Assignments
Siyavula’s assignment-setting feature allows you to choose the questions you’d like your learners to practise. You can use them for homework, revision or assignments and don’t need to create your own content. Using assignments means that you:
Can easily find the questions you want your learners to practise, in one place
Can choose questions from across grades
Don’t have to mark learners’ work - our system does it all for you
Can immediately see where learners are struggling, and the areas where they need help
How to get to your assignments:
From the Teacher Home page, click on the green Learner Assignments button to reach your dashboard. All the assignments you set and sent can be found here.
You can also navigate to your Assignments dashboard by clicking on the main dropdown menu and selecting Assignments.
Your Assignment dashboard
On your assignments dashboard, you can:
Set a new assignment
View your draft assignments
View your sent assignments
View the reports of your sent assignments
Share assignments you’ve created with other teachers
How to set an assignment
From your Assignment dashboard, choose Maths or Science.
Once you’ve chosen the subject, you will see the classes you are linked to.
Select the class(es) you’d like to send an assignment to by clicking on the box next to the class name.
Give your assignment a name. We suggest including the content in the name so you can keep track of your assignments easily.
Select the difficulty level you want, or select ANY, for a mixture. The difficulties of our questions are rated from basic to hard.
Select the grade for the assignment.
You can set an assignment from more than one grade. E.g. you can set a Grade 11 assignment from Grade 10 content, or you could set a Grade 12 assignment with a mixture of Grade 11 and 12 questions.
Under each grade are the chapters and sections for the curriculum. Please note that Siyavula’s practice service is aligned to the CAPS curriculum.
Clicking on a section will give you a list of all the questions in that section, with their difficulty levels.
Click on any question to see what kind of questions your learners will see.
Our program is able to create many versions of the same question, so learners can practise more than one example of a question. If you want to see more versions then click on the green “View another version” button.
Select the questions you want to send your learners by clicking on the check box on the right-hand side of the question.
Once you have selected your questions, you can choose to schedule your assignment by selecting a start and/or a due date for your assignments.
Once you’ve scheduled your assignment, click on Send Now. The assignment will only appear in your learners’ assignment box on the start date.
You can also choose to save your assignment as a Draft. This will allow you to add or delete questions at a later stage.
The order in which you select the questions will be the order that which your learners will see the questions in the assignment.
Draft, scheduled, and sent assignments
Your draft and sent assignments can be found under Assignments in your main dropdown menu, or by clicking on Assignments on your Teacher Home.
You can see the report for any assignment that was sent to one of your classes by yourself or another teacher. You can even reuse and share these assignments!
DRAFT ASSIGNMENTS:
These are assignments that you’ve created but have not yet sent out. To work on a draft assignment, click on Use on the right-hand side, and you’ll be able to add or delete questions to the assignment. You can then send it to your class(es) or save it again as a draft.
Select and then delete drafts that you no longer plan to use.
If you have lots of drafts, you can search within them.
SCHEDULED ASSIGNMENTS:
These are assignments that are scheduled but have not yet gone out to your learners. Once the start date is reached, a scheduled assignment will move to the Sent Assignments table.
This shows when the assignment will be sent to learners.
This shows when the assignment is due.
SENT ASSIGNMENTS:
You can see how your learners did on the assignment and how many of them completed it in the assignment report. To view this, click on View in the report column.
Click to see the assignment as learners see it.
Click to view the class and individual reports.
Your sent assignments can be reused or shared with other teachers. Questions can easily be added to or removed from any reused or shared assignment. To share an assignment just click on the Share” button. This generates a link that you can copy or email to a colleague.
Assignment reports
Assignment reports give teachers immediate, detailed information on how their learners have done in set assignments. The reports can be viewed online on the Siyavula website and downloaded as Excel spreadsheets.
The reports are as follows:
Class assignment reports - providing detailed information on assignment results for a class
Learner assignment reports - the detailed assignment results for each learner
These reports provide teachers with valuable information that includes results by question and section, for assignment reports.
Different ways assignments can be marked:
Because learners can try questions multiple times, the assignment report allows you to calculate the final result of the assignment as:
The average of all attempts made for each question; or
The result only from the last attempt made on each question.
