Manage groups guide

If students have already been allocated to a group for a team project, these groups can be manually created in Moodle by creating the groups and manually allocating the students to the groups. This option works well when you have a small number of students to allocate to groups. 

If your students have been allocated to groups and you have a large number of students, any member of staff with the Programme Administrator role can use the bulk enrolment method to create the groups.

1. Select Participants from the contextual navigation menu to open the list of enrolled users. 
2. Change the drop-down menu from Enrolled users to Groups. 
3. Select Create group.
4. Add the Group name and optionally a Group description.
5. If you want you can enter an Enrolment key. A group enrolment key will let the user into the whole course, and it will automatically make them a member of this group. Note: you need to set a student enrolment key too if you use this option.
6. Select the appropriate level of Group membership visibility. Please note: this cannot be changed after members have been added to the group.
7. Check the box to show group in dropdown menu for activities in group mode. Please note, this option is only available for visible groups. 
8. If you want to enable Group messaging, so that the students can use Moodle messages to communicate, select Yes from the Group messaging drop-down list.
   1. If you or other lecturers want to view and participate in the Group messaging, then you will need to add yourself and other staff to the group.
9. Select Save Changes.
10. Your group will display on the Groups page.
11. Make sure the group is highlighted and then select Add/remove users. 
12. The Potential members list on the right displays all students and staff enrolled on the module. Use Search (name or email) at the bottom of the Potential members list to find the student.
    • Note: you may need to use a % between first and surname so you can find people with middle initials.
13. Select the student and select the Add button. The student will be added to the Group members list on the left.

    

14. Once you have finished adding people to the group, select Back to groups at the bottom of the screen. There is no need to save.

Hidden groups and their membership are only visible to staff. Any activities and resources which are restricted to hidden groups are automatically hidden from any students not in the group. 

Create a hidden group

1. Select Participants from the contextual navigation menu to open the list of enrolled users. 
2. Select Groups from the drop-down menu. 
3. Select Create group.
4. Add the Group name and optionally a Group description. 
5. From Group membership visibility, select Hidden. Please note: this cannot be changed after members have been added to the group.
6. When you select Hidden, the options to show group in the dropdown menu for activities in group mode and group messaging are removed.
7. Select Save Changes.
8. Your group will display on the Groups page.
9. Highlight the group and then select Add/remove users. 
10. The Potential members list on the right displays all students and staff enrolled on the module. Use Search (name or email) at the bottom of the Potential members list to find the student.
    • Note: you may need to use a % between first and surname so you can find people with middle initials.
11. Select the student and select the Add button. The student will be added to the Group members list on the left.

    

12. Once you have finished adding people to the group, select Back to groups at the bottom of the screen. There is no need to save.

You can quickly enrol participants on groups or edit their group membership from the Participants list.

Enrol via the Participants List

1. Open the Participants List
2. In the Groups column, select the pencil icon next to a participant's list of group memberships. If they are not in any groups yet, it will say "no groups".
3. Select the group(s) you want to add the participant to from the dropdown list.
4. Select the save icon to save the membership.

Edit group membership via the Participants List

1. Open the Participants List
2. In the Groups column, select the pencil icon next to a participant's list of group memberships.
3. To add them to a new group, select the group(s) from the dropdown list.
4. To remove them from a group, select the X next to the group name.
5. Select the save icon to save the membership.

This screencast demonstrates how to create groups in Moodle.