CTL Blog

New Feature for Multiple Choice Questions in the Quiz Generator

Thu, 18 Jun 2026 00:00:00 -0400

Multiple-choice questions are the most common question type used in the Quiz Generator. It's a seemingly straightforward type of question that belies a lot of pedagogic complexity.

For years, you have been able to allow multiple-choice questions to have a single answer or multiple answers. More recent changes have made it so that the buttons that students click to select a response to a multiple-choice question all look the same to avoid “hinting” that there’s a single answer versus multiple answers to the question. CoursePlus was just updated to include another change on that front.

Previously, if a multiple-choice question had a single answer, students could only select one answer in the CoursePlus interface even if faculty wanted students to potentially choose other answers in addition to the one correct answer. This made it easier for students to determine that there was only one correct answer.

CoursePlus now provides an option to let students choose more than one answer even if there is only one correct answer to the question. This is the new default, as you can see in the configuration of each individual multiple-choice question:

When “Yes - Students can select multiple answers, even if they are incorrect,” is selected (which is the new default), the CoursePlus interface will change to let students select multiple answers. If this option is not set, then students will only be able to select one answer to the question.

We hope that this change to the Quiz Generator makes delivering quizzes and exams more flexible and authentic. As always, if you have questions about this new feature, please reach out to the CTL Help team, and we will be happy to answer any questions you might have.

Listen & Learn: Recording Podcasts with CTL

Wed, 06 May 2026 00:00:00 -0400

This guest post is by Renee Dutton-O'Hara, Executive Audio Producer, and Emily Haagenson, Instructional Designer, at the Center for Teaching and Learning. Audio Editor: Wayne Kee.

Listen to this blog post as a MP3 audio file

We’re making it easier to record short, polished podcasts with the Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) — and we’re offering it with a 4-week deadline. This is the perfect choice if you want a quick, conversational way to refresh course content or host a guest speaker without creating or revising a full slide deck.

What’s New

More time to record! You can record your podcasts up to 4 weeks before the start of term (compared to the current 8 weeks for PowerPoint-based lectures). A streamlined podcast production path will allow CTL to create your content faster.
Podcast slides. A simple, standard trio of podcast slides succinctly communicates your lecture section title, format, and copyright information. We only need your lecture title, headshot, name(s), and credentials.

Figure 1: Standard CTL podcast slides from a lecture in International Adolescent Health

Why CTL Is Doing This

People like podcasts. As of 2025, 73% of Americans have watched or listened to a podcast at least once in their lives, and of these, 55% had watched or listened in the last month and 40% in the past week (Breitman, 2025). This includes our students!
Easier Updates. Faculty told us they want lower-effort, faster ways to update lectures, and we listened! Podcasts are a great fit: less prep, high impact.
Quick turnaround. Fewer slides and shorter sessions cut down on your preparation, and our team can produce your podcast up to 1-month before your course opens.

Crafting your Podcast

Tell a story. Podcasts can give life to examples or applications - consider a guest with a unique perspective on a foundational topic in your course or a discussion of a relevant “case study” or current event. Use familiar story structures: introduction, logical transitions, conclusions, even cliff-hangers, red herrings, or calls to action.
Keep it brief. Academic podcasts are ideal for short, conversational content - quick updates, interviews, reflections, or panel discussions, like in BSPH’s Public Health on Call podcast.
Be strategic. Podcasts are a great way to complement core instructional content covered in your lectures, but not right for all content. Foundational, technical, or highly visual content is probably not right for a podcast, and you should consider other content types.
Be conversational. Podcasts are a different genre than a PowerPoint-based lecture - they are an opportunity for you to connect with your students and your content in a more casual format. A natural speaking style works best - a few “ums” and pauses are fine; our audio editors will fine tune the content.
Consider your listeners. Most people listen to podcasts passively while engaged in another task (chores, commuting, exercising) - this makes this format convenient for your students but also means that you should consider tailoring your delivery to fit these contexts (Breitman, 2025).

Podcast Logistics

For podcasts with CTL, keep the final episode content to ~30 minutes or less. If you think you have more content than this, reach out to an instructional designer to discuss your best options.
For optimal audio quality, we recommend an external microphone, wired earbuds, or AirPods. If you want to borrow equipment, let us know - CTL has loaner microphones available.

