International Student Custom Groups

This plugin allows course participants to name, create and/or join a group, and also gain a link to the group invitation. It also allows teachers to set min/max numbers of group members and, further, can limit the number from each country participating.

Course managers and teachers may want participants/students to create their own groups rather than have to assign them themselves. This plugin allows participants/students to easily either create a group or join one that has been created by another participant/student. The manager/editing teacher clicks the "add an activity or resource" button when edit mode is on. They choose the "Students’ custom group module", and then add any information / restrictions they wish to include. Once saved, the module becomes visible to participants. Participants can then either click "create group" or click on the "join group" button next to those that have been created. At this stage students can only be a part of one group. Once the group creation period – set by the teacher – arrives, the teacher clicks "Apply groups to course" and all the groups are created. The teacher can put all the groups into a single grouping via the initial settings if required.

This plugin was originally made to enhance the group making functionality for the International Virtual Exchange Project (IVEProject). In the IVEProject there are 3,000+ students from multiple countries coming together to exchange messages and collaborate on tasks in a Moodle site. This plugin solves the problem of enabling students to form smaller diverse groups for more personal international exchange.

This plugin was developed with funding from the Moodle Association of Japan.