What is the 'Announcements' forum?

Every course space in Moodle comes with a forum that is set-up already for class announcements. This is the forum activity located in the top section of the course called ‘Announcements.’

Everyone enrolled in the course, both instructors and students, are automatically subscribed to this forum. When anyone posts to this forum, the entire class receives an email with the content. The content is also kept in the ‘Announcements’ so anyone can refer back to the post.

This ‘Announcements’ is intended for class-wide announcements. To post to the ‘Announcements,’ please follow the instructions below.

1. From the main page of your course, locate the ‘Announcements’ in the top section. Click on the ‘Announcements’ forum.
2. From within the ‘Announcements’ forum, click on the ‘Add a new topic’ button.
3. On the ‘New discussion topic’ page, give your post a title or name by completing the ‘Subject’ field.
4. Then type in your announcement content into the ‘Message’ box.
5. You can use the icons at the top of the box to style your announcement. The first icon on the top row will also expand a second row of editing icons.
6. Scroll down. You’ll notice that you are automatically subscribed to this discussion. This means that you will get an email when anyone posts to the forum or responds to your announcement in the ‘Announcements’ forum activity.
7. You can add an attachment in the next field by dragging and dropping the file, or by clicking the icon in the upper right that’s of the piece of paper with the plus sign.
   
8. From the “File Picker” pop-up window, you can either “Upload a New File” or see your previous files by choosing the “Server Files” option.
   1. Click the “Upload a File” option, and then click the “Browse” or “Choose File” button to add your new file.
   2. In the next screen, click the “Browse” button to navigate to the file on your computer.
   3. When you find the file, click on it and then click on the “Open” button.
   4. Rename the file, if you want to, by changing the file name in the “Save As” box.
   5. When you are ready, click the “Upload this File” button.
   6. This will bring you back to the ‘New discussion topic’ page and you will see the file in the ‘Attachments’ field.
9. If you are the instructor of the course, you can choose to have this post ‘pinned’ to the top of the forum threads.
10. If you want the students to receive the announcement immediately, check the box next to the ‘Send forum post notifications with no editing-time delay’ option. Otherwise, the students will receive the content 15 minutes later.
11. Click the ‘Post to forum’ button.
12. If you have sent the post with no editing time, you will see a message at the top which reads, “This post will be mailed out immediately to all forum subscribers.”
    If you have pinned the post, it will appear at the top of the list of posts with a ‘pushpin’ icon next to it.
13. If you have no sent the post with no editing time, you will receive a notice that your post has been successful and that you have 15 minutes to edit it.
    1. After those 15 minutes, if you are a student, you will no longer be able to edit the post.
    2. If you are the instructor for the course, you will be able to continue editing it, but the students will have received the announcement in the state it was at the 15-minutes-after-posting mark.
14. Now your announcement is posted to the ‘Announcements’ forum!
15. If you want to view your announcement, you can click on your discussion title/name/subject.