Next Steps

Discern where and how a podcast would enrich your course.
Book a one-hour “Podcast” recording session in Acuity at least four weeks before term starts. See recording timelines on the Teaching Toolkit website, but know you can always record sooner, if your schedule allows.
Outline a relevant, engaging, and conversational public health story to discuss in 30 minutes or less.

If you have questions or ideas, CTL’s Instructional Designers and Audio Production team are here to help every step of the way.

The CTL podcast option is an easy, time-saving way to share focused, conversational content without the overhead of a full slide deck. Follow the timing and technical guidance above, and we’ll help you produce an engaging, easy-listening lecture your learners will appreciate.

Source(s)

Breitman, K. (2025, December 12). Podcast Statistics and Trends for 2026 (& Why They Matter). https://riverside.com/blog/podcast-statistics

Reminder: Access to AY22-23 Courses Ends May 31, 2026

Fri, 01 May 2026 00:00:00 -0400

Access to academic year 2022-2023 courses ends on May 31, 2026. This is in line with the policy for access to CoursePlus websites. The policy states that access to a CoursePlus site is enabled for the academic year in which the course is offered and following three academic years. For example, if a course occurred in the third term of the 2022-2023 academic year, a student enrolled in the course has access to the CoursePlus site until the end of the 2025-2026 academic year. After that point, access to that CoursePlus site is terminated.

If you need materials from a CoursePlus site in the 2022-2023 academic year, please download them before May 31, 2026, as you will not be able to access the sites from the 2022-2023 academic year after that time.

April 2026 CoursePlus Update: Reset Quizzes Yourself, and Export Rubric-Based Grades/Feedback

Tue, 28 Apr 2026 00:00:00 -0400

Two of the changes in this month's update address things faculty have been asking us about for a while — one that used to require a support ticket, and one that used to require manual workarounds.

You Can Reset a Quiz Attempt Yourself

Previously, if a student hit a technical issue mid-quiz or needed a supervised retake, the only way to reset their quiz attempt was to email CTL and wait for someone to clear it. Depending on timing, that could leave a student stuck for hours.

You can now do this yourself from the quiz management page. It takes a few seconds, and the student can get back to the quiz right away.

You Can Export Gradebook Rubric Information to Excel

When you grade with rubrics, the scores and responses are stored in CoursePlus, but pulling them out used to mean copying things by hand. Gradebook now offers a direct Excel export for rubric-based grades and feedback.

This is useful for reviewing how a cohort performed on specific criteria, sharing results with co-instructors or TAs, or sending records to a program office.

Gradebook Setup Page Rebuilt

The Gradebook setup page was rewritten on a current JavaScript framework. It looks and behaves the same, but will be significantly easier to maintain and improve moving forward.

Other Fixes

“Time Spent on Quiz” Excel report now shows correct dates for all students.
Lecture duration times in PageBuilder display in the right format again.
Discussion Forum topics set to inherit visibility from a parent category now actually do.
Draft Coach handles temporary AI service outages more gracefully.

If you have questions or concerns about any of these changes, CTL Help is the best place to reach us.

Assignment Assistant: Support for Busy Faculty

Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 -0400

Assignments and assessments are a critical component of any course. Creating quality assignments that meet the learning objectives of a course takes time. CoursePlus has a new tool designed to help faculty with the process of creating and improving their assignments: Assignment Assistant.

Currently, Assignment Assistant has four main features:

Brainstorm ideas for a new assignment: Generates assignments directly aligned with specified learning objectives, complete with instructions, deliverables, and evaluation criteria. Each generated assignment maintains high academic standards while providing a foundation for customization to specific course needs.

Get feedback on assignment instructions: Evaluates pedagogical alignment and clarity while analyzing assignment structure, timeline feasibility, and grading efficiency to identify potential issues with rigor, ambiguity, or overly restrictive requirements.

Build a rubric from an assignment: Creates precise evaluation tools by converting detailed assignment instructions into comprehensive analytic or objective rubrics. Course context guides the generation of assessment tools that ensure systematic evaluation of graduate student mastery.

Get ideas to make an assignment resistant to generative AI: Analyzes an existing assignment and identifies elements that could be completed using generative AI tools. Based on this analysis, it provides specific recommendations to modify an assignment, making it more resistant to AI-generated responses while preserving learning objectives and academic standards.

These tools are a resource that can complement the pedagogical collaboration offered with instructional designers in the Center for Teaching and Learning or other knowledgeable individuals.

