Within Brightspace, there are a few ways to view your course as a student. To impersonate the full student experience with a course, it is recommended to use the Create a Test Student widget. An easy, albeit more limited, alternative is to use the View as Learner view, but there are limitations to what can be seen. The View Your Course Using a Different Role guide provides guidance for using the View as Learner option. The following instructions demonstrate how to use the Create a Test Student Widget.
If this widget does not appear on the course homepage, use the Add Widgets to a Course Homepage guide to add it. Additionally, refer to the Student Guides section of the Brightspace help site for specific instructions on how to complete tasks while impersonating a student.
Instructions
- Once the widget has been added to your homepage, navigate to the Create a Test Student widget on the course homepage and click Create Test Student Account.
- On the pop-up, click Create.
- The test student’s information will now be displayed in the widget. To access the test student, click Classlist.
- Locate the test student in the Classlist. Next, click on the drop-down arrow next to the test student’s name and select Impersonate.
- On the confirmation pop-up, click Yes to confirm the action.
- The impersonated student’s name now appears above the navbar. From this point, it is possible to navigate the course as a student. Please refer to the Student Guides for specific instructions on how to complete a given task.
- To stop impersonating a student, click on the test student’s name above the navbar and click on the X in the dropdown menu.
Note: Impersonating a student while you are creating a quiz, assignment, or any other course content as an instructor may cause errors. It is recommended that you save any new changes to content first, and then impersonate a student afterward to emulate the student experience.
