With the publication of Moodle Habitudes (TechEdge) and Engaging Online Learners (MassCUE), I’ve received a few questions. I like these questions because they make me apply what I’ve learned to new situations, often situations that haven’t arisen in my own online learning environment.
Here’s one exchange:
I am just getting started with Moodle, but have a quick question I’m hoping you can help me with. When I assign the role of “teacher” to a user, it allows the user to assume the “teacher” roll for ALL courses that have been created. How do you make a user a “teacher” to a specific course so they can only edit only a specific course assigned to them?
My response, typed a bit quickly since I was running from one meeting to another:
When you assign teachers at the Site or Top level of the Moodle, then they are assigned that status Moodle-wide. When you go INTO a specific course, and assign them a user the teacher role. That will limit the teacher role for that user to that specific course. But you have to login to a course before you start assigning roles.
I felt a bit bad about that response, it was so quickly composed. Nevertheless, the person wrote me back:
We are going to set it up with Active Directory to authenticate users, but in the meantime, I am manually creating a couple of accounts for teachers who are going to start putting content on our Moodle. When I create their account, then, should I set them up of the top level of Moodle perhaps as a “non-editing teacher” and then go into their specific course and make them the teacher at that level?
So, I wrote back one last time:
With AD/LDAP authentication, they will first have to login. Once they have logged in for the first time, then you can go into a particular course and assign them the role you choose (e.g. Teacher).
I wouldn’t assign system-wide roles for teachers, or non-editing, unless you’re going to use them to help you supervise/administer other courses…in which case, I’d just give them Course Creator rights.
Thanks.
PS: Great article in this month’s issue of TechEdge!
Now, if we could only have a few hundred more of those learning conversations!
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A couple of twists on role assignments have worked well enough at Eustace ISD that they might be worth sharing. First we have a general purpose “social” category named “MoodleSpace” or “MSpace” for short. In MSpace all Authenticated Users have Course Creator Privileges which serves two purposes: One; teachers have a place where they can create a course and begin work on it as soon as they first login without waiting for role elevation. Later this course is moved to the appropriate “permanent” category, which in our case is a sub-category of their campus where they are given Course Creator privileges in case they need to add more courses. Two; of course this opens the possibility of students creating “courses” which is our intention, as MSpace gives them more creative latitude with Moodle features to explore it’s potential as a social networking arena.Second, in cases where a Moodle Admin has a need to assign a teacher their roles prior to first login, a manual account can be created for them and then it is converted to LDAP Authentication. As long as the username matches an Active Directory or LDAP account, LDAP will adopt this account even if the passwords do not match yet. Of course where many accounts are being addressed, prior login is more efficient.
A couple of twists on role assignments have worked well enough at Eustace ISD that they might be worth sharing. First we have a general purpose “social” category named “MoodleSpace” or “MSpace” for short. In MSpace all Authenticated Users have Course Creator Privileges which serves two purposes: One; teachers have a place where they can create a course and begin work on it as soon as they first login without waiting for role elevation. Later this course is moved to the appropriate “permanent” category, which in our case is a sub-category of their campus where they are given Course Creator privileges in case they need to add more courses. Two; of course this opens the possibility of students creating “courses” which is our intention, as MSpace gives them more creative latitude with Moodle features to explore it’s potential as a social networking arena.Second, in cases where a Moodle Admin has a need to assign a teacher their roles prior to first login, a manual account can be created for them and then it is converted to LDAP Authentication. As long as the username matches an Active Directory or LDAP account, LDAP will adopt this account even if the passwords do not match yet. Of course where many accounts are being addressed, prior login is more efficient.
As a way of “expediting” the issue with needing to login first before you can assign a role to someone when using LDAP authentication, I urge campus principals to use our Moodle during the beginning of the year staff development – that way every teacher has signed into the Moodle long before they start asking for a course (particularly handy with new teachers).
As a way of “expediting” the issue with needing to login first before you can assign a role to someone when using LDAP authentication, I urge campus principals to use our Moodle during the beginning of the year staff development – that way every teacher has signed into the Moodle long before they start asking for a course (particularly handy with new teachers).