A note: The images in this tutorial were generated
from the previous version of CTools, so they may look slightly different
from what you see. The substance of the tutorial should, however, be
correct.
Steps in This Tutorial
- Log in to CTools.
- Use the Worksite
Setup page to create a new course site,
- Create a new course site,
- Set the Roster
for your course site,
- Edit the Site
Information,
- Edit the Site
Syllabus,
- Edit the
Resources,
- Publish Your
Site,
- Review and Finalize
Your Site.
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You Log In to CTools through the University's central
login service, so if you've already authenticated through the weblogin
system you may find that where the login button is shown below you see
the text "Your Name (uniqname) | Logout." If this is the case, go to
the Worksite Setup
page.
- Log In to
CTools: Go to
http://ctools.umich.edu/
(this link will open in a new window).
- Click the "log in" button
(figure to the right).
- Then go on to the
Worksite Setup
page to create a new coures site.
Worksite Setup allows you to create, delete, and
change sites that you've created in CTools. We use it here to create
a new course site.
- Click the Worksite Setup link on the left menu
bar.
- After making your selection, you'll see
something
like this
image (previous
image). Next, click the "New" link to
create a new
site for your course.
The Create Site page allows you to create course or
project sites, and to use the templates we have available.
- Creating a new site:
Click the
create site from template checkbox to enable the template selector.
There are specific templates for Math 105, 115 and
116, which are found in the Specialized
Courses expandable box. If you are teaching
some other math course, there is a
Math General Template in
the Affiliation category. Then select
the correct term.
- Then click Go to roster selection to
confirm your class
roster.
By Setting the Roster for your course site, you
allow access to the site to those students who are enrolled in your
class-section.
- Check the roster selection shown on the page.
In most cases you should be able to just check the roster for
the class-sections for which you're creating a course, and then
click "Continue."
- If the roster you want isn't shown, click the "Add course(s)
and/or section(s) not listed above" link to select another
class-section.
- Then click Continue to finish site
creation. You may need to change to the site by selecting it, or it
may put you directly to the site editing. If you don't see the name
of the site highlighted in the top sitelist bar, click on that to
get to your site. Then
edit the
site information for your site.
By Editing the Site Information for your course site,
you change the default informational text and identify the site with
your class-section.
- The Site Information for the site is the information
that your students will see on the front page of your site. Click
the site info
link on the left side bar to get the option to edit
all of this information. Then click the
Edit Site
Information link to get the edit options.
- For non-Introductory Program courses you will
probably want to
include the Course Number, Section Number,
Term, Your Name, and A short description
of the course. (See, for example, the
undergraduate
course catalog [link opens in a new window] for a
description.)
- For Math
105, you will want to edit the section
number in the template description, and you may of course
change any of the other information from the template to
personalize your site;
- for Math
115 and
Math
116, the site info may not need editing, though
again you may want to change it to personalize your site
to your class-section.
- Next, edit the short description, farther down
the page:
(short
description):
this is the information that shows up on the public list of
courses. You probably want this to be just the course number,
section number, term, and maybe your name, e.g.,
Math 115-023-F10, taught by Jane Mathematician.
- Then click "Update" to save your options,
and continue to
edit your syllabus.
A published course site will show up on the public list of
CTools sites. This is, in general, what you want to have happen: it
means that your students will be able to find it.
- To check the published status of your site, go to the Site
Info page. Then click the
Manage
Access link at the top of the page.
- Then check that the
publish
site checkbox is selected.
- And click "Update."
- Finally, Review and
Finalize your site.
The final step in creating your course site is the
confirmation dialog. At this point the basic configuration of the
site is set, and so you can just scroll to the bottom of the
confirmation page and click the "Create Site" button. You will
be able to edit all of the course information after the site is
created, and add and modify the site's appearance and content.
After clicking "Create Site," continue to update site content, in
particular, the
syllabus,
resources, and
schedule
for your site
You need to Edit the Syllabus for your course site
so that the basic information about the instructor, text, etc. are
clearly indicated for students.
- In the
course site,
click "Syllabus"
on the left sidebar of your site to bring up the syllabus page.
This is pre-configured to
include a series of logical Syllabus Items, each of
which has a Title and Content:
a course information
sheet,
list of prerequisites,
instructor info,
and so forth.
In some cases the content may be as little as
single link, and in others it will contain information (such as
your name, office number, etc.).
- Edit this information by clicking on the
create/edit
link. This brings up a the list of
syllabus
items you can edit. By
clicking
the edit links you can edit individual items. You can
change the order of the items by clicking the
reorder
items arrows and then clicking the "update" button.
- Update syllabus items by clicking the
different
edit links.
This lets you
edit the item:
the title, content, and attachments.
In particular:
- Change the descriptive information in the Content
Editor. You will want to do this
for all of the template syllabus items.
You can add or update links to other pages by
clicking the link editor icon,
.
- To update an attachment, remove the existing attachment
and then add a new version. You will want to do this for
the
syllabus.pdf
file that exists in the
template.