You can also choose how to calculate the final average result of the assignment by:
Counting all questions in the assignment; or
Counting only the questions that the learner tried.
If you’d given a due date to the assignment, you can also choose whether or not to include questions answered outside the dates given for the assignment.
How to change the way assignment results are calculated:
Our assignment reports allow you to measure your learners’ work in different ways. At the top of each assignment is a grey box that indicates how the assignment is marked. The default setting is that results reflect:
An average of all attempts made on each question;
All questions in the assignment are counted, whether or not they’ve been attempted; and
Only answers entered before the due date are counted.
To change this, click on the blue CHANGE button.
In an assignment, learners can attempt the same question multiple times. To take this into account, you can choose whether you’d like to see a mark that:
Is an average of all the learner’s attempts at a question; or
Shows the result only from the learner’s last attempt at a question.
You can also choose how to calculate the final assignment average between:
Seeing the percentage achieved across the entire assignment (whether or not a learner has attempted all the questions); or
A percentage that reflects only the questions the learner attempted.
Even if you’ve given a due date to an assignment, learners can still practise the assignment after the due date has passed. You can choose whether to include work done:
Only before the due date has passed
Before AND after the due date has passed.
Once you’ve chosen how you’d like marks to be shown, simply click on GENERATE REPORT.
Assignments don’t disappear from a learner’s assignment page once the due date has passed. This means that learners can still access the assignments for their own revision. However, you can choose whether or not to include work done on an assignment after the due date has passed.
Assignment reports for a class:
The class assignment reports give detailed results for an assignment.
When you click on the Assignments Reports link, you’ll see a list of the assignments that have been sent to that class.
Clicking on the link takes you to the assignment report.
The class practice report can be downloaded by clicking the DOWNLOAD button on the top right of your screen. The report is downloaded as an Excel spreadsheet.
The reports contain the following information:
Title of assignment: this includes information on which teacher created the assignment, when it was created or updated, the number of questions it contains, and the average difficulty of the assignment.
Overview of completion: gives an average completion rate and average result, as a percentage, of the entire class.
Result by learner: shows how much of the assignment each learner has completed, and the overall result, both given as percentages. Each learner’s name is a link to that individual learner’s assignment report.
Result by question: this table shows the section from which the question was taken, the title of the question, and the question’s difficulty level. It shows how many learners attempted each question (as a percentage), and the average result per question (as a percentage).
Result by section: shows which chapter the section is in, and the class average result per section, as a percentage.
Summary of learner attempts: the final table in the report lists each learner’s name as a link to their individual assignment reports. Against each question, you can see how many times the learner tried each question, and how many of these attempts were correct.
Assignment reports for a learner:
How learners receive an assignment
Learners will see their latest assignments on their home page. It will show whether the assignment has been started, or whether they still have to start the assignment.
Learners can click on their latest assignments to go straight to that assignment. Alternatively, if they click on the “My Assignments” link, they’ll be taken to their Assignments page. Any assignments that still need to be completed are in the “Current Assignments” table. There is also a table for past assignments, which shows those that are either complete or where the due date has passed.
If learners have no current assignments, they can access their Assignments Page by clicking on the white “My Assignments” button.
Learners can get back to their Learner Home by clicking on the Siyavula logo on the top left of their page.
Using assignments
Here are some ways in which you can use assignments to support your teaching objectives:
Full check for understanding:
Dedicate a maths or science lesson to Siyavula practice, to revise a section you have already taught by setting an assignment.
You can choose the questions you want your learners to try
Answers are immediately marked, with full solutions, so learners can see where they’re going wrong
Assignments for homework:
Create a Siyavula assignment for your learners to do as part of their homework.
Answers are immediately marked, with full solutions, so learners can see where they’re going wrong
Students can’t copy because everybody receives an equivalent but unique version.
You save time because our system checks and tracks homework completion
Informal assessments:
Use Siyavula for an informal test during class or at home. You can schedule it and select how marks get awarded.
You can schedule deadlines for the assessment.
