Groups & Groupings - Creating & Using

Site:	College of the Rockies - Online
Course:	COTROnline Faculty Help Manual
Book:	Groups & Groupings - Creating & Using

Printed by:	Guest user ,
Date:	Thursday, 7 November 2024, 6:16 AM

Groups vs Groupings
ILP Groups & Section Grouping
Creating Groups
Adding People to Groups
Creating Groupings

Groups vs Groupings

Groups are used to

teach multiple course sections using one course page
filter grade book
for group assignment submissions (set up groups first)
group discussions and collaborative activities
provide access to resources or activities to a specific student or group of students (using resource or activity Restrictions)

Groupings are used to

make resources or activities available to specific groups of users
avoid confusion when multiple group schemes are used in a course (e.g. one set of groups for a set of discussions, another set of groups for another set of discussions, and a third set of groups for a group assignment)

Resources and Activities can be configured with no groups, visible groups or separate groups.

No groups - activities and resources are available to everyone in the course once they are visible in a course
Visible - group members interact in their own group, but can see what other groups are doing. Mainly used for Discussion Forums.

Example: a student in one group can view forum postings from another group, but they can't respond to those postings, only to postings from within their own group.

Separate (hidden) - each group member can only see and respond to forum postings from other members of their own group; postings from everyone else are hidden.

ILP Groups & Section Grouping

When more than one section (e.g. 01I & 01D or OL01, OL02, etc.) are linked by the ILP for a specific course, the ILP creates a group for each section and sets the groups to Visible Groups in the Course Administration > Edit Settings. As per Darrell Bethune's directions, June 24, 2021, COTROnline switches the group setting to Separate Groups.

DO NOT remove the ILP created groups. Removing ILP created groups will remove all students in a course.

ILP created groups will look like this:

ILP Groups - don't remove

Create umbrella groups for sections with I, D, and/or R components (e.g. BUSI-101-01D, BUSI-101-01I, BUSI-101-01R), groups must be labelled to appear at the top of the list, so all students in the same section can interact with each other.

To create groups that automatically update as student registrations change, go to Course Administration > Users > Groups

Groups link in course administration

In the Grouping tab, Create a Grouping for each set of sections to be combined (e.g. Section 01 Grouping for BUSI-101-01D, BUSI-101-01I, BUSI-101-01R sections)

Use CTRL to select multiple sections from the Potential Members list, then click Add

adding groups to groupings

Click the Back to Groupings to return to the Grouping tab, then click the Groups tab to Auto-Create Groups

Auto-create groups

In the Auto-Create Groups form > General:

In the Naming Scheme, name the section group (we recommend starting with the sections number, so the new group falls at the top of the list of Groups).
Set the Auto Create Based On to Number of Groups
Set the Group/Member Count to 1

In the Auto-Create Groups form > Group Members:

Chose the Section Grouping in the Select Members from Grouping

In the Auto-Create Groups form > Grouping:

Set the Grouping of Auto-created Groups to No Grouping

Click Submit to create the section umbrella group

The final result will look like this and will update automatically as students add, remove, and change sections:

Groups

If you encounter any difficulties or would like some help, please send an email to cotronline@cotr.bc.ca indicating when you are available and we will set up a Teams meeting to work with you.

Creating Groups

In the Administration block, select Course Administration > Users > Groups
DO NOT delete groups that look like this; if you do, you will delete all your students
On the Groups page, click Create Group
On the Create group page:

Enter a Group name and a Group description if want.
Click Save
Repeat as often as needed to create multiple groups
If you create a group name already used by the course, you will receive an error message such as below, and you need to Cancel and find the group listed

You can also use Auto-Create Groups and specify whether you want students split into groups of a specific size (e.g. 6 students per group) or if you want a specific number of groups regardless of number of students (e.g. 3 groups total).

Adding People to Groups

Once the groups have been created, click on the group you want to add or remove students to/from, then click Add/remove users:

On the Add/remove users page:
- Select names from the list of students displayed for a group. CTRL-click can be used to select multiple students.
Repeat to populate other groups.

Creating Groupings

In the Administration block, select Course Administration > Users > Groups > Groupings
On the Groupings page, click Create Grouping
On the Create Grouping page (Domestic 01D and International 01I sections should be combined using Groupings):
- Enter a Grouping name and a description if want.
- Click Save
- Repeat as often as needed to create multiple groupings
Once the Groupings are created, Groups can be added.
Click the icon at the far right of the Grouping name
Select the Groups to be added to the Grouping
Click Add, then Back to Groupings.
Repeat as needed