2. Restricting Access

The Value of Restrict Access

If you're looking for more granular control over the visibility of course content and topics that goes beyond a simple hide or show, Restrict Access offers additional conditions for when content is (or isn't) available to learners. 

Though some activities like Quiz have their own availability features (open and close dates), all activities, resources, and topics have Restrict Access available as an optional setting. Restrict Access allows you to set a condition or conditions for when something is made available to learners in your course. For example, you can use Restrict Access to:

  • Make an entire topic visible once a certain date and time is reached
  • Keep content hidden until another activity is marked as complete (some instructors use Restrict Access to hide their first topic until the Syllabus is marked complete)
  • Set content to only be visible to learners if they've been added to a specific group
  • Set content to only be visible if learners complete an assessment with a specific grade

Setting Restrict Access

This feature is found on the Edit Settings page of your activity, resource, or topic. Content can be restricted using a broad array of conditions, and conditions can run in parallel or be combined. For example:

  • Parallel Restrictions: If you wanted to allow stronger learners to work ahead, you can set a topic to become available on a certain date, OR if the learner completes an assessment in the previous section with a passing grade. 
  • Combined Restrictions: If you wanted to restrict the flow of the course so learners cannot progress until they can demonstrate mastery of a previous section, you can set a topic to become available on a certain date, AND when the learner completes an assessment in the previous section with a passing grade. 

Options for Restricting Access

Restrict Access offers the following conditions for content visibility. You can add multiple conditions, and require learners to meet all or any of them:

  • Activity Completion: This can be a specific activity in the course, or the previous activity. 
    • If you do not see the activity you would like to require completion for, it likely does not have completion conditions set for it yet. Edit that content and set its activity completion requirements. 
    • If your course regularly goes through major revisions, setting this to "previous activity" will always require that the most recent activity or resource with activity completion requirements above it be completed before the content is made available. 
  • Date and Time: Bear in mind this can be used to enforce when content becomes available, or remains available. This can be useful for controlling progress through a course, or automatically hiding content after a certain point. 
  • Grade: This includes grades for individual activities, or the course total. 
  • Group: This option will only appear if you have created at least one group on the Participants page of the course. 
  • User Profile: This works especially well if you want users with specific profile field entries to see specific content. Some academic advisors use this feature to make support resources available to student athletes. Some corporate clients use this to make specific resources available to learners with a specific job position in the company. 
  • Restriction Set: This is the most complicated option available. Restriction Set allows you to create a combination of the settings listed above. This is most useful in situations where you have a complex set of requirements. 
    • As an example, if you have two groups of learners in the course who have to meet different requirements to view course content, Restriction Set would be a good option. 


Special Note

Restrict Access settings will override any activity level settings. For example: If you configure a Quiz's open date to be Monday at 10am, but have Restrict Access settings configured to not make the Quiz available until Tuesday at 10am, the learners will not see the Quiz until the Restrict Access settings release it on Tuesday morning.

Additional Notes

How Unavailable Content is Displayed

If an activity or resource is restricted from learner view before a certain date, it will either be completely invisible to the learner, or its link will be grayed out with details regarding the conditions set on its availability. You can change how this displays in your course settings (Course Format > Hidden Sections). Even if learners do see the grayed out link, they cannot see the activity until it's made available. 

Consequences of Hiding Graded Activities

If an activity (such as an assignment, forum, or quiz) is set to be available until a certain date, once that date has passed the activity will disappear entirely from learner view. This means that learners will be unable to view assessment feedback they've received, and their grade will likely be hidden from them in the gradebook.

Conflicts with Quizzes

If you have entered a User Override or Group Override for users in a Quiz, Restrict Access will override those settings. This could accidentally prevent learners from accessing the Quiz.