Learners cannot copy from one another because every student gets a unique but equivalent version of a question
You save time because answers are marked and downloadable reports are generated automatically
Can easily find the questions you want your learners to practise, in one place
Can choose questions from across grades
Don’t have to mark learners’ work - our system does it all for you
Can immediately see where learners are struggling, and the areas where they need help
How to get to your assignments:
From the Teacher Home page, click on the green Learner Assignments button to reach your dashboard. All the assignments you set and sent can be found here.
You can also navigate to your Assignments dashboard by clicking on the main dropdown menu and selecting Assignments.
Your Assignment dashboard
On your assignments dashboard, you can:
Set a new assignment
View your draft assignments
View your sent assignments
View the reports of your sent assignments
Share assignments you’ve created with other teachers
How to set an assignment
From your Assignment dashboard, choose Maths or Science.
Once you’ve chosen the subject, you will see the classes you are linked to.
Select the class(es) you’d like to send an assignment to by clicking on the box next to the class name.
Give your assignment a name. We suggest including the content in the name so you can keep track of your assignments easily.
Select the difficulty level you want, or select ANY, for a mixture. The difficulties of our questions are rated from basic to hard.
Select the grade for the assignment.
You can set an assignment from more than one grade. E.g. you can set a Grade 11 assignment from Grade 10 content, or you could set a Grade 12 assignment with a mixture of Grade 11 and 12 questions.
Under each grade are the chapters and sections for the curriculum. Please note that Siyavula’s practice service is aligned to the CAPS curriculum.
Clicking on a section will give you a list of all the questions in that section, with their difficulty levels.
Click on any question to see what kind of questions your learners will see.
Our program is able to create many versions of the same question, so learners can practise more than one example of a question. If you want to see more versions then click on the green “View another version” button.
Select the questions you want to send your learners by clicking on the check box on the right-hand side of the question.
Once you have selected your questions, you can choose to schedule your assignment by selecting a start and/or a due date for your assignments.
Once you’ve scheduled your assignment, click on Send Now. The assignment will only appear in your learners’ assignment box on the start date.
You can also choose to save your assignment as a Draft. This will allow you to add or delete questions at a later stage.
The order in which you select the questions will be the order that which your learners will see the questions in the assignment.
Draft, scheduled, and sent assignments
Your draft and sent assignments can be found under Assignments in your main dropdown menu, or by clicking on Assignments on your Teacher Home.
You can see the report for any assignment that was sent to one of your classes by yourself or another teacher. You can even reuse and share these assignments!
DRAFT ASSIGNMENTS:
These are assignments that you’ve created but have not yet sent out. To work on a draft assignment, click on Use on the right-hand side, and you’ll be able to add or delete questions to the assignment. You can then send it to your class(es) or save it again as a draft.
Select and then delete drafts that you no longer plan to use.
If you have lots of drafts, you can search within them.
SCHEDULED ASSIGNMENTS:
These are assignments that are scheduled but have not yet gone out to your learners. Once the start date is reached, a scheduled assignment will move to the Sent Assignments table.
This shows when the assignment will be sent to learners.
This shows when the assignment is due.
SENT ASSIGNMENTS:
You can see how your learners did on the assignment and how many of them completed it in the assignment report. To view this, click on View in the report column.
Click to see the assignment as learners see it.
Click to view the class and individual reports.
Your sent assignments can be reused or shared with other teachers. Questions can easily be added to or removed from any reused or shared assignment. To share an assignment just click on the Share” button. This generates a link that you can copy or email to a colleague.
Assignment reports
Assignment reports give teachers immediate, detailed information on how their learners have done in set assignments. The reports can be viewed online on the Siyavula website and downloaded as Excel spreadsheets.
The reports are as follows:
Class assignment reports - providing detailed information on assignment results for a class
Learner assignment reports - the detailed assignment results for each learner
These reports provide teachers with valuable information that includes results by question and section, for assignment reports.
Different ways assignments can be marked:
Because learners can try questions multiple times, the assignment report allows you to calculate the final result of the assignment as:
The average of all attempts made for each question; or
The result only from the last attempt made on each question.
