Gauge Student Readiness While Fulfilling Your Participation Roster Requirement

Just in time for the upcoming semester, the Office of Distance Education and eLearning (ODEE) has built a participation roster widget. This tool lets instructors select an assignment for each of their active courses in CarmenCanvas. When students complete the selected assignment, it is submitted to the Registrar and will automatically update the course’s participation roster in the Faculty Center.

This tool allows instructors to focus on creating an early assignment that adds value to the teaching and learning experience—but how do you ensure your assignment is beneficial to the course and to your students?

Karen Dannemiller, Assistant Professor in the Colleges of Engineering and Public Health, has a solution. She uses a quiz assignment coupled with open reference material as a way to evaluate student readiness in her Engineering Design for Environmental Health course. The assignment helps ensure students from a variety of disciplines have the information they need to succeed in the course, and it provides a refresher for students already familiar with the material.

“This type of early assessment is especially helpful with interdisciplinary courses,” Dannemiller explains. “In my course, students need a basic understanding of biology concepts, rather than a full pre-requisite course on the subject.”

With the help of instructional designers from ODEE, Dannemiller set up a basic biology quiz for her students to complete in Carmen. Students are able to take the quiz multiple times, and a free online textbook is provided so students can review the material.

“Using Carmen for this assignment is helpful,” said Dannemiller. “Students can take the quiz at their own pace and the resources are right there for them to access.”

Dannemiller also uses Top Hat in her courses to take attendance and pose poll questions to the class. Either of these activities can also be used to fulfill the participation roster requirement.