duo
basics
A Quick guide to duo for new staff
Learning Material Communication Reading Lists Assessment Feedback
What are the basics?
THIS GUIDE IS TO GET YOU STARTED WITH THE BASICS
OF USING DUO FOR TEA CHING





UPLOADING LECTURE NOTES
COMMUNICATING WITH YOUR STUDENTS
ORGANISING YOUR DUO COURSE
SETTING UP READING LISTS
SETTING UP ASSIGNMENTS
Dear Colleague,
Welcome to Durham!
This guide is to get you started with using duo to support your teaching practice.
We’ve outlined what we consider to be the basics of what we’d expect for most
lecturers to be able to achieve within the first few weeks of starting and this is meant
as a help guide. If you find that you’re struggling with any of these suggestions
please do get in touch.
Each faculty has their own learning technologist assigned to them to support staff in
using technology in their teaching practice. The role of a learning technologist is to
provide training support and guidance when you chose to use technology in your
teaching. They’re also on hand when things go wrong and provide a link to other
technical services in the university.
Flexible learning for
students’ needs
WHAT IS DUO?
“DURHAM UNIVERSITY ONLINE”
AN E-LEARNING PLATFORM RU N
ON BLACKBOARD WHERE YOU
CAN UPLOAD FILES, LE ARNING
RESOURCES AND CREATE
ASSESSMENTS. EVERY C OURSE
TAUGHT IN DURHAM WIL L HAVE A
DUO SITE SO THAT STU DENTS
CAN ACCESS THEIR LEA RNING
MATERIALS, ANY TIME, ANY
PLACE.
Many people don’t ever stop to wonder
what duo is. That’s probably a very
good sign! Essentially it is just a set of
web pages, most of which require you
to log in. Behind the web pages is a
service that connects to many other
University systems – Student Records,
the Library, Computing & Information
Systems databases, HR, etc. After
you’ve logged in to duo, the system is
able to determine a lot of information
about you – e.g. the modules that you
are studying (or teaching) and show
you links to them. There are also other
‘portal’ type features, some of which
you can add yourself. The best way to
find out more is to try it for yourself:
https://duo.dur.ac.uk
10 Second Start Guide
With any course you’re enrolled on as an
instructor, you will have an edit mode button.
Before you try and make any changes to your
course, make sure that this is set to ‘On’.
To see what the students will see switch this to ‘Off’.
The courses that you will be teaching on are located in the Current courses section
on the duo home page.
The tabs along the top of duo are links to the duo pages of various services at the
University.
When it gets to the end of the year, the courses that you will be teaching next year
appear in Future Courses. This process is called ‘Rollover’.
At the beginning of October each year these courses are moved to Current Courses
in preparation for the start of the new academic year.
The Past Courses are the courses you will have taught the previous year.
You can add widgets to your front page of duo using the add module button—these
are things such as calculators, feeds from BBC news sites or links to other
self-enrolling courses.
SOME THINGS YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
EMPOWER
You can use the features of duo to provide instant feedback
to your students using self-marking tests.
There is no evidence to suggest that this decreases student
attendance.
ENHANCE
Use the email tool to keep in contact with the students in
your cohort. You can send reminders, keep on top of who
has been in and out of the course and who actually has
picked up that reading you put up last week!
EXTEND
Set your course up for the year, using the adaptive release
rules. Your material will become available when you need it
to be.
.
UPLOADING
Your lecture notes
Uploading your notes to duo from your lectures is a
standard requirement for all teaching staff in
the university. This is done so that your students
have fair and complete access to all lecture content.
Putting lecture notes online onto duo helps students in a number of ways, ensuring
that they are prepared for lectures so that they can get more out of them and also so
that they have a point of reference when it comes around to revising for their exams.
The materials you put up here can be anything, from word documents, PowerPoint
slides, PDFs of readings and copies of scanned books (under the Copyright
Licensing Agency's Higher Education Licence for photocopying and scanning. Ask
the library about how to organize this.).
The minimum requirement is a summary of the main learning objectives from each of
your lectures.
HOW DO I DO THIS?
1. Click on the Content area where
you want to upload your Content.
2. Click on Build Content
3. Choose Item
4. Give the item a Name and
add some text to explain the
attached file.
5. Browse for the file clicking on
My Computer.
6. Change the link title if
required.
7. Permit users to view this
content.
8. Change the availability dates
if needed.
9. Click Submit.
SOME THINGS YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
SUPPORTING DISABILITY
Empower
Putting your lecture notes onto duo in advance of your
lectures will really help disabled students follow what is
going on in the lectures and have a profound impact on
supporting their learning and engagement.
There is no evidence to suggest that placing lecture notes
online has an impact upon student attendance.
USING CLASS TIME MORE EFFECTIVELY
Enhance
Putting your notes online before the lecture and perhaps
asking your students to read these beforehand means that
you can make more use of the face to face contact time.
Students value a more active and engaged session than one
that simply delivers content that they could read by
themselves.
SOMETHING YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
Extend
You could think about creating some videos and putting
these online prior to the lectures – this allows students to
watch these before and after the lecture as many times as
they need. If they don’t catch something in the lecture, they
can go back and revisit the material.
