How can explorers upload documents or files for review or assessment?

The Upload element allows explorers to upload a file into a topic or article. The uploaded files can be reviewed by creators and assessors, and optionally assessed (pass/fail, score, comments).

Creators can use the Upload element in any topic or article, in any location. You can also have multiple Upload elements to allow for multiple file uploads as required (since explorers can only upload a single file per Upload element).

Expand the following sections to learn more.

Steps to add an Upload element to a course

Add the element to your topic or article by selecting the 'Upload' option from the Content box, then follow these steps:

Give the Upload element a label. The label is hidden from explorers and is used for reporting purposes. It also helps you differentiate between multiple uploads within the same topic or article. The label should be a very short (1 or 2 word) summary of this upload.
Optionally add brief instructions about the file to be uploaded - perhaps defining exactly what file the explorer is supposed to upload.
Optionally adjust the colour of the heading.
Manage your settings for the upload:
- Explorer requirements. These requirements outline what explorers must do in order to complete the question. You can choose whether the explorer must submit an upload. You can also choose to have an assessor grade the explorer's upload. Note: we discuss assessing in more detail below. You can choose whether to turn both the submission required and the assessor verification on, just one of them, or neither, depending on your requirements.
- Email Notifications - If you have enabled assessor review you can optionally send email notifications for each submission by each explorer. You can choose to send these to topic creators, topic assessors or other stakeholders. These notifications are sent immediately on submission and include the date/time of submission, the explorers name, which topic it was for (including a link to that topic), what item and a copy of the uploaded file.
- Progress settings. There are two progress setting options. Firstly, you can choose whether the explorer is able to continue through the part without the explorer requirements being met, or whether they are unable to do so until all requirements have been met. Secondly, you can choose whether the explorer is required to complete the explorer requirements in order to complete the topic. As with the explorer requirements, you can choose to turn on either progress setting, turn on both, and turn on neither.
Click 'Save'.

Video demonstration

In the video below, we show you how the Upload element works. Please note, certain aspects of the UI may have changed since this video was recorded.

Settings and options

Explorer requirements

Tick 'Explorer must upload a file' if you want to tell explorers they must upload a file to proceed. Once a file is uploaded it will confirm they have completed this content.

Tick 'An assessor must review and 'pass' the uploaded file' if the upload requires an assessor to verify the uploaded file. In this scenario, a separate person designated as the assessor would confirm this in the platform.

Note: You can choose to require just the explorer confirm their completion, just the assessor verify the explorer's completion, both the explorer and the assessor verify completion, or neither the explorer or an assessor verify completion.

Progress settings

Firstly, you can choose whether the explorer is able to continue through the part without the explorer requirements being met, or whether they are unable to do so until all requirements have been met. The former allows explorers to continue to progress through the part without the requirements being met and might be particularly useful for tasks that will take some time to complete. In this scenario, explorers can continue exploring the part while simultaneously completing the task.

Secondly, you can choose whether the explorer is required to complete the explorer requirements in order to complete the topic. You may decide to allow the explorer to continue exploring before the task is complete, but choose to turn on the requirement to complete the task before they can complete the topic.

As with the explorer requirements, you can choose to turn on either progress setting, both, or neither.

Completion setting

There is a final option to "Set this entire knowledge to complete once this Task element is complete." CAUTION - Use this setting carefully. If enabled, this setting will set the entire topic to complete once the upload is complete. This is a rarely used setting and should only be used in specific scenarios where this upload determines the completion status of the entire topic. There are four possible scenarios for upload completion and its impact on topic completion:

No explorer requirements are selected - This setting will have no effect.
The explorer must submit a response - This setting will set the topic to complete as soon as the explorer submits their upload.
The explorer must submit a response AND an assessor must pass that response - This setting will set the topic to complete only once the assessor has entered a pass grade for the explorers response.
The assessor must pass the response - This setting will set the topic to complete only once the assessor has entered a pass grade for the explorers response.

Note: When this setting is enabled, we recommend communicating to learners that completion of the Upload will mark their enrolment in the entire topic as complete, as a best practice.

Assessing uploads

You can choose to make the Upload element assessable by requiring an assessor to review and 'pass' the explorer's uploaded file.

To do this, mark the checkbox "Assessor must review and 'pass' the uploaded file response" in the 'Explorer requirements' section. Once explorers have submitted their file, they will be informed that an assessor will grade their response:

Assessors have a separate tab in the platform, called “Assess”. This tab can be found in creator mode and is not visible to explorers:

Assessors and Creators can click on 'Assess uploads' to review the explorer's files. They can mark the result as pass or fail. Optionally, they can also include a score, comments and their own upload. After uploading a file, assessors can choose to either 'show' or 'hide' the file from the explorer being assessed.

Assessors can also click a 'Notify learner' link to send an email notification to that learner with their graded results (including the topic and item information, result, score and comments). The "Notify learner" link can be used each time the results are updated to send an updated notification to the learner.

If a result is marked as a 'pass' the learner will be informed of this:

Alternatively, if an outcome is marked as 'fail' the explorer will be informed and told to submit a new upload:

Examples

Here are three different ways you can use the upload element to help you get inspired!

Ask explorers to take a photo or video of something or themselves and upload for assessment.
Combine with a Download element. Have explorers download a template document in a Download element, complete it and then upload the completed template in an Upload element.
Ask explorers to upload important files, such as induction documentation or registration forms. These files do not need to be assessed, but can still be collected and reviewed by creators or assessors.

What do explorer's see when interacting with an Upload elements?

Explorers will see your Upload element, with any optional instructions, with a prompt to upload their file. After uploading, explorers can delete and replace their file. If the Upload requires assessment, they will also see additional prompts about the assessment status (see below).

Reporting and analytics

Details of documents uploaded via an Upload element within a topic or article can be obtained using the Uploads report in Analytics.