1. Before you begin
Do not log into the Medical Language Lab website and create an MLL class manually, because doing so will create a course that will not integrate with your LMS gradebook.
Your integrated Medical Language Lab course will be created through your LMS. To begin, log into your Learning Management System (Blackboard, Canvas, Moodle, or D2L/Brightspace) and access your course.
2. Locate an MLL assignment
Once logged into your LMS course, locate a link to Medical Language Lab content.
The locations and titles of MLL assignment links will vary depending on how your admin has designed your course. Look for "Medical Language Lab," or chapter titles like "Body Structure” and "Medical Word Elements." Ask your admin for help if you're unable to find your MLL assignments.
Though the example below is of an MLL assignment within a Canvas course, your MLL assignments will appear similarly in all Learning Management Systems:
3. Launch an MLL assignment
Click the link in your LMS course to launch a Medical language Lab assignment. Depending on your LMS, the MLL assignment may load automatically in a new browser window, or you may be taken to a launch page with a button to load the assignment.
If you are taken to an MLL assignment launch page, you may see an assignment description entered by an admin. If you don't see an assignment description, you can add one later on the assignment's setting page in your LMS. Click the button that reads "Load (assignment name) in a new window," so your assignment will launch in a new tab.
If you click an MLL assignment link and it fails to launch, it's possible your web browser settings blocked the assignment's launch page. Check your browser settings to make sure pop-ups are permitted.
After launching an MLL assignment, you'll see an MLL chapter module. Click "Details" to reveal the full contents of the assignment onscreen, so that you might preview the exercises assigned to your students. For more information on the types of activity and exercises you might assign, consult our "Assignment Exercise Types" article.
If the Medical Language Lab loads successfully, that means you have successfully activated and launched your integrated MLL course. Your students will now be able to use the links in your LMS to automatically enroll in this Medical Language Lab course and access their assigned coursework, which will be recorded in your LMS gradebook.
Please stress to your students that they must always access MLL assignments via the links in your LMS course, for their grades to record correctly.
4. Navigate to your MLL Class Set-up
After launching an MLL assignment, you'll be able to customize your MLL class' settings. Navigate to your MLL Classes page by clicking "Classes" in the top-left navigation bar.
Your MLL Classes page collects your current and expired MLL classes. After a successful launch, an MLL class with the same name as your LMS course will now appear under your list of Active Classes. You may see a duplicate listing directly below that course, but you can disregard this as a normal part of the integration display. If you do see a duplicate course, please only make changes to the course listed in BOLD font.
Click "MANAGE" (1) if you have a co-instructor who needs access to your MLL class. Consult our "Adding Co-Instructors" article for additional information on giving colleagues access to your MLL class.
Clicking "ROSTER" (2) will bring you to your MLL class' student roster, so you can confirm all your students have enrolled.
If you click the "Action" button (3) for a class, you'll open a dropdown menu with features pertaining to that class.
You will not utilize the "Clone" or "Delete" features seen in an Action dropdown menu. If you want to teach a copy of one of your MLL classes, you can create that copy via your LMS. Please consult our "Clone a Class" article for more information.
Furthermore, please don't delete integrated MLL classes, as this can result in technical errors.
To view your class' Dashboard, select “View.”
Click "Edit" to access your MLL Class Set-up, so you can progress toward finalizing your MLL class' settings.
5. Finalize your MLL Class Set-up
On the Class Set-up page, you will see a menu with six steps of adjusting your course settings. Thanks to your integration, some of these steps have already been pre-configured for you.
The first step, "Create Class" will auto-populate when you first launch an MLL assignment integrated within your LMS course. You may notice that the default class start date and class end date are open longer than your actual course dates. You do not have to change these settings, as your students’ access to the class content will be determined by their access to your LMS course.
Scroll to the bottom of each step and click the "Next Step" button to progress your MLL Class Set-up. Clicking the "Next Step" button saves whatever changes you made on a step of the Class Set-up, in addition to progressing to the next step of the Set-up.
On the "Customize Content" step, you'll see a list of all the MLL assignments inserted into your LMS course. This is where you can customize the types of content and the number of exercises available to your students within each assignment.
You can preview or turn off content in MLL assignments down to the exercise level.
Click its "Details" button (1) to open the full contents of an MLL assignment. Then, click the down caret (2) for an activity type within an opened assignment to see the exercises it has available.
Please do not turn off full assignment modules here, via the initial row of On/Off buttons highlighted in the image below. Use the settings in your LMS course to control which MLL assignments students can access, then use the "Customize Content" step of your Class Set-up to choose which exercises within your MLL assignments are available.
Before students begin working in your MLL class, please make sure you or an admin have finalized which exercises your students will be responsible for completing.
When you are finished making changes, select “Next Step” to move on.
The "Schedule Content" step of your MLL Class Set-up is where you'll finalize due dates for your MLL assignments. If you want students to be penalized for late work in your course, you will need to enter assignment due dates on this page to match the due dates in your syllabus or LMS.
