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What are the activity options in a topic?
What are the activity options in a topic?

Learn about on-the-job activities and setting implementation tasks for explorers in your topics.

Lou Monsour avatar
Written by Lou Monsour
Updated over a week ago

Activities are on-the-job tasks which can be assigned to an explorer as part of a topic.

Activities typically ask the explorer to complete a task related to that topic - to test out new skills, develop new tools or processes, complete an offline assignment and so on.

You can have multiple activities in each topic, although each activity is completed in order - completing one activity unlocks the next activity.

Activities are very powerful interactions to drive behavioural change and track on-the-job results. However, they will not suit all topics - factual or reference topics may not require any activities.

If you would like to use activities in your topic, go to the Settings menu when you are editing your topic and select 'Manage Navigation'. Initially, there will be no activities in your topic and you will see an option to 'Add a new activity' to your topic.

After adding an activity, you can then edit that module to determine the Activity settings.

Activity settings

  • Title. Create a short title for the activity. We recommend using a verb and making this a short instruction so that explorers can quickly get the broad idea of the activity. e.g. Make 10 new phone calls or Create a new letter for a client.
    Instructions. Now explain the details of this activity. Be clear. Explain exactly what you want explorers to do. Relate the activity back to the content of the topic (e.g. See Rule 4 for examples). Most activities end up with 2-4 sentences of detailed instructions.

  • Deadline. Finally, set the number of days to give explorers to complete the activity. This will also trigger any enabled reminder notifications (see below). There is a minimum of 1 day.

  • Time. Optionally, you can specify how many minutes the explorer is expected to take to complete this activity. This can just be left at 0 minutes. If you specify more than 0 minutes, it will provide this estimate to the explorer to help them plan their time. It will also add these minutes to the CPD Length of the topic (but not change the calculated Topic Length). This is a good way to capture offline work completed by explorers for CPD tracking.

  • Download. Optionally, you can add a file for explorers to download as part of this activity (e.g. template, written assessment, case study, cheatsheet). They will be able to download the file when they start the activity.

  • Upload: Optionally, you can request that explorers upload a file to complete the activity. If you select this option, explorers will see a request for their file upload as they report on the activity outcomes. Creators can review all file uploads in the Uploads menu option in their topic.

  • Question. Now select a suitable reflection question you would like explorers to answer after they have completed the activity. There are a variety of questions to suit different types of activities.

Important - if you are adding an Activity to an existing topic that previously did not have any activities enabled, you will need to publish a new version of the topic for the Activity to appear for learners. After publishing, you will then see the 'Activity Notifications' panel appearing in the 'Notifications' tab within that topic.

Activity management

  • Disable. Activities can be created but disabled using the toggle on the top right of each activity. Disabled activities are hidden from explorers but any existing data from already completed activities remains.

  • Delete. You can permanently delete any activity using the Delete link on the lower right. Note that this will also delete any data captured with this activity. If unsure, please disable the activity instead.

Activity notifications

Notifications about activities can be set by Admins in the Notifications tab within the topic. By default, explorers receive an email when they start an activity - it contains the activity instructions and deadline. Optionally, your Admins can also enable notifications for overdue and completed activities.

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