COMMUNICATING
With your students
There will be times when you need to send
a message out to your students, thinking
about timings for submission of
assignments and last minute changes to
rooms and seminars.
You can communicate this quickly and effectively using a number of tools in duo.
Emails can be sent either to individuals, whole courses or groups and
Announcements can be used to make a general notification to students that
something needs to be done.
.
SENDING EMAILS
1. Find the Send Email
tool in the Control Panel.
2. Select who you want the message to go to
from the list provided.
3. Create your message and click Submit.
If you want a copy of this email sent to your
own account, tick the box.
CREATING ANNOUNCEMENTS
1.
Go to the control panel and select Announcements.
2.
Click on Create Announcement.
3. Create your announcement
4. Decide whether your message is to be Permanent or date restricted. If you
have chosen date restricted then set the Start and/or End Date/Time and tick
the respective boxes
5. You can now choose to send the announcement via Email to all course users.
6. Finally click on the Submit button
SOME THINGS YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
SUPPORTING DISABILITY
Empower
Giving your students plenty of warning about course events
saves students with mobility problems from having to make
at times difficult journeys to get in for a lecture that they later
find has been cancelled.
Similarly good communication allows them to keep up with
course events and means that they can let you know of any
problems as well.
USING CLASS TIME MORE EFFECTIVELY
Enhance
Communication with your students allows them to know what
is expected from them. The tools in duo allow for efficient
communication between students and tutors and between
groups of students themselves. Preparation before class is
much easier when they know what they’re supposed to be
doing!
SOMETHING YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
Extend
You may want to have an online office hour for your students
to ask you questions about their work, without having to set
aside time to create a number of appointments. You could
use instant messenger with your students allowing them to
see each other in the waiting room, you may find that by
providing this space students are sometimes able to answer
each other’s queries.
ORGANISING
Your duo course
Each course will have a content menu on the left-hand
side. This will normally come with some empty but
named content areas, such as Information and
Content. You can rename these and add new areas as
you need. You can also create folders in which to store
content in each of these areas.
Having a well-organized course, with a consistent layout means that students will be
able to find the material they are looking for quickly and will improve their learning
experience online.
CREATING NEW MENU ITEMS
1. On the menu bar click on the plus sign and
choose content area.
2. Give this a name and decide whether you want
this to be visible to your students, you can
change this at any point.
3. Click submit. The new content area will appear
on the menu.
The grey box beside it indicates that this content area is currently
empty and is therefore not visible to students. When you start
putting content into this area this will disappear and the area will
become visible.
CREATING NEW FOLDERS
1.
Click into the menu item that you want to create a
folder in and select Build Content then Content Folder.
2. Give your folder a name, a
description and, if you need to,
adjust the dates that it is
available for.
3. You can also apply tracking to
see how many times the folder
has been accessed
4. Click submit and this will be
added to your content area.
SOME THINGS YOU MAY SOME THINGS YO MAY WANT TO
TRY
SUPPORTING DISABILITY
Empower
Ensure that your buttons are clear and chose a colour that is
in high contrast to that of the background. Avoid using any of
the more garish buttons as these can be difficult for some
students to read. Having a well-organized duo course means
students will find it easier to locate the resources they need.
USING CLASS TIME MORE EFFECTIVELY
Enhance
You can create areas for groups to work in outside of class
time. They can use the discussion boards, share files,
collaborate and share ideas for discussion prior to lectures.
SOMETHING YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
Extend
Duo has a content management system that is an effective
way of storing large files. You may want to think about
exploring the potential of this area for students to access
their lecture content.
.
The Library prepares a digitized version
of many reading and course materials
each year, from a list provided by the
lecturers. The materials on this list could
be papers, book chapters and other
journal articles that are central to your
students’ learning.
CREATING COURSES
Reading Lists
This list is then automatically dropped into your course on duo. If you have any
materials that you would like to add to this list get in contact with your Departmental
Librarian who will be able to organize this for you.
DISPLAY YOUR LIST
1. Make sure the edit button is switched to
‘Off’.
2. Click on the Tools Menu.
3. Click on Library Resources from the
Tools Menu.
4. This will show you what your library
resources tool looks like. If you’re happy
with this then you can add it to your
course.
Add this link to your course menu
1. Switch Edit mode to ‘On’.
2. Click on the plus sign to add a Tool Link and choose Library Resources from
the drop down list.
3. Type Library Resources in the Name box and click Submit.
CONFIGURING AND UPDATING YOUR READING LIST
1. Ensure the edit mode is set to ‘On’ which will switch to Manage Library
Resources screen.
2. Go to the Tools Menu
3. Ensure that the correct module code is entered and select the order in which
to display the resources
4. If you need to update your list click the Contact the Library button.
This will allow you to create an email to the appropriate library contact with
your request
SOME THINGS YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
SUPPORTING DISABILITY
Empower
Making your reading available online for students allows
those who may need screen readers to access these easily.
Using accessible online materials will ensure that they can
be accessed by all students.
Talk to DUSSD about the best approach to use when setting
these up.
