Qwickly Attendance is a tool that allows instructors to take attendance using either a roll call style list or by requiring students to mark their own attendance through a ‘check-in’. This guide shows you how to take attendance using Qwickly in conjunction with Canvas.
Instructors can use Qwickly to take attendance for a particular section, or groups of students in a Canvas course. The Attendance tool allows an instructor to change their attendance taking mode in a course if groups or sections are detected.
Important!
By default, groups/sections are NOT a visible option in the Qwickly Attendance tool even if you have groups/sections in your Canvas course. You will need to go into Qwickly’s settings to connect the sections/groups in Canvas, after which they will be visible in the Qwickly attendance tool.
If you have not yet enabled course groups/sections attendance in Qwickly, refer to the Setup Qwickly guide. Once sections/groups are connected between Canvas and Qwickly for your course, you can take attendance:
Launch Qwickly Attendance from the course navigation menu. The Take Attendance view will load.
From the ‘Section’ drop-down list, select the group or section for which attendance needs to be taken. This will change the roster and only show users who are part of the selected group/section.
Continue with the steps below for Manual attendance or Student self check-in.
Useful tip
If you don’t see Qwickly Attendance in the course navigation menu, you can turn it on by selecting Settings, Navigation in your course menu and then drag the Qwickly Attendance menu item up to be visible.
Manual attendance taking
Open Qwickly Attendance from your Canvas course menu and navigate to Take Attendance.
From the left menu you can see the following ways you can take attendance:
Check-in – student self check-in mode
List – displays a vertical list of students
One By One – displays one student per page
To manually take attendance:
Navigate to either List or One By One.
Select the desired group or section you would like to take attendance for from the section dropdown menu. Your view should display the students assigned to that group/section.
Click Submit Attendance to save the record.
Important!
Canvas synchronises student lists (e.g. section lists) with Allocate+, while Qwickly Attendance synchronises with Canvas. You may find that your section lists are out of date when students update their enrollment information as the synchronisation may take some time to reflect any student changes due to this flow of information.
You can mark all your student statuses using the All Students status option. This will change the attendance status of all students for that record.
You can mark students’ attendance status individually by selecting a status corresponding to their name.
You can make a comment by clicking on the comment icon.
The attendance Status Count at the bottom of the screen will update automatically as you make attendance status selections.
Manual attendance tips and notes
Students will be able to see their attendance record immediately after you have clicked Submit Attendance. You may want to consider asking your students to check their record at the time of attendance to ensure it is accurate and therefore issues can be addressed immediately if any arise.
Student self-revision
Students will be able to see their attendance record immediately after you have clicked Submit Attendance. You may want to consider asking your students to check their record at the time of attendance to ensure it is accurate and therefore issues can be addressed immediately if any arise.
Qwickly Attendance is arranged in chronological order. By default, Qwickly will use the current date/time when recording attendance. Using the Past Time option allows you to set a date and time for your attendance record.
Set date
Qwickly Attendance is arranged in chronological order. By default, Qwickly will use the current date/time when recording attendance. Using the Past Time option allows you to set a date and time for your attendance record.
Qwickly Attendance allocates a default Session title in the form of Month Date to each attendance record e.g., Feb 25. This is based on the date the record was saved. You can customise your record entry by adding a Session Title with something more meaningful to you and your teaching team e.g., 25/02 Tut 1 or 25/02 Lab.
Custom session title
Qwickly Attendance allocates a default Session title in the form of Month Date to each attendance record e.g., Feb 25. This is based on the date the record was saved. You can customise your record entry by adding a Session Title with something more meaningful to you and your teaching team e.g., 25/02 Tut 1 or 25/02 Lab.
Each time you submit attendance Qwickly creates a new record. If changes need to be made once attendance has been taken, these should be made in the attendance record rather than initiating a new attendance record.
Edit records
Each time you submit attendance Qwickly creates a new record. If changes need to be made once attendance has been taken, these should be made in the attendance record rather than initiating a new attendance record.
Comments privacy
By default, Qwickly Attendance comments are private and not visible to students. Only teaching staff can view attendance comments in Qwickly, unless the visibility of a comment is manually changed to allow the student to view their comment per attendance record. It is recommended that all comments made in Qwickly Attendance be made under the assumption that records can be requested and made visible to students. Ensure your comments comply with the UTS Privacy Policy, for example avoid references to health, religious or other sensitive information.
