Adding Activities

Activities, such as forums, quizzes and wikis enable interactive content to be added to the course. Some are only suitable for a tutor/teacher supported course (tutor only) rather than a free standing open educational resource.

  • Blog allows for creation of blogs within a course (tutor only)
  • Choice enables a tutor to ask a question and offer possible responses (tutor only)
  • Custom Certificate is your preferred design, rather than standard Statement of Participation
  • Forum provides a discussion Moodle forum facility (tutor only)
  • Glossary can be a list of definitions, like a dictionary, or resources for information.  
  • H5P HTML5 Package of interactive content (presentations, videos, multimedia, questions etc).
  • Lesson enables sharing content and/or practice activities in flexible ways (tutor only). 
  • Questionnaire allows survey construction using a variety of survey question types.
  • Quiz enables a course author to create quizzes comprising questions of various types.
  • SCORM package Shareable Content Object Reference Model collection of files.   
  • StudentQuiz allows students to add questions for the crowd (tutor only).
  • Wiki lets users edit a set of linked pages, often a collaborative activity (tutor only). 
  • Workshop enables collection, review and peer assessment of students' work (tutor only)


1. Blog

The blog activity module allows for creation of blogs within a course (these are separate from the core Moodle blog system). You can have course-wide blogs (everyone in the course posts to the same blog), group blogs, or individual blogs.

You need to think carefully about using a blog in your OER. Questions you might consider include whether you will be planning to update it regularly with new posts, the extent to which you might allow others to comment or whether you'll allow others to write blog posts as well.

You might want two different kinds of blogs for your course - one which is a reflective blog for each student which only the student and tutor can see, the other could be a group blog where all the students can publish a post and comment.

For a stand-alone open course which will not be tutor supported, a blog might not be an appropriate tool to use.

You need to have the Course Manager or Teacher role to be able to manage learner blogs in OpenLearn Create, so will need to complete the Data Declaration form to get this role (please contact the OpenLearn create mailbox to request the form). 

Add a blog

  1. Click on Add an activity or resource
  2. Select 'blog' from the list
  3. Give the blog a name.  You can add an introduction however this isn't required.
  4. Select the blog settings, depending on what you need the blog to do.

Allow comments (if chosen for post)

  • 'Yes, from signed-on users' allows comments from OU users who have access to the post.
  • 'Yes, from everybody' allows comments from OU users and from the general public. You will receive emails to approve or reject comments from users who are not signed in.
  • 'No' prevents anyone from making a comment on this post.

Individual blogs - options include:

  • No (blog together or in group): Individual blogs are not used - There are no individual blogs set, everyone is part of a bigger community (depending on 'Group mode' setting).
  • Separate individual blogs: Individual blogs are used privately - Individual users can only post to and see their own blogs, unless they have permission ("viewindividual") to view other individual blogs.
  • Visible individual blogs: Individual blogs are used publically - individual users can only post to their own blogs, but they can view other individual blog posts.

Maximum visibility - options include:

  • On a personal blog: Visible only to the blog owner (private) - nobody* else can see this post.
  • On a course blog: Visible to participants on this course - to view the post you must have been granted access to the blog, usually by being enrolled on the course that contains it.
  • Visible to everyone who is logged in to the system - everyone who is logged in can view the post, even if they're not enrolled on a specific course.
  • Visible to anyone in the world - any Internet user can see this post if you give them the blog's address.
  • This option exists on the whole blog as well as on individual posts. If the option is set on the whole blog, that becomes a maximum. For example, if the whole blog is set to the first level, you cannot change the level of an individual post at all.

Show intro when posting (tick box) - default is unticked

Maximum attachment size - This setting specifies the largest size of image/file that can be used in a blog post.

Maximum number of attachments - This setting specifies the maximum number of files that can be attached to a blog post.

Show blog usage extra statistics - Enable extra statistics display in the Blog usage 'block', this is relevant for Personal (global), Visible Individual and Visible Group blogs only.

Alternative activity name (blank uses default) - Set an alternate activity type name within the interface. Leaving it blank/empty will mean the default ('blog') is used.  The alternate name should start with a lower-case letter, this will be capitalised where needed.

Enable post import - Allow any user to import pages from other blog activities they have access to.

Tags - Give users tags to choose from when entering a tag on a post. Tags should be comma separated.

Allow 'set' tags only - If you select this option, you can restrict tag entry to only those that are set at activity level.

Grade - If the blog is part of the assessment and requires grading, you will need to complete the Grade section

  • Grading - If you select this option, a grade for this blog will be added to the course gradebook and calculated automatically. Leave this off for a non-assessed blog, or one you plan to assess manually.
  • Grade - Select the type of grading used for this activity. If "scale" is chosen, you can then choose the scale from the "scale" dropdown. If using "point" grading, you can then enter the maximum grade available for this activity.

Ratings - If the blog will be rated by learners on your course, you will need to set the ratings

  • Roles with permission to rate - To submit ratings users require the moodle/rating:rate capability and any module specific capabilities. Users assigned the following roles should be able to rate items. The list of roles may be amended via the permissions link in the administration block.
  • Aggregate type - The aggregate type defines how ratings are combined to form the final grade in the gradebook.
    • Average of ratings - The mean of all ratings
    • Count of ratings - The number of rated items becomes the final grade. Note that the total cannot exceed the maximum grade for the activity.
    • Maximum - The highest rating becomes the final grade
    • Minimum - The smallest rating becomes the final grade
    • Sum - All ratings are added together. Note that the total cannot exceed the maximum grade for the activity.

If "No ratings" is selected, then the activity will not appear in the gradebook.

However, grading and rating are only used if your OER is going to be supported by a tutor.


Click on 'save and return to course'.