About the Assignments Tool

Assignments is a management tool used for student submission of assignments (eg. papers, etc.). It enables students to submit assignments or files in TCU Online, eliminating the need to email work to instructors. Students will simply upload their submission to the appropriate assignment, and submit.

As an instructor, you have ongoing access to all items submitted to an assignment. This allows you to have an archive of student work, in case you need to consult it later for questions about grading, recommendation letters, etc. Using the Assignments tool for submission of student papers also allows you to use Turnitin to assist you in plagiarism detection and teaching students about proper citations.

The Assignments tool can support a variety of file types, learn about acceptable file types.

Why Use the Assignments Tool?

Use the Assignments tool to:

  • Create assignments and organize assignments into categories to group and organize similar assignments.
  • Restrict access by date, time, group membership and/or special access permissions.
  • Associate assignments to rubrics, grade items, and competencies.
  • See individual or group submission time & date.
  • Exempt students from the assignment.
  • Download assignments to your computer.
  • View submissions with the document viewer on the Leave Feedback page.
  • Evaluate non-submissions and system-external submissions.
  • Return submissions with grades and feedback.
  • Check for plagiarism detection using Turnitin’s Similarity Check and leave inline feedback through Turnitin’s Online Grading suite.
  • Use search and filter options to find students’ submitted files by username, submission history, and feedback received.

What Tools Interact with Assignments?

Assignments interact with a variety of tools. These tools include:

  • Content: Assignments are seamlessly integrated within the Content tool, allowing students to submit assignments without ever having to leave Content. You are able to edit and modify the majority of the properties in an assignment from the Content tool.
  • Grades
  • Groups
  • Rubrics
  • Class Progress

About Turnitin Integration with the Assignments Tool

Turnitin is an integrated cloud-based service that includes a Similarity Report and Online Grading tools.

  • Similarity Reports identify matching or similar text to sources in Turnitin’s databases. This allows you to monitor assignment submissions and identify potential cases of plagiarism. You can then view Similarity Report, which highlight key areas, show a breakdown of matching sources, and provide direct links to the matching content.
  • Online Grading is an intuitive suite of feedback and grading tools.

Note: The use of Turnitin combined with the special access features in the Assignments tool is not supported. If you set a due date for a student with special access that is different than the due date set on the Turnitin tab, the Turnitin due date does not change.

Learn to Use the Assignments Tool

Get Started with Assignments

Create your Assignments

Add Restrictions

Accommodations and Special Access

Manage Assignments

Assignment Categories

Assignment Folders

Assignment Submissions

Evaluate Assignment Submissions

Assignments and Turnitin

Enable Turnitin

Similarity Reports

Online Grading with Turnitin

e-Rater (grammar feedback technology)

View our Faculty Training Turnitin Webinar

Troubleshooting Turnitin in TCU Online

Assignments FAQ