03 Task Creation by Students
Whenever students develop tasks themselves, they are challenged to be creative and feel that they are being taken seriously. Especially when this results in a joint product that can then be put to practical use. After all, only those who have thoroughly understood the subject matter are able to set good questions.
By using the rights assignment feature, you can turn task creation by students into a didactic scenario. All you need to do is:
Within the OPAL / OPAL School learning platform, even users without author rights can access the “Question Bank” area in the Teaching and Learning tab. This means that all pupils or students can log into ONYX and create tasks themselves. Existing content from other users is not visible, however. Each user only has access to their own or to shared content.
To involve your students in task creation, you first need a folder resource in the question bank. Assign this folder the permission for your students to create tasks. Please refer to the section Technical implementation for illustrated step-by-step instructions and further explanations.
(Didactic) Preliminary considerations
It may be helpful to consider the following points in advance when determining the didactic scope of application:
Um den didaktischen Einsatzrahmen zu bestimmen, könnten folgende Vorüberlegungen helfen:
- I let my students discover the ONYX tool for themselves and simply try it out first..
- I provide students with background information, e.g., a topic on which tasks are to be created, the number of tasks, or the type of task to be used.
- I provide a link to the ONYX help documentation and instructional videos in case there are any technical questions.
- I ask the students to convert existing written questions into a digital task, so that they can concentrate on using the new ONYX tool first.
- I provide a clear framework, e.g., the planned creation period, guidelines for task titles, or whether the completed tasks should be reviewed by other students or team members.
- I consider how I can motivate my students to take on the task of creating assignments. Could I offer to use some of the selected tasks in the next test? Could the task creation itself be included in the assessment?
- I would like to encourage my students to share content with other ONYX users, so I will discuss content licensing options with them. The licences page explains how to grant OER licenses for individual assignments.
Technical implementation
The following step-by-step instructions explain how to prepare the scenario:
How to create folders for student assignments
1 | Open the question bank and select New folder. |
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2 | This will open the Create folder dialogue. | |
3 | In this dialogue, specify a folder title. | |
4 | Click on OK to create the folder and close the dialogue. | |
5 | You will then be directed to the newly created folder. Now you could already start to fill the folder with content or additional subfolders. |
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6 | To get back to the general overview, you can use the navigation structure on the left or the breadcrumb structure in the middle area. |
How to assign folder rights to students
1 | In the Test resources tab, select the |
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2 | A dialogue with the title of the folder opens. Select the Rights tab to view the folder’s current permissions. |
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3 | Click on Add to open the dialogue for assigning rights. Then assign the selected users the permissions to Deposit and Modify (incl. export). |
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