Creating Essay Submissions

An Essay content type can be used for various types of exercises. In this tutorial, we will use Essay to get a summary of the book the learner has read. Also, we will define some keywords for which we will give points/feedback if the learner mentions them in his or her answer.

Accessing H5P in Canvas

You can access H5P in Canvas through the Rich Content Editor (RCE), which is accessible via the edit view of Page, Assignment, Discussion Board, Announcement and Quiz questions. 

For this example, we will be adding H5P onto a Canvas page. The first thing you will need to do is either open the page you want to embed the H5P content into or create a new page. Then click the ‘Edit’ button which will open the RCE. (You will automatically go into edit mode if you create a new page.) 

Next, you will need to locate H5P in the RCE toolbar.

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When you click on the H5P menu item a pop-up will show your H5P library.

From here, you will have the option to either insert previously created content or create something new. 

Select the Add Content option to new content. 

Type Essay in the search bar and then choose Essay from the list of Content types generated:

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Creating an Essay


The Essay editor should now appear.

As with every H5P content type you will need to add a Title. This will not be visible to your learners but can be used for searching, reports and copyright information. 

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The main part of the Essay editor looks like this:


The Essay editor consists of 

  • Task description
  • Help text
  • Sample solution
  • Keywords.

Task description 

In the Task description section, provide the learner with instructions or introduce the problem to be solved e.g.  'Please describe the novel "The Hobbit" by J.R.R. Tolkien with at least 100 characters and up to 500 characters.'

Help text

In the Help text section, give the learner a line to help start the writing process. This text will appear as a placeholder text inside the input field where the learner will type his answer. This section is optional.

Sample solution

In the Sample solution section, show the learner an example of how the finished essay can look. The student will see this sample when done. This section is optional.


Keywords

Using keywords we define how many points we will attribute for the appearance of a specific word. In this example we want to set points for these keywords:

Keyword
Variations
Points
Bilbo
 
10
Gandalf
 
20
Smaug
 
20
dwarfs 
dwarves
10
adventure
quest, journey
10


It is possible to add variations for each keyword, for example: (adventure or quest or journey).

In the 'adventure' example the learner will get 10 points if they mention any variation of this word.

Start filling in the keywords and points for your essay submission task 

Add new keywords by clicking on the button. 
If a keyword has variations, use the button.
If the word has more than one variation, use the button. 
The points for each keyword are set under Points, Options and Feedback section. 

When you are finished adding all keywords, it should look like this:



Various options are available per keyword such as:

  • Points - The No. of points a learner will earn if they include this keyword or its alternative in the answer. 
  • Occurrences - How many occurrences of the keyword or its variation should be awarded with points. 
  • Case sensitive - Is the answer case sensitive or not
  • Forgive minor mistakes - Accepting minor spelling mistakes ( 3-9 characters: 1 mistake, >9 characters: 2 mistakes)
  • Feedback if keyword included - Provide feedback if the user has used this word
  • Feedback if keyword missing - Provide feedback if the user did not use this word 

Behavioural settings


Below are some of the optional settings for this content type such as:  

  • Minimum number of characters - the minimum no. of characters the user must enter.
  • Maximum number of characters - the maximum no. of characters the user can enter. 
  • Input field - the no. of lines the text will cover 
  • Enable Retry - choose whether the learner can retry the task 
  • Ignore scoring - choose whether learners only see feedback provided for keywords, but no score. 
  • Passing percentage - percentage necessary for passing 
  • Mastering percentage - percentage necessary for mastering.  Setting this percentage below 100% will lower the maximum possible score accordingly.  It is intended to give some leeway to students, not to 'graciously accept' solutions that do not contain all keywords. 


Finishing up


Save & Insert to complete set up of Essay Submission content type.