You can also choose how to calculate the final average result of the assignment by:
Counting all questions in the assignment; or
Counting only the questions that the learner tried.
If you’d given a due date to the assignment, you can also choose whether or not to include questions answered outside the dates given for the assignment.
How to change the way assignment results are calculated:
Our assignment reports allow you to measure your learners’ work in different ways. At the top of each assignment is a grey box that indicates how the assignment is marked. The default setting is that results reflect:
An average of all attempts made on each question;
All questions in the assignment are counted, whether or not they’ve been attempted; and
Only answers entered before the due date are counted.
To change this, click on the blue CHANGE button.
In an assignment, learners can attempt the same question multiple times. To take this into account, you can choose whether you’d like to see a mark that:
Is an average of all the learner’s attempts at a question; or
Shows the result only from the learner’s last attempt at a question.
You can also choose how to calculate the final assignment average between:
Seeing the percentage achieved across the entire assignment (whether or not a learner has attempted all the questions); or
A percentage that reflects only the questions the learner attempted.
Even if you’ve given a due date to an assignment, learners can still practise the assignment after the due date has passed. You can choose whether to include work done:
Only before the due date has passed
Before AND after the due date has passed.
Once you’ve chosen how you’d like marks to be shown, simply click on GENERATE REPORT.
Assignments don’t disappear from a learner’s assignment page once the due date has passed. This means that learners can still access the assignments for their own revision. However, you can choose whether or not to include work done on an assignment after the due date has passed.
Assignment reports for a class:
The class assignment reports give detailed results for an assignment.
When you click on the Assignments Reports link, you’ll see a list of the assignments that have been sent to that class.
Clicking on the link takes you to the assignment report.
The class practice report can be downloaded by clicking the DOWNLOAD button on the top right of your screen. The report is downloaded as an Excel spreadsheet.
The reports contain the following information:
Title of assignment: this includes information on which teacher created the assignment, when it was created or updated, the number of questions it contains, and the average difficulty of the assignment.
Overview of completion: gives an average completion rate and average result, as a percentage, of the entire class.
Result by learner: shows how much of the assignment each learner has completed, and the overall result, both given as percentages. Each learner’s name is a link to that individual learner’s assignment report.
Result by question: this table shows the section from which the question was taken, the title of the question, and the question’s difficulty level. It shows how many learners attempted each question (as a percentage), and the average result per question (as a percentage).
Result by section: shows which chapter the section is in, and the class average result per section, as a percentage.
Summary of learner attempts: the final table in the report lists each learner’s name as a link to their individual assignment reports. Against each question, you can see how many times the learner tried each question, and how many of these attempts were correct.
Assignment reports for a learner:
How learners receive an assignment
Learners will see their latest assignments on their home page. It will show whether the assignment has been started, or whether they still have to start the assignment.
Learners can click on their latest assignments to go straight to that assignment. Alternatively, if they click on the “My Assignments” link, they’ll be taken to their Assignments page. Any assignments that still need to be completed are in the “Current Assignments” table. There is also a table for past assignments, which shows those that are either complete or where the due date has passed.
If learners have no current assignments, they can access their Assignments Page by clicking on the white “My Assignments” button.
Learners can get back to their Learner Home by clicking on the Siyavula logo on the top left of their page.
Using assignments
Here are some ways in which you can use assignments to support your teaching objectives:
Full check for understanding:
Dedicate a maths or science lesson to Siyavula practice, to revise a section you have already taught by setting an assignment.
You can choose the questions you want your learners to try
Answers are immediately marked, with full solutions, so learners can see where they’re going wrong
Assignments for homework:
Create a Siyavula assignment for your learners to do as part of their homework.
Answers are immediately marked, with full solutions, so learners can see where they’re going wrong
Students can’t copy because everybody receives an equivalent but unique version.
You save time because our system checks and tracks homework completion
Informal assessments:
Use Siyavula for an informal test during class or at home. You can schedule it and select how marks get awarded.
You can schedule deadlines for the assessment.
Learners cannot copy from one another because every student gets a unique but equivalent version of a question
You save time because answers are marked and downloadable reports are generated automatically
Updated on: 15/03/2023
Thank you!