Each tool uses fixed prompts to a large language model based on user-provided and course-specific information such as the course title or learning objectives from the BSPH course system. While the tool uses OpenAI’s GPT-5.2 model to generate the output, all data provided to the model is kept private and is not used to train future models from OpenAI.

Because each tool uses a leading-edge, “thinking” model, results are not instantaneous. It takes about a minute to upload your assignment description, to process the data therein, and for the GPT-5.2 model to generate appropriate and targeted feedback (or an entirely new assignment description). A loading bar shows progress of generating the output, and there’s an easy-to-play game of “outbreak containment” that you can play while you wait.

It’s also important to note that the tools do not support interactive chat. Output is generated, and you can generate new output or download the output to Word format, but you cannot iterate on the output inside of Assignment Assistant. HopGPT is available to faculty interested in conversational AI.

As with all generative AI tools, it’s important to keep the following in mind:

All results should be scrutinized and evaluated with a critical lens that evaluates potential bias and misinformation that accompanies AI output.
All results should be further evaluated for their relevance and applicability in the broader context of your course, learning objectives, students, and personal resources, including the time available to implement any activities.
All faculty are encouraged to consider collaborating with CTL’s instructional design team. If you’re not currently partnered with a team member, you can start by contacting CTL Help.

We hope that Assignment Assistant will provide valuable support to faculty and teaching teams. As always, if you have questions about this new feature, please reach out to the CTL Help team, and we will be happy to answer any questions you might have.

Setting Clear AI Usage Boundaries: A Guide for Faculty

Mon, 26 Jan 2026 00:00:00 -0400

This guest post is by Celine Greene, Senior Digital Teaching and Learning Strategist at the Center for Teaching and Learning.

There are many approaches to integrating Artificial Intelligence (AI) in our classrooms: from complete avoidance to the full-on embrace, and everything in-between. Because the level of tolerance can vary not just from course to course but even activity to activity, it is very important that faculty are forth coming in their expectations. This communication provides essential guidance for students and serves as a clear boundary for everyone, helping avoid misunderstandings around the rules of academic integrity.

Increasing students’ understanding around using AI with integrity starts with a syllabus statement.

Is a course syllabus statement regarding student AI use required? Does it have to be reviewed or approved? At Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, it is the faculty's discretion to include a course syllabus statement specific to AI use. However, the BSPH Syllabus Guidance does recommend including such a section. Such statements can be found in the recently updated Artificial Intelligence Syllabus Statements document and the CoursePlus Syllabus tool's section: "Use of Artificial Intelligence Software." These example statements have been vetted by Academic Affairs. Faculty who write their own statements are encouraged to consult with Jon Vernick, Director of Academic Integrity.

This question and response is one of several FAQs on the CTL Teaching Toolkit page: Artificial Intelligence in Teaching and Learning.

Beyond the syllabus statement, faculty can increase students’ understanding of using AI with integrity by:

Reiterating the expectations and the why during the term and in activities’ instructions.
Requiring reflection, including process documentation, in activities both avoiding and allowing AI.
Providing guidance through examples and rubrics.
Modeling and providing pathways to AI literacy, including recommending tools; evaluating prompts and results together; and incorporating AI source documentation as part of citation management.

Recommended further learning

Eaton, S.E. (2024, November). Postplagiarism: Helping Students Maintain Academic Integrity in the Age of Artificial Intelligence [Video] Teachonline.ca. https://teachonline.ca/webinars/postplagiarism-helping-students-maintain-academic-integrity-age-artificial-intelligence/

Add Instructional Team Notes to Your Course Schedule

Tue, 20 Jan 2026 00:00:00 -0400

Schedule Builder is a powerful tool that helps to organize lectures, assignments, live sessions, due dates, and more in your CoursePlus site.

Course instructional teams often use the “Additional Information” field in Schedule Builder events to write course design or production notes when developing or revising a course. This information is meant for faculty teams and Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) staff only, but is always publicly visible on the course main content page or Syllabus > Schedule page because content in the “Additional Information” field is always displayed on those pages.

To address this issue, the CoursePlus team has added a new, private field to Schedule Builder events: instructional design notes. This information is visible only inside Schedule Builder, and is thus viewable only by the course instructional team. You can add an instructional design note to any event in Schedule Builder by clicking the green add comment (“+”) icon while adding or editing an event:

When you click the teal “+” bubble, the instructional design notes field appears:

To make it easy to see which events in Schedule Builder have instructional design notes, a teal comment icon is displayed to flag on the main Schedule Builder editing view next to events that have instructional design notes.

