mycourselink Updates

Updates and/or new features and functionalities are applied to the mycourselink environment at the end of each month as part of the Continuous Delivery design model. Highlights that will affect mycourselink are listed on this page.

The full list of updates can be found on The Brightspace Community Site. Please note this site will list updates for tools that Lakehead may not have or could be enabled at a later date.

If you have any questions, please contact us at mycourselink@lakeheadu.ca

 

Most Recent Update - June 24, 2022

Assignments – Save time by copying assignments to other courses you teach

Instructors who teach several courses are now able to directly copy assignments between their courses. The copied assignment includes the following key assignment properties:

  • Assignment folder and properties, including instructions, assignment category, and visibility
  • Assignment properties including description, attachments (direct file attachments, uploaded from Google Workspace or OneDrive, and audio and video files), and category
  • Grade item and grade category
  • Availability dates
  • Submission and completion information, including the Optional Grade item and the course scheme if used.
  • Rubric(s) associated with the assignment. When copying an assignment that uses a shared rubric, instead of linking a copied assignment to a shared rubric, the rubric is also copied. The copied assignment links to the copied rubric. If an assignment uses a rubric that is archived, the rubric is copied and retains the archived state in the destination courses.

The following attributes are not copied:

  • Instruction quicklinks and attachment resources created with the Attach link to existing activity action.
  • Instruction images added using Insert Image that were saved to course files.
  • Availability Release conditions and special access settings
  • submission and completion information including group assignment designation.
  • Evaluation and Feedback information including Turnitin associations, competency, and outcome associations.
  • Content topic associations (for example, if the assignment is linked from content)

NOTE: In some cases, references to links and images that are not copied may result in broken links.

The Copy to Other Courses option appears in the context menu of assignments.

Screenshot showing the Copy To Other Courses option

In the Copy Assignment dialog, you can select any rubrics and grade items associated with the selected assignment to include them in the copy package. The Choose Destinations area enables you to search by keyword or semester to find the destination courses for the assignment. The maximum number of courses you can select is 10.

NOTE: If you are looking to copy items from other tools or multiple Assignments at once, you can still use the options found by clicking Course Admin then Import/Export/Copy Components

Classlist – View user pronouns next to names to further personalize learning

The Classlist will now display user's pronouns next to their names. Pronouns display in the 'Last Name, First Name' column of Classlist, to the right of the user's name, in parentheses. User name text is blue, pronoun text is grey. Previously, the only location where pronouns displayed was in a user's profile card.

Screenshot showing where the pronouns are displayed on the classlist

To set your pronouns:

  • Log in to https://mycourselink.lakeheadu.ca
  • Click your name at the top-right of the page
  • Click Account Settings
  • Check the Allow others to see my pronouns box in the Pronouns section
  • Select Use different pronouns and enter your pronouns in the box below
  • Click Save and Close

Previous Updates

January 28, 2022

Uploaded media files use Content Service

To improve the functionality of audio-video files in Brightspace this feature ensures most audio-video files are handled by the Content Service. The new capabilities are documented in the Brightspace Learning Environment – Improved viewing features in Audio-Video player | New, and the Brightspace Learning Environment – Improved editing features in Audio-Video Editor | New features from this release. Newly uploaded audio-video files can now take advantage of all the features of the Content Service, and similar behavior is experienced in all locations where media files can be uploaded or edited. Audio-video files that were uploaded prior to this release do not have access to the features available to files hosted by the Content Service. All audio-video files uploaded to Content service are now automatically converted to mp4 files (or mp3 for audio) to ensure they are playable on all supported devices.

Note: Videos uploaded as Assignment submissions or uploaded to a course’s Manage Files area continue to use the legacy method for handling files.

Improved editing features in Audio-Video Editor

This feature introduces new capabilities to the Audio-Video editor for files uploaded to the Content Service. Users can now edit video timelines, create chapters, and add captions to their videos. D2L recommends using the desktop experience when editing audio-video files.

Editing timelines allows users to skip unwanted sections of a video recording.

Chapter titles can be used to create a Table of Contents for videos to allow quick navigation to specific sections.

Captions can be uploaded from a .vtt or .srt file or automatically generated to make videos accessible to all users.

Videos can be edited from course content or by using the Edit > Advanced Editing option in the Admin Tools menu.

Improved viewing features in Audio-Video player

To improve the functionality of the Audio-Video player in Brightspace Learning Environment, multi-bitrate streaming, and search functionality are now available.

Multi-bitrate streaming allows high-definition videos to be played at standard definition to reduce the bandwidth necessary for users to watch videos.

The new search functionality allows users to locate key words in video captions and quickly navigate to those sections.

December 23, 2021

the Updated Assignments Creation Experience

The assignment creation interface is being updated to make it easier to use. Information on this new interface can be found on the Welcome to the Updated Assignments Creation Experience page.

Check out these tables to compare Classic Assignment creation functionality to the New Assignment Creation Experience.

 

September 24, 2021

Discussions - New Discussion Evaluation Experience

The new evaluation experience for Discussions appears first for all users, but they have the ability to opt-out until the December 2021/20.21.12 release, at which time the new evaluation experience for Discussions will become the only option available.

For more detail about the improvements in this new experience, visit the Welcome to Our New Discussion Evaluation Experience post on Brightspace Community.

