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FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
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Creating a C-TOOLS Assignment
The C-TOOLS "create/edit assignment" interface lets you enter an assignment for your students. Different aspects of the assignment can be customized including the title, instructions, and how to present the workspace and concept map drawing area to the student. For example, the concept map drawing area can be pre-seeded with a set of concept words, or with a predefined concept map. An instructor teaching about the solar system might, for example, pre-seed the concept map with names of the planets such as "Earth", "Neptune", "Jupiter", and so on.
To access the C-TOOLS "create/edit assignment" interface, use the "ASSIGNMENTS" menu bar in the upper left corner of the C-TOOLS web interface. To create an assignment, you must be an instructor. If you would like to be granted instructor privileges, look at the document Who can post an assignment to the C-TOOLS server?
Step 1: After accessing the assignment editing interface with the "ASSIGNMENTS" menu bar, you can select an existing assignment or create a new assignment. To create or edit a C-TOOLS assignment, the first button you press after entering information is Initialize.
Important note: As you make changes to your assignment, it is important to click the Save Changes buttons. It is important to save your work frequently. There is no way to recover data if you do not save your changes. The Initialize button does not save any information, it only loads the interface with information concerning an existing or new assignment.
Making your assignment viewable: After you are satisfied with your assignment, you make it viewable by following the [advanced management options] link and setting the assignment status to be "viewable and enabled".
When you are finished: The C-TOOLS "create/edit assignment" interface opens up in a new browser window. When you finish creating or editing assignments, click on the Close This Window button at the bottom of the "create/edit assignment" interface page.
Help: Title and Identifier Tag
You can choose to do one of two things: create a new assignment or edit an existing assignment. After choosing an existing assignment or entering information for a new assignment, click the Initialize button.
The assignment identifier tag must be a unique text string that is up to 25 characters long. This text string can only consist of alphanumeric characters and the underscore ("_") character. Invalid characters (such as spaces) are automatically replaced with an underscore. The purpose of the assignment identifier tag is to allow for the descriptive labelling of filenames and websites associated with the assignment.
Assignment titles can be up to 45 characters and should typically indicate the assignment subject. For example: "Plant Biology and Primary Productivity" or "Natural Selection". Titles can only consist of characters coming from a restricted character set. If you use characters like ">" and "<", these will be replaced with underscores ("_").
The title appears in the upper-left assignment menu of the C-TOOLS interface as well as above the concept map drawing area on the assignment's customized workspace.
Help: Management
There are various fields you can fill out to manage the general operation and view of your assignment with the C-TOOLS system.
For more advanced configurations such as start submission date, stop submission date, and whether or not the assignment is viewable & enabled, select the [advanced management options] link. The [advanced management options] link also provides a place to make special notes (unseen by the regular student) regarding any notes you wish to make to yourself or to others involved with C-TOOLS instruction.
Help: Specify Instructions
Online instructions are shown as a web page separate from the assignment workspace. Your students access these instructions from their assignment workspace by clicking on the Instructions link.
You choose one of 3 independent assignment instruction specification modes for the creation and editing of online instructions.
Uploaded html files, HTML/textarea, and online word processing choices can also incorporate graphics images. Use the "upload images" option.
After you have entered and saved your desired instructions, you can view the assignment instructions (what the student would see) by clicking the [preview] link.
Help: Pre-seeding (initializing an assignment with a non-blank concept map)
Pre-seeding a C-TOOLS assignment means that the concept map drawing area for an assignment can be initialized with concept words (or other concept map elements) to help a student get started.
There are three modes to preseeding:
For the "An existing concept map" mode, you are provided with a list of choices from your map gallery like, for example:
MAP1: my first map
MAP2: photosynthesis
MAP3: untitled
MAP4: untitled
MAP5: anaerobic respiration
If you select MAP2, and then subsequently edit MAP2, your assignment will continue using the older version of MAP2 until you update your assignment accordingly by selecting MAP2 instead of MAP2.orig (see list below).
MAP1: my first map
MAP2.orig: photosynthesis
MAP2: photosynthesis
MAP3: untitled
MAP4: untitled
MAP5: anaerobic respiration
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