Notes can be added and changed as needed, and when notes are removed, the indicator icon also disappears.

We hope that these changes improve the course building and revision process in CoursePlus. As always, if you have questions about this change, please reach out to the CTL Help team, and we will be happy to answer any questions you might have.

New Lecture Video Playback Features for the New Year

Tue, 13 Jan 2026 00:00:00 -0400

Students spend a lot of time watching lecture videos in CoursePlus. Faculty and the Center for Teaching and Learning work hard to ensure that these videos are of the highest quality.

The CoursePlus team has implemented two new features to make the lecture playback experience better for students.

First, you can enable an auto-play option that, when enabled, will automatically take you to the next section of a lecture when the current section ends.

Enabling this option does not cause playback to continue across lectures – only from one section of a lecture to the next. Additionally, browser security prevents auto-play of video or audio content on a page without your express consent. This means that while the auto-play option will automatically take you to the next section in a lecture, playback of the next video will not automatically start. Some will point out that this is allowed on YouTube, but YouTube is so large and powerful that browser vendors allow (or “whitelist”) YouTube as a site that can have automatic playback of video or audio. You must still click the “Play” button on the video to get the video to start playing back. There is a browser setting you can change to allow video to play back automatically on CoursePlus, and doing this, combined with enabling the auto-play option, will result in true automatic playback of one lecture section after another.

Second, you can now jump forward or back 15 seconds in the lecture video playback by either clicking the circular arrow icons in the video player or pressing the right arrow (to jump forward) or the left arrow (to jump backward) on your keyboard.

Alternatively, you can double-click the right side of the video to go forward 15 seconds, or double-click the left side of the video to go back 15 seconds.

This new “jump forward/back” feature fulfills a longstanding request from students about lecture playback.

We hope that these changes improve the lecture video viewing experience in CoursePlus. As always, if you have questions about this change, please reach out to the CTL Help team, and we will be happy to answer any questions you might have.

A New and Much Improved My Calendar View

Tue, 11 Nov 2025 00:00:00 -0400

The Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) performed a student survey about CTL and CoursePlus in April, 2025. The number one CoursePlus feature request was for a revamped, month-view calendar of activities in all courses.

CoursePlus has long had a chronological list of new activities and due dates for all courses in which an individual is enrolled. This view can be found on the “My Calendar” tab when you sign in to CoursePlus. This list view isn’t the same as a traditional, month-based calendar view, as a calendar lets most people quickly visualize upcoming work. Students stated very clearly that a new, month-based calendar view was a high priority.

To meet this need, the CoursePlus team implemented a totally new, month-based calendar view on the “My Calendar” page:

Some highlights of this new calendar view:

The calendar displays all “available on” and due dates for all items on the main content page of every course website in which you are enrolled.
Due dates are highlighted with the prefix “DUE:” and an alert icon.
LiveTalks for online courses are displayed separately and get their own icon.
Items with due dates that are complete (marked off as complete on an individual course schedule) have a checkmark next to them and are struck out in the calendar view.
Items in the past are colored in gray. The new calendar displays items up to two weeks prior to the current date.
If there are many items available or due on the same day, a shortened list is displayed (prioritizing due dates and LiveTalks at the top) and there’s a “+ [x] more” link that can be clicked on to display all items on that day.
Clicking on an item shows you an overlay with full details (as titles often get truncated in a calendar view) and a link to the course website.
There is an option to only display due dates.
You can switch between a traditional calendar view (the new default) and a chronological list view.
All items in a course use the same color. Colors are assigned once per course per term, so they stay consistent every time you look at the calendar.
There is a legend at the bottom of the calendar that displays the course title in the matching color.

The revamped list view in the new “My Calendar” is also more streamlined than the previous version, grouping items by date:

The new “My Calendar” view represents a big step forward to enabling students to get a big picture view of all of their course activities. It’s important to keep in mind a few limitations:

There is no way to subscribe to this calendar as you would subscribe to a calendar in Outlook or Google Calendar. Addressing this is a priority for the CoursePlus team.
Items not on a main course content page/schedule will not be displayed on this calendar. If faculty want items to appear in this calendar, those items must have representation on the main course content page/schedule.
There is no way to add custom events to the calendar or filter out individual courses.

We hope that everyone finds this new My Calendar view to be a big improvement over the old version!