For additional information on the consistent evaluation experience across all Brightspace tools, visit the What is Coming in Evaluation: 20.21.12 post on Brightspace Community.

Discussions – Improvements to visibility and posting restrictions

The following changes are visible to instructors when creating or editing discussion forums and topics:

  • From the Restrictions tab, the previous Locking Options are now consolidated with the Availability Start Date and End Date options and display as the following new options:  
    • Visible with access restricted before/after start/end. The topic/forum is visible to learners before/after the start/end date, but they cannot access it. Previously, Classic Content was the only tool to make discussions visible without access.
    • Visible with submission restricted before/after start/end. The topic/forum is visible to learners before/after the start/end date and they can access it, but they cannot post new threads or replies. This effectively makes a discussion read-only. Previously, this was accomplished with the lock option or unlock dates.  
    • Hidden before/after start/end. The topic/forum is hidden from learners until the start/end date. This is a new feature. Calendar events for Availability Starts and Availability Ends are hidden until the start/end date. Notifications are also not sent until the start/end date. Previously, the hidden status of a discussion topic was decided by the tool displaying the topic.
  • From the Restrictions tab, the Display in Calendar option is now consolidated with the Availability Start Date and End Date options, which adds the start date and end dates to the calendar. Previously, the tool decided which calendar event should be added to the calendar. With this change, calendar events for availability dates may change and additional events for Availability Start Dates may be added.
  • Calendar events for unlocked dates are now hidden from learners.  
  • Where Discussions and User Progress may have previously hidden a topic or forum when outside of availability dates, those tools now may show them as visible, but inaccessible.
  • From Discussion Settings, instructors can now set the default visibility and access behavior for new discussion forums and topics. The defaults can be set at an organization level.

 

 

August 27, 2021
 

Assignments - Consistent evaluation experience

With this release, the new Assignments - Consistent evaluation experience is now permanently turned on by default.

For additional information on the consistent evaluation experience, visit the What is Coming in Evaluation: 20.20.12 post on Brightspace Community.

Brightspace Editor – Available as the default editor

This release sets the new Brightspace Editor as the default editor across Brightspace Learning Environment.

As mentioned in the Brightspace Editor – Replaces The HTML Editor | New release note in April 2021, the Brightspace Editor does not have a built in spell checker. Your web browser’s built-in spell check functionality is available in the new Brightspace Editor and D2L recommends using it.

July 23, 2021
 

Quizzes - Set grace period time to 0 minutes

When setting an enforced time limit for a quiz, instructors can now set the grace period for a quiz to 0 minutes, in place of the default grace period setting of 5 minutes. Entering a 0 minute grace period flags the quiz attempt as exceeded immediately when the quiz time limit is reached by the learner. Quiz attempt logs display when the learner attempt exceeds the regular time limit, grace period time limit or any extended time limit. Grace period of 0 minutes can be set for quizzes with special access restrictions as well.  

Note that setting a non-0 grace period can support learner accessibility requirements and other situations, such as slow internet connections when completing quizzes.

April 23, 2021
 

Quizzes – Improvements to Special Access functionality | Updated

Instructors can now grant learners special access in terms of quiz time multipliers (for example, 1.5x quiz time) or +minutes (for example, an additional 30 minutes). For example, if an instructor has a 30-minute quiz and using the Special Access page, grants three learners 1.5x the quiz time, their updated quiz time of 45 minutes displays. Instructors no longer have to manually calculate the updated quiz time.

Note: After extending the learners quiz time by way of quiz time multipliers or +minutes on the Special Access page, if an instructor updates the duration of the quiz, the learner’s quiz time on the Special Access page does not dynamically update at this time.

September 25, 2020
 

Discussions - Visual word count for discussion posts | New

A visual word count is now visible in the HTML Editor for discussion posts. All words in a discussion post are counted and include filler words such as “the,” “if,” and “to.”

The word count is dynamically displayed to learners while they type in the HTML Editor (Discussions Reading View only) and it also appears next to their posts in the Discussions Reading View and Grid View. Learners can view the word count for their posts only.

For instructors, the word count appears on the Assessment page during the discussions assessment process and it also appears inline with the post details in the Discussions Reading View. Instructors can view the word count for all user posts.

Quiz Builder - Enhanced question reordering | New

To simplify the movement and reordering of questions in Quiz Builder, a new Move To option is visible when a question is selected. The Move To option allows questions to be moved to the Top of the Quiz, Bottom of the Quiz, or to a specific section within the quiz.

Previously, to move multiple questions into a section, instructors had to individually drag the questions into the desired section. Now, instructors can select multiple questions and move them all at once using the Move To menu. The drag and drop reordering of questions has not been affected by this feature and remains available.

August 27, 2020
 

Question Library – Attach files in written response questions | New

When creating a written response question, instructors can now allow learners to upload files in their answers and include embedded images. Learners can also record audio or video responses when answering written response question types. Written response questions are available in surveys.

When grading a quiz, similar to the behavior in the Discussions tool, instructors can download and open these attachments in another tab.

When learners are reviewing their quiz submissions, if they are allowed to view their quiz responses, they can view their uploaded attachments.

The maximum file size for a single file or embedded image attached to a quiz response is set to 102400 KB (100MB). The maximum file size for all files attached or embedded in a single quiz question response is set to 102400 KB (100MB).