Modules Locked Until Date, but some have lock icon & Grayed out assignments, others don't

[lglen2]

I've checked the settings multiple times and all of my modules (after module 0) have the same settings:

no prerequisites
no requirements
locked until date is set (different for each module)

and yet some modules show with a "lock" icon and their assignments are grayed out; others don't have the icon and the student view can click on the assignments. When they do, they get a message that "this assignment is locked until..." but I want them all to behave the same way (preferably the grayed out version).   Why am I getting different behaviors?

EDIT: Weirdly, it's Modules 2 and the Final Exam that are showing as grayed with the lock icon; 1, 3 and 4 are not grayed and accessible to students (although the assignments won't open)

[NoahBoswell]

Hi!

While I don't work for instructure, I might be able to point out a few things that may be helpful. 

First off, ensure that the assignments under the module you locked do not have due dates that would override the module being locked. Whenever you lock a module and schedule it to be unlocked on a specific date, if an assignment has a different due date, it will override the system at times, that's happened to me as well.

Second, make sure you didn't duplicate anything from other modules that would result in due dates changing. For example, in module one if you had a due date for lets say October 1, and you duplicated that assignment and moved it to a later module (lets say module 2), canvas may think you want the same due dates as the assignment you originally duplicated from, resulting in it being unlocked for your students. So make sure you didn't accidentally duplicate due dates.

Third, this kind of relates with the one above. If your assignment has different availability settings under a module that will unlock at a different time, chances are that button will be unlocked and will unlock the entire module (as we can't grey out individual buttons in modules).

There are other things that can cause this but start off here and see if this works. Make sure that all your assignments under the module have the same availability date (thats different than the due date), or better off make don't have an availability date at all, as that can also mess things up.

Sorry if this was confusing, ask questions I will clear stuff up.

Noah

[NoahBoswell]

UPDATE

I just played around with my modules, and I scheduled it to go out on August 30. However, I made an assignment scheduled available on July 21 (the day im writing this). The full module unlocked because of the one assignment that was scheduled to be available.

This make more sense?

[lglen2]

Thanks, but I don't appear to have any of those issues. All of my available from dates occur at the same time as the module is scheduled to open or after.

[lglen2]

Interestingly, one of the modules that /was/ locking had a conflicting date (an assignment that was available before the module was scheduled to open). Your first caveat makes sense, but in that one case, it was still locking. I've checked all the others and there are some with assignments that are scheduled to open at the same time as the module, but none that are scheduled to be available from a time before the module is scheduled to open. So I don't think that's it. Unless it's the fact that I have both "Available from" and "due at" dates that are the same (with different times). That's intentional. This is not an online course. I don't want students to see what we're doing in class before we do it, but I want the date it's "due" to be the same day as we cover it in class. There's no penalty for not turning it in after the due date, so I want the due date to show the day that we work on it in class. That said, those dates are all after the date the module is scheduled to open.

Your second suggestion doesn't apply either; you can see all the due dates when a module is open. I've checked all of those against the date each module opens, and they are all after the date the module opens. I do a lot of duplicating, but my dates all seem to be okay.

I'm not sure what you mean by the third one. I do have available from dates, but I have them in all modules, and some assignments are clickable and some aren't.

I'll keep playing with it, but so far nothing's changed.

[lglen2]

I did just notice that one of the modules that isn't graying out, there is an assignment in the module before it with a due date after the new module opens. There are no prerequisites set though...

[NoahBoswell]

Prerequisites don't determine if a module opens or not whenever you have dates scheduled.

Do you currently have any assignments under your module that have availability dates? If so, I recommend removing them so theres no dates under that module, then you can set the dates you want them available as you're about to do the lesson.

Overall, remove any availability dates from any assignments under your modules, regardless if it has the same dates as when the module is to unlock. Whenever you have an assignment with scheduled available dates, it will unlock automatically, or ungray out, (thats a canvas thing), but will just say that its locked until a future date, just like what your issue is.

Using the availability dates on assignments individually are more for modules that you already keep unlocked, but want the individual assignments to unlock day by day throughout the week. When you have an entire module you want scheduled, if there are other dates chances are the assignments will display the same as if it was in a fully published module.

Does this help? Sorry if I'm not making much sense, doing my best to help.

[lglen2]

Hmmm, interesting. I did that for one module, but there was no change. And the modules that /are/ grayed out have "available from" dates set.

I'd rather have it so that students could see what was in the module, but not even be able to click (grayed out). I use the date of the lesson as the title so they don't know what we're going to be doing. If they can click on a title but only get the "Sorry, you can't see this yet" message, it seems a bit like I'm goading them to try to look ahead but then not letting them.

If I can't have that, then I'd take the assignments being "clickable" with "Sorry" message behind the link, but I do want them all to be the same...

[NoahBoswell]

I used to do the grayed out module thing too, however it both gave me the issues you are telling me, and some students found a way to bypass the sorry message and view the assignment/quiz.

That's why I just unpublished my modules completely and I just published it the morning of us beginning that lesson, maybe you could do that too?

[leslieatwhatcom]

Woah....

Well I certainly don't want them bypassing my carefully structured timeline!

I've done the "Coming Soon" thing in the past, but only because I genuinely didn't have content for them. It hadn't occurred to me to do it intentionally!

I like to set the dates ahead of time because my brain tends to be in one mode or the other; if I'm not in "planning" mode, I forget to do things like open modules, write announcements, etc. 

But I think that approach is worth a shot, given the problems I've had with it, and given what you say about students getting into the content in spite of the locks. 

Thanks for the suggestion.

[lglen2]

How did this get marked as a solution? It's a thought, but it doesn't solve the problem I originally posted. I certainly didn't mark it as a solution.

No shade on you Noah (in fact your later post looks very promising, and I will be experimenting with that later).

Just another example of Instructure thinking they know what's best for us...

[NoahBoswell]

Hey @lglen2 ,

It’s possible that someone else in the community found my response helpful specifically to them, and they marked it as a Solution. It could’ve also been done by mistake.

I have removed the solution from my response to minimize any confusion with other members. 

Reach out if you need any more assistance! Sorry about that.

[Nancy_Webb_CCSF · Accepted solution]

Hi @lglen2 , did you try resetting student view?  Probably too late now!

[JM8121]

This worked for me. Thank you!

[clouden]

Thank you!  I had tried everything to fix this and, poof, that one button fixed it.  😁