1 Minerva Introduction for new students in the academic year

2 = the electronic learning Ghent University Minerva ? It enables teachers to create and maintain course websites for their students and enhances communication between them.

Minerva helpdesk

4 1 – Sign on

5 1. Open in an up-to-date web browser (Chrome, Firefox, IE 11, …) 2. Select the button “Login with CAS” 3. Enter your UGent username and password loginnaam **********

6 The first time you visit Minerva, you will see the message above and receive an at your personal UGent address asking you to activate your registration as user of the Minerva application.

7 2 – Homepage

8 The menu item “My Minerva” shows all course sites and infosites to which you are subscribed (the ones that are already activated by their course managers). You will be automatically subscribed to a number of course sites and infosites based upon your enrolment / curriculum in Oasis.

9 Course site = Minerva site of a specific course eg. “Soil Physics” (code I = code in Oasis/programme catalogue) Infosite = Minerva site of a faculty, programme, monitoring service, student organisation, … eg. learning programme “Master of Physical Land Resources” with code IMPLRSEG

10 OASIS synchronizes your official subscriptions and/or curriculum data to Minerva. If your registrations in Minerva are incorrect, then you have to correct this data in OASIS.

11 The page “Coursesites” shows all course sites to which… 1. you are subscribed automatically in Minerva (based upon your enrolment in Oasis). It is not possible to delete this subscription. You can only access these sites once they are created by their course manager. 2. you have subscribed manually by clicking the button “Subscribe to (other) coursesites”. It is possible to delete this subscription. You can access these sites directly or once the course manager has accepted your request.

12 The page “Infosites” shows information about the programme or faculty (eg. examination schedules). You will be automatically subscribed to all infosites linked to your programme (based upon your enrolment in Oasis). You can subscribe manually to infosites by clicking the button “Subscribe to (other) coursesites”. It is possible to delete these subscriptions afterwards.

13 The menu item “My profile” shows your profile in Minerva where you can change your time zone, photo, language and default calendar view. Attention: this language setting only applies to the interface of the Minerva application. The course manager determines the language of the course site.

14 The menu item “My agenda” shows all: - private agenda items you have added in Minerva - agenda items from all your course sites and infosites (created by course managers). + a continuous synchronisation between this agenda and tools like Google Calendar, Outlook and iOS (iphone/ipad) is possible!

15 The menu item “My Minerva” is the startpage where you can: 1.read new announcements that are relevant to all Minerva users 2.open course sites and infosites by clicking on their title 3.open modules with new material since your last visit by clicking on their icon.

Minerva modules

The startpage of this course site above contains all possible modules (because its course manager has activated every feature in Minerva). Inactive features are normally indicated in gray (not selectable) or even hidden to users. Modules containing new or modified items since your last visit are marked with a star. 17

18 The module “Agenda” shows date & time related information about the course: - class schedules - deadlines for tasks - approved reservations - planned webconferences - … Difference: The menu item “My agenda” displays the agenda items from all your courses and makes it possible to add personal items to this agenda.

19 The teacher uses the module “Announcements” to communicate important course related information to all users of the course site such as more details on group assignments, last minute changes in class schedules, … Teachers can define a target audience (all - a specific group of users - all users) and choose whether to send the announcements as to your UGent address or not. the course’s bulletin board

20 The module “Documents” is the place to find or download course material such as weblectures, classroom presentations, additional texts and articles, solutions of exercises, images, video, audio, … In this modules you will find files that were uploaded by the teacher, organized into folders and subfolders. It is not possible for students to upload their own material using this module.

21 Students can only upload/share their documents using one of the following modules depending on their objectives: Gradebook (eg. for submitting a written assignment) Dropbox (eg. for submitting a written assignment) Groups (eg. in the context of group work) Portfolio (eg. in the context of mentoring, projects,...) WebPA (eg. in the context of online peer assessment) Student publications

22 The module “Links” gathers course related links to external websites. Just click on the link title to open these websites. Course managers can also: organize links into folders add links as a step in a learning path display links on the startpage of the course site

23 The module ”Learning path” allows learners to build knowledge progressively. A learning path usually combines multiple learning activities: - reading (handbook, presentations, articles, notes, …) - viewing video (eg. weblectures, clips, …) - assignments (eg. self-tests) - discussions (eg. forums) - …

24 A learning path is a sequence of learning activities that you run through with some element of student control over time, place, path and/or pace. Why? Because learning paths are mainly used as preparation for, in addition to or even as replacement of a lecture.

