Knowledge Base

Use the Discussions tool in your course to encourage users to share thoughts on course material with their peers. This tutorial demonstrates how to assess students’ posts through an attached rubric in MyFIRE.

1.     Access the desired course in MyFIRE.

2.     Select the Instructor Tools tab at the top of the page.

3.     A drop-down menu will appear. Select Discussion.

4.     When the page refreshes, locate the desired discussion topic.

5.     When the page refreshes, select the drop-down arrow to the right of the title.

6.     From the drop-down menu, select Assess Topic.

7.     When the page refreshes, a list of students who have submitted to the discussion topic will appear. Select Topic Score beneath each student to view the students’ initial post and their responses to other students.

8.     When the page refreshes, the discussion will be available for assessment. The forum and discussion topic will be displayed at the top of the page for reference.

9.     The student that is being assessed will appear in the top-left corner of the screen. Hover over the student’s profile picture to view the student’s ID number and to contact the student either through email or instant message.

10.  The student’s initial post and replies to other students’ posts will be visible on the left side of the page.

a.     Filter your view of the student’s posts by selecting Filter above the student’s posts.

                                               i.     Then either select Threads to view the student’s initial post or select Replies to view the student’s replies to other students’ posts.

b.     Sort your view of the student’s posts by selecting Sort above the student’s posts.

                                               i.     Sort by choosing either oldest first, newest first, or post subject. Post subject will show the student’s initial response to the discussion topic first.

11.  If needed, select the title of the student’s post to review the student’s post directly in the discussion. Once the title of the post is selected, a new browser tab will open to the student’s post. When finished reviewing the post, close the browser tab and return to the assessment page in the original browser tab.

12.  If needed, there is an option to quickly view the discussion topic main page by selecting the ellipsis icon on the right side of the screen.

a.     A drop-down menu will appear. Select View Activity.

                                               i.     If view activity is selected, a new browser tab will open the discussion topic main page in the reading view to quickly review the discussion prompt and instructions. Close the browser tab when done reviewing the discussion main page.

13.  Once finished reviewing the student’s responses, locate the evaluation panel to assess the student on the right side of the screen.

14.  When assessing a student with a rubric, the rubric title and icon will be visible under the Rubrics title. Select the rubric name to open and assess the student through the rubric.

a.     If a rubric’s status is changed to archived after the rubric has been connected to an assessment, an archived tag will appear below the rubric title where the rubric is displayed. Archived rubrics can still be evaluated and archiving a rubric does not remove it from activities or published feedback. Students are able to see the archived tag.

15.  The rubric will open within the evaluation panel.

a.     If needed, expand the evaluation panel to view the rubric in a larger window by selecting and dragging the toggle bar to the left.

b.     If the rubric is too large, instructors have the option to expand the view of the rubric in a table format through a pop-up window by selecting the pop-out icon in the top right corner of the page. If not utilizing this feature, continue to step 16.

                                               i.     If the pop-out icon is selected, the rubric will appear in a separate pop-out window that can be resized if desired. With this view, assess the students by selecting the desired level for each criterion.

                                             ii.     If needed, provide additional feedback to students for each criterion by selecting the Add Feedback link.

                                            iii.     If needed, increase or decrease the students’ default rubric scores by selecting the score field to the right of criterion row.

1.     Then, use the up and down arrows to set the desired score or type the desired score.

                                            iv.     Once finished assessing the student through the rubric in the pop-out window, select Close at the bottom of the window and continue to step 19.

16.  Assess the student by selecting the cells in the criterion bar for the appropriate score level for each criterion row.

a.     Instructors can also select the left and right arrows to scroll and view all of the criterion levels.

b.     Once the criterion bar is selected, the level selection will show a checkmark and will automatically save.

c.     The level title and description appear below the criterion bar.

17.  Once a point level is selected for each criterion row, determine if additional feedback is needed. If additional feedback is needed, select Add Feedback under the desired criteria section.

18.  Then determine if the student’s score needs to be manually adjusted. If the score needs to be adjusted, select the score for the desired criteria on the right side of the criterion section.

a.     Once the score is selected, the cell will refresh to show an editable field to adjust the point value for the desired criteria. Either type the new score or use the up and down arrows to set the desired score.

b.     Once the criteria score has been set, the score cell will be highlighted blue with an asterisk on the right.

                                               i.     Additionally, an option to clear the edited score will appear. To clear the edited score, select Clear Override.

19.  If more than one rubric is attached to the assignment, determine which rubric will be used to grade the student by selecting the appropriate rubric from the grading rubric drop-down menu.

20.  As each criterion is assessed, the overall score for the assignment will automatically be calculated in the overall grade field.

a.     If desired, select the statistics icon on the right of the overall grade field to view the discussion topic statistics by class and user stats in a pop-up window.

21.  Next, provide feedback to the student in the overall feedback textbox. For further instructions on utilizing the editor textbox, please refer to the utilize the MyFIRE editor tutorial.

22.  To publish the score and feedback for the student immediately, select Publish at the bottom of the screen.

a.     If you would like to save the score and feedback as a draft, select Save Draft at the bottom of the screen.

b.     If attempting to publish or save the assessment in the middle of scoring the assignment through the rubric, a pop-up window will appear stating that not all rubric criteria have been scored.

                                               i.     Select either Continue Grading or Publish Anyway. Note: If publish anyway is selected, the student’s grade will reflect only the partial assessment, but the student may think it is their total score.

23.  If desiring to grade the next student’s discussion submission, select the left and right arrows in the top right corner of the screen to continue to the next student’s submission.

24.  If desiring to return to the list of student submissions, select back to assess topic in the top left corner of the screen.

a.     When the page refreshes, the assess discussion topic page will appear. From this page, instructors have the ability to publish or retract all or multiple scores simultaneously by first selecting the checkbox to the left of the students’ names.

                                               i.     Then select either Publish Feedback or Retract Feedback above the student list.

                                             ii.     If publishing feedback, a confirmation pop-up window will appear asking if you are sure if you want to publish all scores. Select Yes if you are sure.  Note: Once the grade is published or updated, students will receive an instant notification to their SEU email account that their assignment has been graded.

                                            iii.     If retracting feedback, a confirmation pop-up window will appear asking if you are sure if you want to retract feedback. Select Yes if you are sure. Note: The student’s previously published scores will be removed from the gradebook and drafted in the discussions assess topic page.