TELT Newsletter - July 2023

26 July 2023

Reminder - We are upgrading QMplus on Tuesday 29th August

This is a reminder that we will be upgrading QMplus on Tuesday 29th August. QMplus will be unavailable for the whole of that day.

This year our upgrade is taking place later than usual and QMplus will be unavailable for longer than usual. This is because this year’s upgrade is more complex than previous years.

The upgrade will bring many bug fixes, improved performance and some new features. We will be running "QMplus Upgrade Awareness" sessions over the summer for staff who would like to get a preview of what’s coming. You can find out more and book on to these sessions via the online course booking system.

You can find more information on our QMplus upgrade page.

If you have any questions or concerns, you can get in touch with your local QMplus support contact. You can also raise a ticket on the ServiceDesk and a member of the TELT support team will respond. Indicate that your query relates to the QMplus upgrade.

We are hiring – Technology Enhanced Learning Student Ambassadors

The Technology Enhanced Learning Team are seeking 5 enthusiastic, confident, and tech-savvy students to join our team as part-time TEL (Technology Enhanced Learning) Student Ambassadors, to work with members of the TEL Team delivering TEL student inductions during Welcome Week, 18th – 22nd September 2023.

The closing date for applications in Wednesday 2nd August 2023 and interviews are expected to be held shortly thereafter. You can find out more about these roles on the TELT website.

Please share this post with any students you think may be interested in the role.

COP Recording Links Have Arrived

The recording links from the successful Community of Practice event in June 2023 are now online for viewing.

A full write up and more details of the event can be found over on the TELT website.

Choice Activity – Worth Choosing?

In this article TELT Learning Technologist John Seamons will promote the QMplus activity Choice  which can facilitate student engagement and involvement in decision-making.

A Choice is a short poll which enables educators to ask students a single question (not multiple) it includes radio buttons for students to select an option/s from a list.

You can view the full article online.

Let’s Meet… Richard Chantler

This month we’ve been speaking to Richard Chantler, former colleague in TELT (when it was the E-learning Unit), now of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Read the article to find out a bit more about Richard, his interests and what he’s currently working on.

Qudos Corner

This month the TELT would like to give a shout out to Andrew Hancox. Andrew is a Moodle consultant who has been working very closely with us over the past 3 months to get QMplus, based on Moodle,  ready for the upgrade in August.  Andrew knows Moodle inside out and his expert knowledge and coding skills have been invaluable in helping us whip all our in-house QMplus developments into shape for the upgrade.  Many thanks Andrew!

FAQs

I would like a new course to be created on QMplus.

Members of staff can request a new course to be created on QMplus by opening a ticket through the ITS Helpdesk.

When making the request, you should provide the following information:

• The course title – What you want your course area to be called. If the course area is for a module registered on the central student record system (SITS), we will give the course area on QMplus the same name.
• Where you would like the course area to be located (e.g. should it be for staff you may wish to have it created under a category called staff courses, or simply under your School’s category).
• How students will get access to your course area – we can automatically enrol students on a particular module code or codes, on a particular program or in a particular department. You can also manage enrolment manually if you wish.
• Other members of staff that require access to the course area - By default, we will enrol the person making the request as the teacher on the course area. You can ask for other members of staff to be enrolled, or as a teacher, you can enrol them yourself by following the instructions on this page on ‘Manual Enrolments‘.

How do I get access to QMplus for non-QM staff?

All Queen Mary staff should automatically have a QMplus account. If you would like to request affiliate accounts for non-QM users (external examiners, auditors, visiting lecturers or visiting students) who do not have or cannot get QMUL accounts, then please raise a ticket via one of the options below:

• Web – helpdesk.qmul.ac.uk
• Email – servicedesk@qmul.ac.uk

What are Moodle Groups?

Groups allows you to split students or users into groups for a range of purposes such as to restrict access.

You can find a wealth of information on groups including different methods of creating them via this Moodle Doc

Upcoming TEL staff development sessions

We have scheduled the below one-hour sessions to showcase changes and new features of QMplus that will come into effect once it is upgraded (to Moodle 4.1) at the end of August.

Code Title Date Time Venue TELT022 QMplus upgrade awareness session 27-Jul-23 14:00-15:00 Online TELT022 QMplus upgrade awareness session 02-Aug-23 11:00-12:00 Online TELT022 QMplus upgrade awareness session 10-Aug-23 11:00-12:00 Online TELT022 QMplus upgrade awareness session 16-Aug-23 14:00-15:00 Online

These sessions will take place online using Microsoft Teams. 

For more information and to book yourself a space please visit our online course booking system and search for the course code listed above. A link to the session will be sent to you at least one day before the session is due to take place.