Turnitin

Setting up Turnitin in your Brightspace Assignment

Once you have created an assignment submission folder in Brightspace, you need to set up your Turnitin options. Consistent with the principle of using Turnitin as a learning tool, we recommend configuring Brightspace assignments as follows.

Enable Multiple Submissions

For any given assignment, we want the student to have the opportunity to review the Turnitin similarity report and any comments from the instructor and to make changes and resubmit. At a minimum, we want the student to be able to submit at least twice and possibly more if you wish.  In the Properties panel, configure the Submission Options as shown below.

The most important setting is All submissions are kept. This allows the student to submit multiple times and review the similarity report and instructor feedback from each submission.

Enable Turnitin

Go to the Turnitin panel and configure as shown below.

Enable GradeMark for this folder is required in order to enable the Originality Check below.

Enable Originality Check for this folder is required in order to be able to generate the similarity index and similarity reports.

Allow learners to see Turnitin similarity scores in the their submission folder is what allows students to see the similarity index for the submission as well as view a full report along with the instructor’s comments.

Automatic originality checking on all submissions allows students to view the similarity report instantly (or within a few minutes of submitting). This enables students to start work right away on dealing with any similarity issues, even before receiving additional feedback from the instructor.

Typical Workflow

  1. Instructor creates assignment and configures submission folder as described above.
  2. Student submits first draft.
  3. Student is able to see the similarity index and the similarity report immediately.
  4. Instructor reviews the similarity index and the similarity report and reviews the first draft and provides feedback to the student.
  5. Student reviews instructor feedback, makes changes, and submits final draft.
  6. Student is able to see the similarity index and similarity report for the final draft immediately
  7. Instructor reviews final draft and assigns final grade and may provide additional feedback.
  8. Student reviews grade and feedback.

Accessing Similarity Reports

Pictured below is a sample submission page in Brightspace for an assignment configured as described above.

There is a new column, Turnitin Similarity, which shows the similarity index. In the example, the student has submitted twice. The first submission has a similarity index of 0%. This indicates that the first submission did not match any documents in the Turnitin document database. The second submission has a similarity index of 29%. This indicates that the second submission partially matches one or more documents in the Turnitin database. You can click on the similarity index which will open a new tab with the full similarity report for that submission.

This video shows how to work with the similarity report.

Turnitin maintains extensive documentation on working with the similarity report.

Leaving Feedback

This brief video gives an overview of using QuickMarks, which you can use to save and re-use comments you find yourself leaving often. Click here for the QuickMarks support documentation.

For help with writing inline feedback on student papers, click here.

Turnitin maintains extensive documentation on leaving feedback for students.

Transferring Feedback Studio Grades into Brightspace

If you are entering grades directly into Feedback Studio, you may wish to transfer those grades back into Brightspace. To do so, complete your grading using Feedback Studio and then return to the list of submissions for an assignment inside Brightspace. Click on the “Evaluate” link for a student which will take you to the Brightspace grading form. On the left hand side, you will see the history list for the submissions for this student. For each entry, there are now two new sections, “Turnitin Similarity” and “Turniting GradeMark”. In the “Turnitin GradeMark” section, there is a link, “Use this score”. Click on this link to copy the grade from Feedback Studio to the grading form. Click on the “Publish” button to transfer the grade to the grade book. The revised grading page is shown below.

Learn more about Turnitin: