Release Notes v2.68 August 2021

Preview as a student, Custom subtitles, Team Based Learning development, Online user indicator tweaks, Automated Feedback improvements

Updated over a week ago

(24-08-2021) The next release is scheduled in approximately three days. The release will contain the following:

  • Preview as a student 1.0

  • Custom subtitles

  • Team Based Learning further development

  • Online users indicators tweaks

  • Improvements for Automated Feedback on references

  • Linking words automated feedback


Preview as a student 1.0

A limited first version of the 'preview as a student' functionality is now available only for Canvas and Blackboard. To enter the preview mode we use the student preview mode of the LMS. Therefore, entering and leaving 'student view' has to be done from the LMS.

Preview context

When teachers enter an activity in preview mode they will see a dialog explaining that changes made on preview mode won't affect the activity.

In preview mode the activity will have a yellow border and a dark yellow bar on the top. When clicking on the "Actions" button on the bar a dialog opens that allows teachers to:

  • In assignments with various steps and deadlines (such as Feedback Assignments/Discussion Assignment), the teacher can open or pass deadlines in order to see how deadlines affect the activity, this is possible using the arrow and "Next deadline" button or the "Previous/Next deadline".

  • In Interactive Study Material activities with "Deadlines & realtime control" enabled they can open/re-open/close the activity. For example, if the teacher scheduled the activity to close on a certain date, and they enter the preview mode after that date they should initially see the activity as closed, but they can still re open it.

Limitations:

  • No allocations: We do not want the preview user to be allocated (meaning, review or discuss) the work of real users. This means the users cannot start or complete the review or discuss step when previewing as a student.

  • Not in groups: The preview user does not function as a real student and is therefore not automatically added to a group. Teachers also cannot add them to a group, as the preview user disappearing when leaving preview mode. Therefore, if groups are used in an assignment, the regular "This assignment will be completed in groups: once you're added to a group, you can continue with the next step." warning is shown.

Currently there is no preview mode available for Automated Feedback and Interactive Presentations.


Custom subtitles

In Interactive Video and Audio teachers can now upload their own subtitles. In the settings of the activity, there is a button that opens a dialog where the subtitles can be managed. Own subtitle files can be uploaded or deleted here. Subtitles already present in the source are also shown and can be hidden if desired.

When copying an existing activity that has subtitles configured, those subtitles are copied over as well.


Team Based Learning further development

This tool is available as a feature flag, if you'd like to try it please contact your contactperson or our support. Read this article for more explanation on how the Team Based Learning tool works

Team-based learning is a phased learning activity – consisting of 6 phases – and should be implemented in its full form to reap all of the positive outcomes associated with its practice. As of this release, FeedbackFruits only supports two of these phases, phase 2: iRAT and phase3: tRAT, with the goal to add support for the other phases in the near future.

Team Based Learning consists of an individual task (iRAT) followed by a team based task (tRAT). With this release, we have added the tRat task to the tool, along with teacher analytics for all of the tasks, as well as comparison analytics.

How does tRAT work?
The tRAT step is answered in groups, each group has a group leader who is the only student allowed to answer the questions. The rest of the students can see the quiz, and as soon as the leader submits an answer they will see the answer.


The group leader is the first group member that starts taking the quiz on the tRAT step, if the group decides to retake the quiz the leader can be a different student.


Online users indicators tweaks

Previously, users were able to see other active users from the same institution listed as online in the top-right of their activity. From now on when working in an activity, only the active members in the same activity are shown as online.

Teachers can always see both active teachers and students.

For students:

  • By default still both teachers and students shown as online

  • When working in groups, only group members are shown as online

  • When working with anonymity enabled, only the number of students online is visible.


Improvements for Automated Feedback on references

A number of improvements for Automated Feedback, related mainly to the reference usage check and the reference style check, have been added.

  • Improved reference detection, which improves the accuracy of detected references.

  • Slightly improved in-text citation detection, which improves reliability of the reference usage and in-text citation style feedback.

  • Improved matching between detected references and in-text citations, which leads to more reliable detection of reference usage and citation usage.

  • Citation usage feedback as an option in the reference usage check, gives feedback when a citation does not match any reference

  • Citation formatting feedback as an option in the reference style check, gives feedback when the citation is not correctly formatted according to the configured style (or when you have spelling/content errors in your citation)


Linking words automated feedback


A new experimental check on linking words has been added The check gives suggestions about when to use or remove words like 'however', 'therefore', or 'nevertheless' that serve as linking words or connectors in paragraphs.

This concludes the Release Notes v2.68 August 2021.
If you have any questions or experience a technical issue, please contact our friendly support team by clicking on the blue chat button (Note: support is available 24h every weekday & unavailable on the weekend).


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