25 The module “Wiki” enables students to add and edit online content (both your own content as well as the content of other students) without the need of a formal validation by experts before publication. So, a wiki is an online collaboration tool for group assignments and projects.

26 The module “Gradebook” is the place where students can: - start assignments like self-tests, exercises, online examinations, … - submit assignments (reports, group work, …) - view their scores (and read feedback of the teacher) This module can also be used for scores on assignments that run outside Minerva (such as oral presentations, observations of practical skills, attendances, …)!

27 “WebPA” is an online peer assessment tool in the context of group work: -each student makes a draft -each student gives scores and/or feedback to the drafts of other group members -each student makes a final version -teachers give scores to both the group as to every individual group member. Do not confuse this WebPA module with the peer review tool inside the module Gradebook!

28 The module “Forums” is used for online discussions between users of the course site. Classic examples of discussions room categories are: ”General” for discussions open to all users of the course site ”Groups” for discussions only open to users that are part of the same group.

29 With the module “Tests”, teachers can create online tests that are automatically evaluated: multiple choice question with one or more possible answers fill in the blanks to enter text or numbers matching questions where corresponding items have to be matched. A test can contain one or more (different types of) questions.

30 With the module Student publications, students can: upload documents and videos share these files with a selection of users and/or groups.

31 With the module Dropbox, students can exchange documents (eg. tasks) and videos with all teachers or a selection of users and/or groups. This offers a valuable alternative to sending s with documents and videos in attachment. The selected users will receive the documents in their personal “Files received” tab.

32 The module Poll gives teachers the possibility to ask short multiple choice questions in order to: gather opinions of students (eg. to provoke a discussion) test the knowledge of students (at the end of a session or at the beginning of the next session)

33 The module “Curios” is our online test environment for self-testing, surveys, multiple choice examinations, … This module is used for more complex question types (compared to the Module Tests), eg. marking a corresponding object on multimedia.

34 The module “Portfolio” can support portfolio based education and can be used for supervision and assessment of internships, papers, project work,... It contains 3 elements: a document space, wiki and discussion forum.

35 The module “Webconferences” is used for online lectures, presentations, feedback sessions, meetings... between teachers and students. It combines video (webcam), audio (microphone), chat and (annotations on) presentations in one virtual room.

36 The module “Course specification” links towards the official course catalogue.

37 The module “Course description” provides general and didactic details about the course.

38 The module “Users” gives an overview of all users that are subscribed to the course site and mentions: - their role within the course site (bv. teacher, assistant, student,...) - the group (or groups) each user belongs to (if used by the course manager) - the course manager.

39 The module “Groups” make it possible for students within a course to collaborate on tasks & assignments in online work groups. When clicking on the name of their group, students get access to these collaborative group spaces containing a document section, forum and/or wiki. This module also manages the way students subscribe to groups: determined by the teacher, the students themselves or Minerva.

40 The module “Reservations” makes it possible for: - course managers to offer a list of available items such as: - subjects for master dissertations or papers - contact moments (eg. for feedback, sessions with monitoring service, …) - students to communicate their choice (or order of preference) to teachers

41 Teachers can use the module “Glossary” to create glossaries in which terms are defined. Teachers can enable the collaborative option (so students will also be able to modify the definitions of the terms). All words added to the glossary will automatically be highlighted in the course site. The definition is shown while hovering over the term.

42 The module “Typologies” is used for labelling or categorising: - discussions in the module Forums - documents in the module Documents or Dropbox - wiki pages in the module Wiki Documents Forums

43 The module ”Dissertation” is used by students for uploading their dissertation online.

44 3 – Log out after using Minerva!

45 We advise you to always log out after using Minerva, especially if you sign up with CAS on a computer for shared use (eg. in a PC room). Never leave your computer unattended...

Minerva helpdesk