Select “Set Dates,” and then click “Next Step” to see a list of assignments available in your course. For each assignment, you will see a Start Date and an End Date. You can disregard the Start Dates here, as you are able to control when students access each assignment through the settings in your Learning Management System.
For each End Date, select the deadline that aligns with your intended due date for that assignment. The student will still be able to access the assignment after the End Date, but any new work submitted will be flagged as late and given a pending grade of “0” which you can override at your discretion. For more information on late work, see the “MLL Gradebook Features” section of our Instructor "Grading and Feedback Center" article.
When you set an "End Date" for each of your MLL assignments, the Medical Language Lab will recognize if work is not completed by that deadline or is submitted late, and will adjust the student’s score accordingly. The adjusted score will then write back to the gradebook in your LMS course.
When you are finished selecting your due dates, click “Next Step” to move on.
On the "Grading Options" step of your MLL Class Set-up, you can choose Grading Rules for the different activity types within your MLL assignments.
Grading rules should remain at the default settings for most course integrations. You do not need to make any changes on this page, but we recommend familiarizing yourself with these grading rules and calling them out to your students in the first week of class.
Information about alternative grading rules can be found on the right-hand side of the page. For more information on grading in MLL, please consult our "Grading and Feedback Center" article for instructors.
Click the dropdown menu to the right of an activity type to choose its Grading Rule. You won't be able to select Grading Rules for all activity types. Generation exercises always have to be manually graded, and Review exercises are always graded on first attempt. Please note that grading rules also cannot be updated once students have enrolled and begun working in the course.
If a Pre-Test and/or Post-Test has been added to your LMS course, you'll be able to finalize the settings for those assignments on the "Pretest & Posttest Assignments" step of your MLL Class Set-up.
For a Pre-Test, you'll be able to set a due-date, then choose if you want to randomize the questions in your Pre-Test and/or generate a study plan for students in regards to their performance on their Pre-Test.
You can also set a due-date for a Post-Test.
You won't be able to choose the exact questions that make up a Pre-Test and/or Post-Test, but you'll be able to toggle off/on the topics those assignments will draw questions from.
The "Summary" step of your MLL Class Set-up gives you a chance to review the settings choices you've made.
Though it instructs you to at the top of the "Summary" step, you won't need to share your Class ID with your students. Because your MLL class is integrated within your LMS course, your students will automatically enroll in your MLL class by launching MLL assignments via your LMS course.
6. Check student performance
We recommend using the Feedback Center (which should be inserted into your LMS course) to track student progress for each assignment and confirm they have completed all required exercises before assignment deadlines.
As a student complete exercises within an MLL assignment, their grade for that assignment will adjust according to the running average of scores for the exercises they've completed.
For example, if a student completes one exercise on-time with a score of 100%, their overall grade for that exercise's MLL assignment will initially appear as a 100%.
Then, if the student completes a second exercise on-time with a 50%, their grade for that MLL assignment would appear as an average of their scores for those two exercises.
The student’s grade will be finalized when they complete all required exercises in an assignment by the due date you’ve selected. If the student does not complete all required exercises on time, then their grade will be finalized when the assignment is due. Once the due date for an assignment passes, any incomplete exercises within that assignment will be scored as 0%, and those scores will be factored into a student's final average grade for the assignment.
Make sure students complete all assigned exercises on-time to avoid lowering their grades!
To inform students how to check their assignment performance, you can send them our "Grading and Feedback Center" article for students.
7. Access your Instructor Resources
After launching an MLL assignment, click "Resources" in the top-right navigation bar to access your Instructor Resources.
Your students won't be able to access the Instructor Resources that come with your textbook. And, you can edit whatever you find in your Instructor Resources however you see fit.
You can find full PowerPoint Presentations in the "Classroom & Lecture Planning Resources" dropdown menu of your Instructor Resources.
Also within your "Classroom & Lecture Planning Resources" dropdown menu, you can find an Instructor's Guide with insights on using MLL content in your class.
In the "Testing Resource" dropdown menu of your Instructor Resources, click the "Test Questions" dropdown menu to find documents with premade test questions for each chapter in your textbook.
Check with your admin to confirm whether the test banks seen here have already been added to your LMS course.
8. Access your eBook
After launching an MLL assignment, click the "eBook" link beneath your top-right navigation bar.
F.A. Davis eBooks are hosted by a separate service called "VitalSource." When first opening an F.A. Davis eBook, you may be prompted to create or log into a VitalSource account.
When creating a VitalSource account, enter the same email you use to log into your LMS.
You won't be able to view exercises that students have completed in their eBooks, and their performance on those eBook exercises won't report to your Gradebook.
9. Need more help?
If you have consulted the information/resources above and are still unable to access your MLL content, please contact us via Integration@FADavis.com. Include your name, LMS login email address, and the name of your institution in your email to us, so our team can contact and further assist you.