- Then Click the "Post" button at the bottom of
the page to save the updates you've made. Note that you can add
more items or delete others from the
syllabus
items page as well. When you have updated
the information, click the Preview link from this page
to return to the view of the Syllabus.
- Next you will likely want to import and edit the
Resources
available in your course.
The Resources section of the template is where you
can add resources for your students. You have inherited some minimal
resources from the CTools template: a "Useful Links" folder with links
to things like the undergraduate math club. There are additional
resources that may be useful to you which you can import, and you can
add additional resources for your class as well. The following indicates
some of those resources that are available; you can also just import
content yourself.
- Open the Resources Page by clicking
Resources on the left sidebar, giving something like
this.
Note the "Useful Links" folder.
(previous
figure). To add resources we will copy them from another site,
using the
show
sites link.
- Click the Show Sites link. Scroll down to
find a site called
Math
General Template Resources Resources (or, if you're
working in Math 105, 115 or 116, Math 105 Template Resources
Resources,
Math 115 Template Resources Resources, or
Math 116 Template Resources Resources). Yes, these do
appear to have a redundant "Resources" at the end of their
names.
- Next, we'll Copy Resources from this site:
Open the Folder by clicking the
expand
folder icon. You may need to then scroll back down to the
bottom of the page to see that the folder contains two
sub-folders: a "Useful Links" folder (which is the same as the
one you inherited from the template) and an "Instructor Tools
and Info" folder. Click the Actions selector next to
the "Instructor Tools" folder and select Copy.
Finally, click the
clipboard
icon next to your resources folder. This will add the
Instructor Tools folder to your resources.
- Then Hide this Folder, because it may contain
information that you don't want to show students. To hide it,
click the Actions selector for the folder and select
Edit Details, giving the
Edit
details page. Click the hide this folder option,
and click the Update button at the bottom of the
page.
- The Instructor Resources folder contains some
files that will be useful for your site. Which files are there
will depend on which template resources you copied; see the
README
files there for more information. You can
create additional folders in the resources into which to put
information that you want to distribute to your students by
using the Add selector in the top resources folder.
- After you're satisfied with this, you will want to
publish
your site.
The Schedule Tool in CTools is one of the most
useful, because it allows you to post a schedule for your class that
your students may view to see when deadlines and exams are, etc. By
default it of course contains no items, but there are several tools
that make it easy to populate it. This tool is not included in the
default templates, but you may wish to include it. However, a web content
tool including the Registrar's Calendar ("Univ
Calendar")in Google is included. If you want to use the schedule,
you may wish to remove this web content link. Adding a schedule is
discussed below.
- First, check the Instructors Info folder in
Resources: depending on which CTools template you are
using, there may be information about creating a schedule there,
or there may be a pre-made CTools schedule
file. If you are teaching a coordinated course (especially Math
105, 115 or 116), be sure to check with your course coordinator
to see if there is a CTools schedule you can import.
- To Import a Schedule, you need a calendar file
in a format that CTools understands: Microsoft Outlook,
Meeting Maker, or the generic CTools calendar
format. A CTools file or information for generating one
will be in the resources. Once you have such a file,
to import it
click
import on the calendar page.
- Then select Generic calendar import (unless you are
are using an Outlook or Meeting Maker file) and
click Continue. Browse to upload the calendar file you
have and click Continue again.
- You can also update your schedule by using the
add
link to add new events to your schedule. This should be
a straightforward exercise in clicking and typing.
- After you're satisfied with your schedule, you will want to
publish
your site.
Your site at this point should be close to done! There are three
remaining items to consider, which revolve around the Site
Info page for your site. You may want to (1) Add or Remove
Tools, (2) Add Participants, and/or (3) Update the
Course Information.
- To Add or Remove Tools to or from your site,
click the
edit
tools link at the top of the page. You might want to do
this if you aren't using a tool that exists in the template you
copied (e.g., the schedule), or if you want to add a tool (e.g.,
Announcements, or a Drop Box, or a
Gradebook). Note, in particular, that the
Announcements provide a good way of posting
announcements to your class, and the Gradebook is very
useful for distributing some or all grades to students (in Math
105, 115 and 116 exam grades are gathered in the Department's
exam data system, which also makes those scores available to
students).
- To Add Participants, click the
add
participants link. Note that you will not have to
do this to keep your roster up-to-date. The glory of using
CTools is that once a student adds your course using Wolverine
Access, s/he will automatically show up on your CTools roster.
But if you have a grader or other instructors you want to be
able to see what you are doing you will have to add them.
Math 105, 115 and 116: you should add your
course coordinator to the participants list for your
class.
- Also note that there is a list of participants for
your course site at the bottom of the Site Info page. This
includes all of the students on your roster, you, and a number
of Departmental Affiliates who are added automatically. The
Affiliate members are people in and related to the undergraduate
or graduate offices who should have access to your site.
- Finally, check that the course description looks
like what you
want, and that the site as a whole does what you expect. You
can edit the course description from the Site Info page, by
clicking Edit Site Information link at the top of the
page, or by clicking Home on the left sidebar and then
clicking the Options link at the top of the home
page.