If this is your first Wilmette Institute course, please make sure you have completed the Moodle Tutorials first.
1. Will I have to participate in the course at a specific time?
No. Learners live in so many time zones and work at such different hours that it is impossible to get everyone together at once. All work is designed to be completed “asynchronously,” meaning that you do not have to do any thing at the same time as other learners.
One exception is OPTIONAL conference calls, chats, or video webinars, which obviously have to occur at a specific time.
Another exception is a small number of our courses that have intentionally been built around live web video presentations. But those courses are prominently marked as such, and even then people can watch the recording later.
2. I tried to add an attachment to a posting, but it was too large. What do I do?
Contact Robert Stockman at rstockman@wilmetteinstitute.org. Our first version of Moodle limited postings to 1 attachment and a maximum size of 500 kilobytes (half a megabyte). That setting is still in a few courses, but the new upper limit will allow as many as 50 attachments, each up to 20 megabytes in size.
3. How do I see all my postings?
Open your profile (click the down arrow beside your profile picture at the top right and choose “Profile”). In the “Miscellaneous” box on the right, click on “Forum posts.”
4. How do I change my Email address?
Because your email address also serves as your username, you cannot change it yourself in the Moodle course management system. Please email wi@usbnc.org and we will be happy to change it for you.
5. How do I find the name of my mentor?
Click on “Participants” in the upper left corner (top of left column). Your mentor’s name will be automatically selected in the participant search filter at the top of the page. See screenshot below.
6. How do I contact my mentor?
The video below demonstrates different ways to access the Moodle Messaging system. You may also email your mentor directly. His or her email address should be listed at the top of the Classroom page.
7. I just typed a lot of text into a forum and lost it somehow. Can I get it back?
Newer versions of Moodle back up your typing periodically. But you might still have trouble finding the backup and using it. One can lose typing on all sorts of forums, not just the ones on the Wilmette Institute site. There are two ways this can happen:
A combination of key strokes can close the page.
You can “time out” — that is, if you take too long to compose a page, the copy cannot be saved. The Moodle software is set to let you remain logged into a page for 2 ½ hours, but sometimes individual computers have shorter timeout deadlines.
There are two simple solutions to the problem of losing copy:
1. Compose your text in Microsoft Word or another word-processing program, and paste it into the forum. Copying and pasting has one drawback: the formatting can be lost.
You can avoid formatting problems by copying the text from your word-processing program and pasting it into Notepad (which you can find on Microsoft computers by clicking on the “Start” icon on lower left of your screen). Then you will need to copy the text from Notepad and paste it into the forum.
NOTE: Ctrl + c will copy, and Ctrl + v will paste (if you cannot find any copy and paste icons). “Ctrl” is the “control” key on the lower left side of your keyboard. For Macs, use Command + c for copy and Command + v for paste.
2. Compose the text in the text box, BUT every five minutes or so (and right before you add the posting to the forum), highlight the entire text, and copy it into your “paste” buffer.
If you have no icon for doing this, highlight the text, and click on Ctrl + c to copy it. That way, if something goes wrong, you can click on Ctrl + v (“paste”) and put the text back in the box.
That is what we recommend, especially if the posting is long. Either method will save a lot of grief!
8. How do I subscribe to (or unsubscribe from) course forums? Video Tutorial
a) Log in to your Classroom Page
b) Click on the down arrow at top right (beside your name/profile picture)
c) In the pop-up box, click on Preferences.
d) In the User Account box click Forum Preferences.
At the top, you’ll see that the default Email Digest type is: Complete (daily email with full posts). This means you will receive one email per day, containing all of the posts created in the previous 24-hour period.
e) To change your default Email digest setting, click the double arrow on the right side and choose from the other options, which are:
No Digest (single email per forum post): You will receive an email every time a new post is created.
Subjects (daily email with subjects only): You will receive one email per day containing only the subjects or topics of the posts for the day.
f) To save your choice, click Update profile at bottom of page.
Note: This procedure will change your preferences for every course** in which you are a participant.
**You can also subscribe and/or unsubscribe from all forums in a particular course by clicking on the Forums link in the Activities box at the top right side of the Classroom Page of the course.
Whichever choice you make, you can still visit and post in any forum in any of your courses including the “Course Lounge” forum.
Didn’t find an answer to your question? Visit the Moodle Tutorials page, or email learn@wilmetteinstitute.org.