USING CLASS TIME MORE EFFECTIVELY
Enhance
Ensuring that your students have access to reading
materials means that they can be prepared for class time.
Electronic versions of reading materials can be created by
the library to ensure that these are always available to
students and not dependent on copies of the book not being
on loan.
SOMETHING YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
Extend
You may want to try making your reading materials available
in a variety of formats. Your students may have access to
iPads, mobile phone and Kindles. You may want to
experiment with making content available so that they can
use these devices to access the learning materials.
CREATING
Online Assessment
and Feedback
There are a wide range of assessment
methods available through duo. You can
use to undertake both formative and
summative assessments.
These can be simple assignment submission points but also online tests and quizzes that
you can set up to provide instant feedback to your students.
The policy for submission of work depends on your department. In some cases they will
accept wholly online submission of coursework, others will ask for paper and some others
will ask for a dual submission. Ask your departmental administrator what the policy is for
your department before creating any assessments.
The policy for anonymous marking of work also depends on your department. If this is the
case then you will have to blind mark the work for your students. Ask your departmental
administrator for details of which policy is in operation in your department.
SETTING UP AN ASSIGNMENT IN DUO
1. Click on Create Assessment in the area where you want to
create the assignment.
2. Choose Assignment from the list.
3. Give your assignment a name and a description.
3. Attach any files that you may need your students
to use to complete the assignment
4. Enter the number of marks allocated and attach a rubric if you are using one.
5. Set how many attempts you want to allow
6. Set the Due Date
7. Set this up as either a group or an individual assignment. If it is a group
assignment if one member of the group submits then they do this on behalf of
their entire group.
8. When you are happy, click Submit.
PROVIDING FEEDBACK TO STUDENTS
If the policy for anonymous marking is not in place in your department you can provide
feedback to your students using the Grade Centre. This allows for instructor feedback to be
given to each student on each assessment that they submit.
1. Go to the Control Panel and click on Full Grade Centre.
2. Click in the relevant cell, type the mark for the student and click Enter.
3. Click on the downwards arrow beside the entry and click Quick Comment.
4. Enter the feedback to the student here (they will be able to pick this up elsewhere
in duo) and any notes that you may want to make on this assessment for yourself
or other instructors.
5. Click Submit.
CREATING TURNITIN ASSESSMENTS
A lot of departments are now using Turnitin as a method of receiving assessments. Turnitin
is a plagiarism detection software platform, that compares a students’ submission to a
number of databases looking for matching text. It produces an report on the originality of any
submission than can be used to check for plagiarism.
HOW DO I DO THIS?
1. Click on Assessments and Choose Turnitin Assignment
2. Choose Paper Assignment and click next step
3. Give your assignment a name, if you need a point value and set the dates
Start date: When the assignment begins
Due date: The deadline for student submissions
Post date: When the marks and feedback are made available for students (a date when you
will have had a chance to mark all the essays!). Anonymous marking will also be removed
on this date and student names revealed.
4. Click Optional Settings
5. Enter any other instructions, this can be an assignment brief or additional information
6. If you choose to allow submissions after the due date they’ll go into your inbox
marked as late by being highlighted in red.
7.
8. Choose when you wish to generate the originality report. If you’re using this as a
learning activity where students can submit a draft use the overwrite option. If you’re
sharing the reports with students choose either the immediate or on due date option.
9. Choose the limitations of your search
10. Choose whether you share the reports with your students
11. Choose whether you’ll show the marks to the student on the post date or as they
become available
12. Check with your department what the policy is on anonymous marking before making
a selection on whether or not to use this feature on your assignment.
13. Choose where you want to submit the papers
14. If it’s a formative assignment and the paper is a draft choose ‘No repository’
14. Choose the sources that you wish to search against
15. Check with your department what their policy is on online marking and attach a rubric
if appropriate.
16. If you’re happy with these settings, tick the box. This means that all other
assignments in your course will have these settings by default.
SOME THINGS YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
SUPPORTING DISABILITY
Empower
Providing feedback in a podcast can be an effective way of
supporting some students with additional requirements. An
audio file can be a good way for students to engage with
feedback and provide a personal touch from the lecturer.
USING CLASS TIME MORE EFFECTIVELY
Enhance
You could try putting formative quizzes online and ask
students to take these prior to your lectures or tutorials. You
can look at the results of these quizzes and find any
common mistakes or misunderstandings in advance of these
sessions so that you’re aware of the problems before you
arrive and can prepare.
SOMETHING YOU MAY WANT TO TRY
Extend
There are a wide range of technology enhanced assessment
techniques on offer. You may want to try creating
collaborative assessments online using the wiki tool. This
can help with the problems normally associated with group
work, such as ‘freeriders’ and groups leaving it to the last
minute. You can monitor what each individual has
contributed to the project and when.
.
WHO IS YOUR FACULTY
E-LEARNING CONTACT?
ARTS AND HUMANITIES
Judith Jurowska
j.e.jurowska@durham.ac.uk
SOCIAL SCIENCE AND HEALTH
Julie Mulvey
julie.mulvey@durham.ac.uk
SCIENCE AND EDUCATION
Elaine Tan
elaine.tan@durham.ac.uk