Emailing Students
This guide shares the recommended methods for emailing your students during different times in a semester. See the chart below to see when each communication method is applicable for your situation. Detailed explanation for each communication tool are included after the chart.
Recommended time to use each tool for communication
| Tool | Before Class Start Date | During Class (From Start to End Date) | After Class End Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Moodle Announcements | No, Course Announcement emails do not send to students when they cannot see/access the course. | Yes | No |
| Moodle Quickmail Block | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Gmail | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Starfish | No | Yes, teachers can see a list of students in courses for the current term in Starfish and can message them. | No |
Moodle Announcements
Inside your Moodle courses, you can use the announcements forum to post messages. These announcement messages are also sent to your students via email. This communication method should only be used during an active class (from the course start date to the course end date). Emails will only be delivered to students who can see/access the course in Moodle. This means if the class is hidden, before the class course start date, and after the class end date, Announcements will not email your students. This also means announcements will not be sent to suspended students. If you would like to work ahead, you can schedule your Announcements to be posted on a future date. To do this you can click "Advanced" to write and schedule announcements ahead of time, for example you could schedule a welcome message to be sent on the first day of class.
Why should I use Announcements? By using this method all your announcements are all saved/displayed in one convenient place inside your Moodle course. This makes it great for documentation and for helping a student catching up on importing course information if they fall behind on reading their emails.
Moodle: Quickmail block
Quickmail is a block that you can add to your block drawer in a Moodle course or on your Moodle Dashbaord. The quickmail block allows you to quickly email people enrolled in your Moodle course. When viewing the Quickmail block, click "Compose Course Message" to write an email. Use the To search boxes to choose your message recipients. You can choose individual students, groups, or all users with a particular role in the course. You can also choose to exclude people whom you do not want to message. Give your message a subject (title) and body message. You can use special user data fields only in the body of your message to fill in details like the student name and class start date.
Why should I use Quickmail? Because Quickmail messages can be sent before and after classes start/end, this is a great way to reach out to students with details like purchasing materials from the bookstore, sharing a sneak peek of the syllabus, or your contact information before a class begins in Moodle. Quickmail also documents the communication inside your course, so you don't have to search through your emails to find the messages you have sent to students.
If you open the block drawer (use grey arrow on the right side of your screen in Moodle) and you do not see the Quickmail block, you can add it. See the steps in our guide: Add a Block To Your Dashboard or Course.
Gmail
Copy student email addresses into Gmail to start and email thread to share messages before, during, or after your class begins/ends. You can grab a full list of your students' email addresses from your Participants page in a Moodle course. Copy and paste each email address into Gmail or export them as an excel table so you can copy and paste them all into an email at one time. At the bottom of the Participants page click, Select all users, then With selected users... Download table data as Microsoft Excel (.xlsx). Be careful not to include suspended users in your emails. Similarly, you can export a list of your students emails from Stormtrac. When viewing your course in Stormtrac click the Export button on the upper right corner of your course roster. In Gmail click "Compose" in the upper left corner and use your exported file to copy and paste all your student into the To: field at one time.
Why should I use Gmail? Emailing your students in Gmail will not help you document communications inside your Moodle course and it takes extra steps. However, this method is recommended for when you need to loop in additional contacts. Emailing from Gmail allows you to easily include contacts not enrolled in your Moodle course like the bookstore, financial aid, a clinical site coordinator, or another contact when issues arise. If you need to send the same message to multiple classes at the same time (say you have an A and B section of the same class), using Gmail to see one email to both classes can help streamline your communications. We recommend adding your students to the BCC line to protect their privacy however. If you add your students to a Gmail contact lists/labels for quick access, make sure you are updating your list to remove any students who drop your class or add your class late.
Starfish
Starfish is great for sharing feedback with students on their progress or referrals to services. You can also message students from within Starfish, but be careful when trying to send all-class emails as student workers do not appear in Starfish.
In Starfish click the menu in the upper-left corner (looks like thee lines stacked), select Students, and the My Students. You can narrow down your student list by using the Connection drop down menu or other search options. Select the radio button to check the box to the left of the student you would like to communicate with and then click Message.
Why should I use Starfish? Starfish allows you to send messages and post notes. These are great for when you want other services like an advisor or another student success service to see the communications when needed. You can also use this page to raise a flag, refer students to a service, send them a to-do, or congratulate their hard work with a kudos message!