Student self check-in
Instructors can allow students to check in to class on their own devices. Checking in allows instructors to skip manually taking attendance and gives students recognition for being in class when they self check-in. As part of the student self check-in feature instructors can also opt to use an auto generated four-digit pin PIN code and/or a count-down timer.
Important!
If taking Attendance by Check-in mode, only one group/section check-in can run at a time. If you start your check-in at the same time another group/section runs their check-in you will need to try again later.
To avoid this happening, you may want to coordinate the time concurrent check-ins are scheduled so they don’t clash at exactly the same time.
Before starting student check-in you may want to review your check-in settings. Refer to the Setup Qwickly guide.
To take attendance with Student self check-in:
Navigate to Take Attendance and select Check In.
Select the section you would like to take attendance for.
Use the optional Session Title field to give your check-in record a short descriptive title.
Select Start Check in.
If you have opted to turn on a PIN, the PIN will only be displayed on the instructors screen. If you have opted to turn on a timer the timer will be displayed on the instructors and students screen. To use the PIN or timer feature refer to the Setup Qwickly guide.
After starting Qwickly Attendance check-in, students are then able to navigate to your Canvas subject site and launch the Qwickly Attendance tool from the course menu. If students have launched Qwickly Attendance before you start the check-in they will need to close the Qwickly tab and launch Qwickly Attendance again. Students will be presented with a check-in button to click and a PIN field and timer if you opted to use them.
Student self check-in tips and notes
If you do NOT change the section and leave attendance set to All Students, the check-in records will only be visible in the All Student Attendance Record view and not available when viewing individual section attendance records. To avoid this ensure you select the section/group before taking attendance. If you leave the Session Title blank, a default attendance record name in the format of Month Date will be allocated e.g. Feb 25. Instead of using the default, use the Session Title field to give your record a custom title e.g. WK1 Tut 2
All students warning
If you do NOT change the section and leave attendance set to All Students, the check-in records will only be visible in the All Student Attendance Record view and not available when viewing individual section attendance records. To avoid this ensure you select the section/group before taking attendance. If you leave the Session Title blank, a default attendance record name in the format of Month Date will be allocated e.g. Feb 25. Instead of using the default, use the Session Title field to give your record a custom title e.g. WK1 Tut 2
Help build an inclusive environment for all your students by using multi-modal instructions to communicate the PIN and countdown timer to your students. For example, display the PIN on a slide or in a shared screen during class time; post the PIN in the chat window and verbally for your students. The instructor view does not show how many students have or have not checked-in. Once check-in is closed, you can navigate to Attendance Record to view student check-in status’.
Accessibility
Help build an inclusive environment for all your students by using multi-modal instructions to communicate the PIN and countdown timer to your students. For example, display the PIN on a slide or in a shared screen during class time; post the PIN in the chat window and verbally for your students. The instructor view does not show how many students have or have not checked-in. Once check-in is closed, you can navigate to Attendance Record to view student check-in status’.
If you choose to use the countdown timer it is recommended that you make regular verbal announcements to help students manage the time restriction e.g. “I have enabled a countdown timer, you have 3 mins to check-in.” Followed by “2 mins to go”, “1 min to go” “30 secs to go”. “Time up” verbal announcements.
Verbal countdown
If you choose to use the countdown timer it is recommended that you make regular verbal announcements to help students manage the time restriction e.g. “I have enabled a countdown timer, you have 3 mins to check-in.” Followed by “2 mins to go”, “1 min to go” “30 secs to go”. “Time up” verbal announcements.
Face to face vs online attendance taking
The process of taking attendance in Qwickly Attendance for F2F or online is identical, PIN numbers can be displayed on a projection screen in the teaching space.
Help reduce fraudulent attendance
The following might be suitable for preventing fraudulent attendance but has its limitations:
Check-in: The check-in option enables you to allow students to register their own attendance using a PIN and timer feature. Providing a PIN for the session may help prevent students from fraudulently checking in if not present at the session.
Zoom & Quickly Comparison: Compare your Qwickly attendance data with your Zoom attendance report.
Randomise attendance taking: To help reduce the incidence of students being marked as attending a lecture, tutorial, lab etc. and then leaving after attendance is taken, it is recommended that you randomise the time you take attendance during a learning activity. Randomising isn’t a guarantee that attendance misconduct won’t happen, rather a suggestion to try to help reduce potential incidences.
