How to Create a Course

As an Instructor, the Course Manager will be your primary tool for pushing out class content to your students, monitoring student activity, grading student submissions, and organizing your students into separate sections and courses.

Accessing the Course Manager

You can find the Course Manager by clicking the triple-dot menu on the top right, selecting Utilities, and then clicking Course Manager.  After you create a course, you can click the Course Manager shortcut icon,   which will appear in the top-right of the screen.

A new tab will open and you will be brought to the LabArchives Welcome Page. Click Create Your New Course Now to get started.

Click any option in the top-right corner at any time to save your progress.

Creating your Course

1. 1. Create a title for your course.
   1. The Course Description is an optional field for your internal use only. You can add any information you deem relevant here.
   2. Select the notebook you would like to use for your course. We refer to this as your Instructor Notebook. Click here for more information on setting up your Course Notebook.
   3. There are five additional fields in the Course Information area. You are free to turn any of these items on or off any time in the duration of your course:
   • Allow students to share their notebooks with other students. This is on by default. This is great for collaboration if students are working in groups, and if you want them to be able to work in each other’s notebooks.
   • Allow students to sign pages in their notebooks. This is off by default. This option freezes the page and will not allow anyone, including the instructor, to edit the page any further.  Most instructors prefer to use the assignment page locking option.
   • Allow teaching assistants to add or delete sections. This is off by default. The instructor can permit teaching assistants to add or delete sections of a course.
   • Restrict teaching assistants’ access to their section(s) only. This is on by default. This option limits each teaching assistant to access student information and grades for only their section. If this option is turned on and sections are used, be sure to assign students and teaching assistants to the correct section.
   • Lock assignment page when the assignment is submitted. This is on by default. When students submit an assignment, the page will lock. After which, they will no longer be able to edit any entries on the page until the page is graded or unlocked by the instructor or teaching assistant.
   • Show comments automatically for Students and Teaching Assistants. This is on by default. When an Instructor or Teaching Assistant comments on a student’s notebook, it will be shown automatically when the student returns to that page.
   • Important Note: We recommend having one assignment entry per page. If the locking feature is on for your course and you add more than one assignment entry on the page, your students will no longer be able to submit other assignments on the same page.

2. Creating Sections

To add sections to your course, add a section name, and an optional description and then click Add. After creating one section, you can add additional sections, edit current section names and descriptions, and delete sections.

3. Adding Teaching Assistants

You can manually add TAs or co-instructors to your course. To add a Teaching Assistant manually, fill in the emails separated by commas, enters, or semi-colons in the field, and click Add. Test will confirm if the email(s) are valid and if the user already exists in your course. Your teaching assistants will receive an email with an activation link.

 Teaching Assistants can be assigned to a specific section of the course. You can always add additional TAs, change their assigned section, or remove them.

4. Adding Students to your Course

A: Sign-up URLs:The Sign-Up URLs tab provides links (HTML code or URL) your students can use to join your course. Simply disperse these links among your students by email or post to your Learning Management System, such as Canvas, Moodle, or Blackboard.

If you create multiple sections in your course, there will be a separate URL for each section, and an additional URL for students who are not assigned to a section.

B: Manually adding Students:

You can also add students individually via email. Students will receive an email inviting them to your course and an activation link to create their LabArchives account.

On the Students tab, fill in each students’ email addresses separated by commas, enters, or semi-colons, then click Add.   After adding students, you can add additional students, change their section, and remove them from your course.

After you add your students, you will have two options. You can either Add students or Test if they can be added.

Test will confirm if an email is valid and confirms whether a user already exists in your course.

Once you are finished adding information to your course, click Save Course and Exit.

Creating or Accessing Other Courses

If you would like to create another course, click + Add New Course in the top right corner of the screen. To access another course, click on the name of the current course, and a drop-down menu will appear with the other courses.