Brandeis's use of Perusall does not require an institutional license. This tool can be used in Brandeis courses without a license because the LTI integration we use is free and does not require a paid license. Upon reaching the student cost screen, select the $0 option to ensure there is no cost for students. Omitting this step may trigger a marketing email being sent to the instructor of record which includes language that urges them to reach out to their institution to pursue the purchase of an institutional license. This message can be ignored.
Perusall is a service for instructors to post their course readings, textbooks, and PDFs online. Students access the course material and can annotate the readings, post comments, and ask questions publicly shared with the entire class. Completing readings can become graded assignments and the entire class (or multiple sections of a course) can work together to understand the material. Now, Perusall can automatically connect with Moodle for a seamless learning experience, without having students create an additional log-in.
If you previously taught a course in Perusall through LATTE, you can easily transfer the content to a new course in Moodle.
Select the next tab, Select Content to continue.
1. Under Courses to Copy select the drop down to locate the previous course in Perusall you want to copy from.
2. In Content to Copy and Assignments to copy, select the content and assignments you would like to copy into the new Perusall Course. Select the Green Continue button at the bottom of the screen.
3. You can skip the Select Content Screen.
4. Brandeis does not have an institutional license for Perusall. However, you can still use this tool in your course because the LTI integration we use is free and does not require a paid license. When you reach the student cost screen, select the $0 option to ensure there is no cost for students. Then, click the green Continue button to proceed with the setup process.
On the Basic settings setup screen you need to add in the academic department for the class, and adjust the Start data and End Date for the course.
Select whether and how analytics and scoring are part of your course
Perusall can automatically synchronize with the Moodle gradebook.
The number of students you expect to join the course. Perusall will use this value and the Target Group Size value to create discussion groups for students. If you don't want groups created within Persuall, leave the value for Target Group Size the same as Enrollment Estimate.
Select the Green Continue button at the bottom of the screen.
Select the next tab, Ready to go!, to continue setting up Perusall.
Perusall will sync automatically with Moodle to load the full students roster. Use this link to learn more about how Perusall and Moodle work together: Moodle Instructor Setup
The next step depends upon how you would like to use Perusall in Moodle. If you plan on providing unique, individual links to each Perusall assignment, you can now add them to your course by following this procedure:
Perusall's annotation and commenting features allow for a wide range of activities:
What parts of the article are unclear or confusing to you?
If something doesn’t make sense, highlight the sentence or phrase and ask a question about it so others can help clarify.What did you find surprising in the article?
Highlight a passage that caught you off guard and explain what surprised you and why.
Which arguments in the article do you strongly agree or disagree with? Why?
Choose a quote that you find convincing or problematic, and share your opinion about it.
Can you connect anything in this article to other readings or class discussions?
Highlight a part of the article and describe how it connects to something else we’ve studied or talked about.
Have additional examples of suggestions to add to this guide? Email the Library to have them included!
Once a Perusall link has been created within your Moodle course, ask students to click on the assignment link. An account will automatically be created for them the first time they open Perusall. The assigned reading will appear, and students can highlight, comment, ask questions, or even add an emoji reaction!
If you have created groups, students will be randomly assigned to them. If you prefer to manually assign to students to groups, you must do so within the Perusall course page. Access the Course Setting and select the Group Options tab. You can manually assign students into a group by placing the group number next to the student's name.
