts for the most recently delivered session for each module. If you prefer to see graphical results for all sessions based on the same module content, consider copying the module and delivering each session with a separate copy of the module.

For example, by copying the Week 6 module listed below, you can deliver the same set of questions multiple times in the same course without replacing the results graphs with each new session. Notice that each copy has been given a distinctive name, and that you still see results for Week 6 Tuesday 8:00, even though Week 6 Tuesday 9:30 has also been delivered.

In this image, the pie charts represent the proportion of correct and incorrect answers per question that was delivered in each session. Note that the second delivery results didn't overwrite the first results because two separate but identical modules were delivered. When the Week 6 Thursday module is delivered, all of the graphs will show results in a way that allows them to be compared easily.

If you do deliver the same module more than once (without delivering copies of the module), the overwritten results images have no effect on:

• Your ability to see detailed results for earlier sessions, as described in Review session results.
• Scores that appear in the Learning Catalytics Gradebook for each session.

You can also click and select Review results to see student-by-student responses for each question. For details about viewing results, see Review session results and Review a student's performance across multiple sessions.