Creating a new course – teacher's guide

1 Where to start

You create a new course in the Courses view of the teacher app. Press ＋ Add New Course, and a course form titled “Create Course” opens.

Courses→ ＋ Add New Course→ Fill in the form→ 💾 Save Course

The most important requirement first: you can only save the course once it has at least one topic with a title – and the course name and course code have been filled in. The form creates one empty topic card for you in advance; you only need to fill in its title.

2 Structure of the form

The course form is divided into five tabs. At the top are the title and the action buttons (💾 Save, ⇩ Export, 🤖 AI export, ⇧ Import), and at the bottom a fixed save bar (Cancel and 💾 Save Course). You can move freely between the tabs – your data is kept until you save.

The course form: title + actions, five tabs and the save bar at the bottom.

The round ? button next to the title opens a quick guide to creating a course directly in the app. When you edit an existing course, the course version number is also shown next to the title (Course version …).

The tabs in brief:

Basic Info – course name, code, teacher, course description, course password, linked exam, search visibility, delivery mode, course image and course links.
Assignments – the course tasks, either in normal mode or as a learning path.
Topics – topics that structure the course. At least one is required.
📅 Calendar – deadline management (becomes active after saving).
💬 Discussion Forums – the course forums (become active after saving).

3 The Basic Info tab

Start here. Required fields are marked with a red asterisk *.

Basic Info: the course name and course code are required. There are also the teacher, description, password, linked exam, search visibility, delivery mode, course image and course links.

Course name * and Course Code * – required for saving.
Teacher – optional; shown in the course details.
Description – optional but recommended: the description is shown to students in the course search results (see below).
Course password – an optional password for joining (see below).
Linked exam – you can link an active exam to the course.
🔎 Search visibility – whether the published course appears in the students' course search (see below).
🏫 Delivery mode – Online (requires a profile photo) or Classroom (also without a profile photo). Available once the course is saved.
Course Image – drag or choose an image; it is shown on the course card.
Course links – course-wide links (title + URL) that students see next to the materials button. For each link you can set visibility conditions (⚙) – see below.

The course description in the students' course search

When the course is published, the text you write in the Description field becomes the course's public description. Students see it when they look for courses in the student app's course search, so briefly describe what the course is about and who it is for.

The description is only updated for students when you publish (Activate course, Update published course or Re-publish course).
If you clear the field and re-publish the course, the description is also removed from the course search.

Course password

You can prevent random students from joining by giving the course a password. When a password has been set, the student app asks for it when a student joins the course. Tell the password to your own students, for example in class or in a group message.

Empty field = no password. Anyone who finds the course can join.
The password takes effect when you save and publish the course. Likewise, changing or removing the password only reaches students after the next publication.
The password is only asked from new students joining. Students who have already joined are not asked again – not even when the course is updated or the password changes.
The password is shown in plain text in the field so that you can check it later.

Note: the course password is meant to prevent accidental joining – it is not a security feature. Do not use a password you use elsewhere.

Search visibility

With the “🔎 Search visibility: Visible in student search” checkbox you decide whether the published course can be found in the students' course search. When you untick it, the text changes to “Hidden from student search”.

The change takes effect immediately – you do not need to save or re-publish the course.
Hiding only affects the search: students who have already joined continue the course as usual.
The option is only available once the course has been published. For a new or unpublished course the checkbox is greyed out and next to it you see “(publish the course first)”; a published course is visible in search by default.

Hiding is useful, for example, when all students in the group have already joined and you do not want new participants, or when the same course has been published as several parallel versions.

Course links and visibility conditions

Add a link by typing a title (optional) and a URL and pressing “Add link” (or Enter). The links are listed as “chips”. Each chip has ⚙ (conditions) and × (delete). An orange number shows how many visibility conditions have been set for the link.

By default a link is always visible. Pressing ⚙ opens the “Link conditions” window, where you can set when the link opens or closes for students.

The Link conditions window for a new course that has not been saved yet: there are no conditions, and the window reminds you to save the course first so that its tasks can be chosen as condition targets.

