Create an Attendance Activity in Moodle

Overview

The Attendance activity is an online tool for teachers to mark the attendance status of a student. 

This page gives you instructions for setting up the Attendance Activity, for taking attendance and for displaying students' attendance reports to you and to them.

You can add only one Attendance activity per course.

When to use

Set up the Attendance activity, including grades and variables, before Semester starts. Record attendance using the tool during each class throughout the course.

Benefits

The Attendance block is the most efficient way to use the Attendance activity. Use it to record students’ attendance at classes or activities, to report on attendance, or to change the attendance settings. In the student view of Moodle, this block will display the attendance report for an individual student.

Guide

Step by step instructions

Advanced

Create an Attendance activity

You can only add one Attendance activity per course.
  1. On the homepage of your course, click Turn editing on .
  2. In the relevant section, click Add an activity or resource and select Attendance from the menu.
  3. On the Adding a new Attendance page, change the Name of the Attendance activity (Optional).  In the Grade section, you can change the grade type to Scale, Point or None.
  4. Complete the remaining fields on the page, and click Save and display.
  5. On the Sessions page, click the Add session tab.
  6. On the Add session page:
    • select the Groups to which this activity applies, if this is a group session or you can select All students.
    • enter the date and time of the first class.
    • you can allow students to record their own attendance by checking the box displayed. 
  7. If you want the attendance activity to be repeated for multiple sessions of your class then do the following:
    • check the box which states "Repeat the session above as follows".
    • check the days on which your classes are held.
    • select the repetition rate ("2" means the class is held every two weeks) 
    • select the date for the last class. 
  8. Click Add and check that the sessions have been setup correctly. 

Hide the Attendance activity and add the Attendance block

The Attendance block is the most efficient way to use the Attendance activity. This block gives you easy access to the attendance functions, but in the student view it displays a report on the student's individual attendance. To speed up the process of taking the roll, and allow students to see their own attendance record, add an Attendance block to the course home page.

  1. On the course home page, click Turn editing on .
  2. Next to the Attendance activity that you created earlier, click the settings icon, then select Hide Attendance block.
  3. In the Add a block section, select Attendance.
  4. The activity will display in the blocks column. You can move the block up or down, take attendance and manage your sessions from here.

Set up grades and variables

  1. On the course home page, click on the attendance activity. 
  2. Click on the Status set tab. 
  3. In the variables section,
    • For Acronym, enter a code e.g. "P".
    • For Description, define the code e.g. Present
    • Enter a Point appropriate to the code. 
  4. Click Add after adding each acronym and click Update.

Record attendance at a session or class

Before you record attendance, it's a good idea to add the Attendance block to the course home page.

  1. On the course home page, in the Attendance block, click Attendance. (If you do not have an Attendance block, click the link for the Attendance activity.)
  2. On the Attendance for the course\Sessions page, under Actions, click the Take attendance icon of the relevant session.
  3. On the class attendance page, for each student, select the button in the appropriate column, and add any necessary Remarks.
  4. When the page is completed for all students, click Save attendance.
  5. You can also save and edit/complete the attendance later.  Click either the link in the Date or Time column or the Change attendance icon .

Make changes to the settings of a session

  1. On the course home page, click the link for the Attendance activity.
  2. On the Sessions tab, under Actions, click the Edit Edit icon icon for the relevant class you wish to edit.
  3. On the Change Session section, change the class Date, Time and Description as necessary, and click Save Changes.

Delete a session

  1. On the course home page, click the link for the Attendance activity.
  2. On the Sessions page, in the Actions column, click the Delete icon, and click Continue in the confirmation page.

Group Mode

Group Mode can be enabled in an attendance activity to split the attendance taking of groups to their respective tutors/assigned persons.

To enable group mode:
Group mode with separate groups selected

  1. In the course, click 'Turn editing on'
  2. Click on 'Edit' beside the attendance activity and select 'Edit settings'
  3. Go to the 'Common module settings' section and set group mode to 'Separate groups' or 'Visible groups'
  4. (Optional) Select a 'Grouping' if you only want to use a specific set of groups to split the attendance

Once enabled, the sessions you create will be on a per-group basis. Tutors must be assigned to a group to give attendance and they can only see and give attendance for groups that they are in.

Tutors who are not in any group can see all the groups in the activity but will not be able to view or give attendance

Instructors and Teaching Assistants are not affected by this and can give attendance to everyone.

Add session page in attendance activity, there is a groups area to select a group

 

Additional information

Further assistance

If you experience technical or other issues, consult the Where to get help page.

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