How do teachers know how Moodle works for their students, e.g., how do exams work from the students’ view? Up to now, lecturers have had two options. First, they can switch to the student’s role and test if files are indeed hidden, go through exams, etc. However, there are disadvantages with the student role and the results of exams, assignments, etc. are not recorded.
The second option is to use the test student accounts of Jane or John Doe, which does indeed provide the real student experience. This also has it disadvantages as one has to remember another login and password, these ‘students’ appear in all graded activities as well as mailing lists, etc. Moreover, many lecturers ‘forget’ to unenroll Jane/John Doe thus allowing anyone with their login credentials access to their courses.
Now, thanks to the new “Companion” account plugin, lecturers can easily switch to a ‘real’ student account to view and test their course activities from their students perspective. Not only does this allow teachers to test their course as if they were a real student, it provides a much more accurate view than the standard “Switch role to” feature and is less time consuming and less risky as using Jane/John Doe accounts.
To use the companion, lecturers can select “Switch to companion” in the user menu on course pages and to switch back, select “Switch back” in the same menu. The companion account can take quizzes and perform other student activities and if lecturers choose not to delete the account right away, the companion student results will be displayed not only in quizzes, but also in the Moodle Gradebook.
When a lecturer is finished, simply go back to the user menu and choose to switch back. Lecturers have the option to keep the companion account for further testing in this course and even in other courses or they can delete the companion account and all of its data.
If lecturers decide to keep the account for further testing, the companion will appear as an enrolled participant, where lecturers can assign the companion to a group, etc.
Additionally, the companion mode even allows easy access through an icon to the left of the user picture/menu. Moodle even displays a message to let the lecturer know that they are in the companion account.