Each condition row consists of three choices:

Type – what the condition relates to: Task, Quiz, Essay, Peer review, Video task or Date.
Target – choose the course task/quiz (or the date) to follow.
State – opens when condition is met (the link only appears when the condition is met) or closes when condition is met (the link is hidden/locked when the condition is met).

Add rows with the “＋ Add condition” button and save. The link appears locked to the student until the opens when conditions are met; any closes when condition closes the link.

Note: to choose the course's tasks and quizzes as condition targets, the course must have been saved. Otherwise the window reminds you: “Save the course first to pick its assignments.”

4 The Assignments tab

On this tab you manage the course tasks. At the top you choose the task mode: a plain list (Normal) or scored levels (Learning path).

Task mode (Normal / Learning path) and managing course tasks.

Normal – tasks as individual cards.
Learning path – task groups with difficulty levels (Easy 4 p, Medium 6 p, Hard 8 p).
＋ Add Task – creates a new task with instructions and a model answer.
📂 Browse tasks – imports tasks from a task bank.
🎓 Matriculation exam tasks – fetch ready-made matriculation exam tasks for the course (see the Matriculation exam tasks guide).

The task card fields and the checking method (AI or teacher) are described in more detail in the guide Tasks and AI checking. On the task card you also choose the grading (Points or Approved / rejected – the latter is always graded by the teacher and gives no points) and Show: in the task list or embedded in a topic, in which case the student sees the task after the topic description. You can also create tasks with the help of AI: see Task assistant.

5 The Topics tab required

Topics structure the content of the course. This is the most important tab for saving: you cannot save the course without at least one topic with a title.

A topic card: the required title, the description (Text / HTML), video links, material (Link / Text / HTML), additional links and, at the bottom, the task type cards.

Topic Title * – required for every topic. An empty title prevents saving.
Task cards inside the topic – you can add quizzes, essays, peer reviews, video tasks, mind maps and Alaia tasks to each topic; for essays, peer reviews, video tasks and mind maps you choose the grading (points or approved / rejected). The 📋 Quizzes card holds both automatic practice quizzes and graded quizzes (formerly hybrid quizzes): “+ Add quiz” asks which type you want.
Ordering – drag the topic cards to change their order.
＋ Add Topic – creates more topics to match the structure of the course.

Some of the task types in a topic (such as graded quizzes and peer reviews) require that the course has been saved at least once. Save the course first, and then you can add them to the topic.

🧩 More details: Topics and topic task cards → ⚡ Automatic practice quiz → 🧪 Graded quiz (hybrid quiz): creating and grading →

6 Calendar and discussion forums

The last two tabs only become active once the course has been saved once. Before that, they show a reminder.

The Calendar and Discussion Forums tabs ask you to save the course first.

📅 Calendar – drag an item to a calendar day to set a deadline; drag it to another day to move it; click × to remove it.
💬 Discussion Forums – create and manage the course forums after saving.

7 Saving and requirements

The save buttons – “💾 Save Course” at the bottom and “💾 Save” at the top – are greyed out until all requirements are met. When the buttons become active, you can save the course.

Saving becomes available when:

the course name has been filled in,
the course code has been filled in, and
the course has at least one topic with a title.

The requirements are not met yet: Save Course is greyed out.

Name, course code and a topic title are filled in: Save Course is active.

After saving, the course appears in the Courses view, and the Calendar and Discussion Forums tabs become active. When you edit an existing course, you can also use “💾 Save & keep editing”, which saves but leaves the form open.

8 Import and export

You can also create a course by importing ready-made content, and you can export an existing course to a file.

📦 Import from Moodle backup – choose an .mbz file on the Basic Info tab (only shown for a new course). The basic details are filled in automatically, and when you save you choose which parts are imported.
⇧ Import – imports the course content from a JSON file.
⇩ Export – exports the course to a JSON file (e.g. as a backup or for sharing).
🤖 AI-export – exports an AI-readable text summary of the course (.txt).

Moodle import is shown on the Basic Info tab when you create a new course.