Two Potential Auto-Enroll Sticking Points

So your students aren't auto-enrolled into your Moodle course shell yet? You have your CRN input into the "Settings" area in your Moodle course shell, and you also input the CRN into the LBCC Moodle CRN form. Heck, you even verified your entry on the verification page, and it all looks squared-away, but your students still aren't enrolled! What do you do?

We have seen two issues crop up occasionally that are both actually easy to fix:

1. You inadvertently inserted a space before or after the CRN in the "CRN" field in your Moodle course settings area:

That one is easy to fix by making sure only the five digits are in the field. Shortly after you fix it, your students should be auto-enrolled.

2. You haven't run that Moodle course shell since we transitioned to Moodle 2 in June 2103. This one is a little trickier to identify, but still well within your ability to diagnose and solve it.

First, click on "Enrolment methods"(we know; it's the British spelling) under "Users" in your course Settings block:

 Next, look to see if the eyeball is closed for "Conduit" (that's the name of our auto-enroll tool that talks between Banner and Moodle). If it's closed, click to open it:

That should wake up the auto-enrollment method, and give your students instant access to your Moodle course shell!

Of course, if neither of these solutions work, let us know. It may be that you accidentally input the wrong CRN into the CRN form, and/or (worse yet) the Multiple CRN Enrollment form - but that's set of issues altogether…

Lastly, and while we are talking about the CRN Form and Multiple CRN Enrollment form forms: check this out.

The CRN and Multiple Enrollment CRN Forms

The two forms serve distinct purposes. Please take a moment and read the info on each form before submitting them.

Please take care to input your CRN(s) precisely. Each mistake on the CRN Form costs us at least 15-20 minutes of staff time to fix, and a mistake on the Multiple CRN Enrollment form can take a lot longer, and can actually stall the auto-enroll process for a number of LBCC Moodle courses altogether, affecting dozens of instructors and hundreds of students.

Once you complete each form, take a moment to notice the verification links to each on the confirmation page. Taking a moment to doublecheck your work, and then letting us know immediately if there is any issue will save you you and your students a lot of hassle.

How to Publish a Google Doc in a Moodle Course

One of the best ways to publish eLearning content is via Google Docs, rather than as a page within your LMS (Learning Management System). This will allow you to keep all of your course content in one place (Google Drive), from which you can edit with no need to republish.

Step 1: From within a Google Doc you wish to publish in your Moodle course, click File > Publish to the web… (NOTE: not the “File” menu for the browser itself):

Step 2: In the “Publish to the web” dialog that appears, note the available checkboxes. We recommend leaving them both as-is. Click “Start publishing.”

Step 3: Click “OK.”

Step 4: In the “Publish to the web” dialog, click in the “Document link” field and copy the link to the clipboard.

Step 5: In your Moodle course, turn editing on:

and click  in the content block where you wish the link to appear.

Step 6: In the “Add an activity or resource” dialog box, select “URL,” then click the “Add” button:

Step 7: This is the “Adding a new URL” page. Note that the field with asterisks are required. Also, we recommend indicating the link to appear in a new browser window. Make your inputs and selections, and click the “Save and return to course” button at the bottom.

Step 8: Locate your new link, and move it, if necessary (with the “” icon), then test it out by clicking the link. It should open in a new browser window or tab.

OPTIONAL: You can shorten the URL via bit.ly. The link for the published version of this Google Doc is: http://bit.ly/1hDp20U