What is Completion Tracking?
Item completion is a setting that records whether or not a student has met a certain completion criteria for any given item that you have placed inside of a Moodle course. You can use it to help students track their progress in a course or to control what students need to complete before accessing certain course material.
Student view of completion conditions:
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Turning on Completion Tracking for a Course
This setting should already be on by default, but if it is not follow the directions below to turn it on.
- In your Moodle course, turn editing on by clicking the Edit Mode toggle in the top right corner of your page.
- Click the course Settings tab.
- Scroll down and click the Completion Tracking heading to expand it and set Enable completion tracking to Yes. Also make sure Show activity completion conditions is set to Yes.
- Click the Save and display button.
Customizing Completion Tracking Settings for a Course Item
- In the Moodle course, click the item’s Edit menu (three dots) and select Edit Settings
- Scroll down to the Completion conditions section and select one of the options:
- None
- Students must manually mark the activity as done
- Add requirements
- If you select Add requirements more options will appear, options will vary depending on the item type (quiz, forum, page, etc.). See a the chart below for recommended settings or more detailed guides like Completion Conditions for Forums.
- Click the Save and return to course button.
Recommended Completion Conditions by Activity Type
Each activity type/item in your course can have different completion conditions. In order to help keep students on track, we recommend the following completion condition settings. These recommendations are general and may not apply to every item in your course design, but can be used as a general guideline. For example when a student views a URL or File on Moodle there isn't an activity we want them to complete other than reading it, in this case you may want to allow them to manually mark it complete themselves or you can set it to be complete automatically when they view it. However, these same settings are not recommended for a quiz. A Quiz is not really complete just because a student viewed it, we want them to submit their answers. So we choose a different completion condition for those kinds of activity. These settings can help you communicate your expectations clearly to students.
Most activities also allow you to set up a Reminder in Timeline, this appears in the timeline on the students dashboard and can send them a mobile notification if they have the Open LMS app and notifications enabled. The reminder in timeline is separate from your due date. It can be helpful for keeping students on track if you do not have a specific due date set for items like a page or URL or if you want to remind them to work on an item ahead of a due date rather than trying to complete a large task at the last minute.
| Activity Type | Select Condition: None | Select Condition: Student Must Manually Mark the Activity as Done | Select Condition: Add Requirements |
|---|---|---|---|
| URL, File, Book, or Page (Important resources to read or view like a Syllabus) | Not Recommended | Yes, this is especially good for items that make take a while to read. | Select: Student must view This indicated that a student looked at the item automatically but does not meant they read it. |
Quiz (formative, low stakes/multiple attempts) | Not Recommended | Not Recommended | Select: Receive a grade If your quiz is auto-graded, this automatically marks those submitted quizzes as complete. |
| Quiz (summative, like an high stakes exam) | Not Recommended | Not Recommended | Select: Receive a grade If your quiz is auto-graded, this automatically marks those submitted quizzes as complete. |
| Forum | Not Recommended | Not Recommended | Select: Start discussions or Post replies You can choose the total number of posts/replies you require. |
| Assignment | Not Recommended | Not Recommended | Select: Make a submission |
| Lesson | Not Recommended | Not Recommended | Select: Reach the end of the lesson OR Time spent |
| Optional activities (supplemental or ungraded items) | Yes | Not Recommended | Not Recommended |
Viewing a Completion Tracking Report
To view a report that shows a list of students and the items they have completed, click the Reports tab and select Activity completion.
Completion Tracking and Restrict Access
You can also use completion conditions to restrict access to other areas of your course. This can be especially helpful at the start of a semester. If you have a lot of activities in your course, it can be overwhelming for a new student to navigate. By using Restrict Access settings (link opens in new tab) you can limit what a student can see early on in a course, so that they do not get lost or distracted from completing their course entry quiz. This is also especially helpful if students are expected to complete activities in a specific order.