As always, if you have questions about these new features, please reach out to the CTL Help team, and we will be happy to answer any questions you might have.

Guiding Your Students Toward Meaningful Peer Feedback

Thu, 11 Sep 2025 00:00:00 -0400

This guest post is by Emily Haagenson, Instructional Designer at the Center for Teaching and Learning.

Peer feedback can be an excellent teaching technique.

When done well, it is an excellent way to:

Engage your students and cultivate a sense of belonging in your course
Maximize and spread your learners’ wealth of knowledge and experience
Lessen the feedback burden on the teaching team
Solidify course concepts through learner retrieval, review, and discussion

HOWEVER, we need to be sure that we are doing peer feedback well, and this means providing our learners with guidance to make it a successful experience for everyone. Below are some optional instructions to provide students as you ask them to give one another feedback.

You are welcome to use or adapt this guidance in your course. Here are the important take-aways from this example:

Emphasis on value and purpose of the peer feedback
Guidance around the types of feedback you want them to provide (consider providing more specific examples, prompts, or sentence stems)
Encouragement of specific and focused feedback (move students away from vague “Good job!” feedback that isn’t helpful)
Attention to intention and tone

Giving peer feedback is not about giving your classmates a high-five for a job well done (though you can include that). You and your peers in this course bring a wealth of knowledge and experience that you can lend to one another to enrich this learning community. This assignment is an opportunity to grow.

Here are some perspectives on feedback that may be helpful to consider as you engage with your classmates.

Types of Feedback

Corrective feedback is specific to how well the learner’s work aligns with the learning objectives of the assignment or activity. This feedback highlights areas where the learner has met the prescribed goals and expectations and identifies areas for improvement.
Epistemic feedback prompts learners to think more deeply about their work by asking for further clarification and challenging learners to dive deeper into particular ideas.
Suggestive feedback gives learners specific advice on how to improve or expand on their work.

The combination of epistemic and suggestive feedback prompts individuals to provide further clarification, while also offering specific suggestions. This can be a helpful combination because it asks learners to “say more” and shows them how to do so (Columbia, n.d.).

Tips for Giving Effective Feedback

Specificity: Be as specific as possible. Take the time to provide your peers with information on what exactly they did well or what they can do to improve.
Focus: Address your peer’s advancement toward the specific goal or milestone outlined in the assignment.
Intention: By fully explaining the purpose of your feedback, you can help ensure that your peer understands how the feedback is meant to help them.
Tone: Feedback can only be productive if it is well-received; prioritize being “candid, empathetic, supportive, encouraging, constructive, and respectful” (Fore). That being said, providing critical feedback is difficult, remember:
- Be genuine. People know when you are using “canned” or meaningless comments.
- Be positive too – purely critical feedback is difficult to digest.
- Encourage peers to use their strengths to address their weaknesses (Brown, 2015).
- Critique the work, not the person (Fore, n.d.).

Feedback Checklist

I provided Corrective Feedback: Clarify whether work aligns with assignment expectations.
I provided Suggestive Feedback: Provide advice on how to improve or expand ideas.
I provided Epistemic Feedback: Prompt greater depth by presenting challenging questions.
My feedback was specific and actionable.
The purpose of my feedback is clear and helps the learner focus on their progress.
My tone is supportive.
I genuinely mentioned something (specific) that is positive or well-done.

Sources

Bloomberg School of Public Health. (2025). Peer presentation feedback [Online course]. In J. Richards, B. Sivaramakrishnan, & D. Warne (Instructors), Indigenous Health Leadership & Ethics. CoursePlus. https://courseplus.jhu.edu/core/index.cfm/go/pb:page.view/coID/25011/pageID/196133/
Brown, B. (2015). Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way we Live, Love, Parent, and Lead (pp. 197–206). Penguin Life.
Center for Teaching and Learning. (2024). Providing Feedback [Online course]. In A. Pinkerton, E. Haagenson, & L. Chi (Instructors), Teaching Assistantship Training. CoursePlus. https://courseplus.jhu.edu/core/index.cfm/go/pb:page.view/coid/25565/pageID/198905/
Columbia University Center for Teaching and Learning. (n.d.). Feedback for learning. https://ctl.columbia.edu/resources-and-technology/resources/feedback-for-learning/#principle1
Fore, J. (n.d.). Striking the right tone in written feedback. UVA Teaching Hub. https://teaching.virginia.edu/resources/striking-the-right-tone-in-written-feedback