Menu Bar

The menu bar, which is located at the top of the main window on a PC, or at the top of the screen on a Macintosh, also allows access to other important functions. When a student or group of students is selected, you can access editing and deleting functions from the Class and Student menus. Using the menu bar, you can import or export spreadsheets of students. You can also create a password to restrict access to the Marks Manager program.

Classes

Adding a New Class
To create a new class, go to the Class menu and click New. Type the class name (perhaps the name of the teacher of the class) in the field provided. Click OK to save the new class.

Editing a Class
You can edit the name of the class that is currently being viewed. Make sure the class you want to edit is being displayed in the main window. Go to the Class menu and click Edit. Now you can change the name of this class. Click OK to save the changes. All of the students that were in the class when it had the old name will still be in the class, listed under the new name.

Deleting a Class
This function will delete the class that is currently being viewed in the main window. Make sure that the class you want to delete is selected. Once a class is deleted, all of the students in that class are deleted. It is not possible to recover a class once it has been deleted. When you are certain that you have the right class selected, go to the Class menu and select Delete. The selected class will be deleted.

Students

Adding a New Student
If you wish, you can enter the names of your students in the Marks Manager. It is also possible for students to enter their own names the first time they run an Essential Skills program. After a student's name has been entered into the database, it will be available from every Essential Skills program. To add one or more students to the database, open the Student menu, and click New. You will see a window that displays the name of the currently selected class, and a blank space for the student names. Select the class that the new students are to be listed under. Type the student names in the large blank space with one student name per line. When you are finished, click OK to save the new students.

Editing Students
To change the name of a student without erasing his marks data, first select a student in the main window. Next open the Student menu and select Edit. The student editing window will appear, which lists a class name and a student name. You can move the student to another class by selecting a different class name. Change the name of the student by typing a new name in the area where the old name appears. It is also possible to edit a group of students all at once. To do so, first select all the students you want to edit with the Control key, or the Shift key in the main window. Afterwards, go to Edit from the Student menu. You will now see a window that lists all of the students that you choose to edit. Here, you can also move the student to another class by selecting a different class name from the list. If you want, you can change the name of some students by re-typing them in the list. Click OK when you are finished, and want to save.

Moving a Student to Another Class
To move one or more students between classes you must first select the students that you want to move. Select a student by clicking on his or her name. You can also select a range of students using the Control or Shift keys. When you have selected the students to move, go to the Student menu and choose Change Class.You should now be looking at a window that shows the name of the class the students are currently listed under. Select another class name to move the students. Click OK when you are ready to save.

Deleting Students
It is easy to delete one or more students from any class. First select the students that you want to delete. Select a student by clicking on his or her name, or select a range of students using the Control or Shift keys. When you are certain you have the right students selected, go to the Student menu and choose Delete. The selected students will be deleted from the database. It is not possible to undo this operation.

Reports

Creating Reports
There are three parameters that influence the output of a report.The report applies only to the students selected in the main window. You can select a single student by clicking on his or her name, a group of students by using the Control and Shift keys, or an entire class by clicking on the Select All Students button. Typically, each student's report will be printed on a different page.You must specify which program the report is describing. The list of programs can be accessed from the bottom part of the main window.The generated report will show only the work that the selected students have done in the program specified here.

Finally, you must select the type of report that is to be created. Most programs allow the printing of a "Standard" report. This report lists the average scores and number of completed activities for each of the major units of the selected program. Some programs may allow the printing of other types of reports, which provide more detailed information. When you have set all of the parameters, you may click on Print or Preview to generate the report output.

Previewing Reports
If you click on Preview, the report will be output to a print preview window. Flip the pages of the report by clicking on the forward and back arrow buttons at the top of the window. Generally, each student is on a separate page of the report. Sometimes, the report for a single student can span two or more pages. If you want to print the report, click the button with the picture of a printer on it. Click the button with the “x” on it to close the print preview window.

Printing Reports
After you set up the parameters for the report you can click on the Print button to output the report to the printer of your choice.You will be first shown a printer setup window. This window will appear different on different operating systems, for example: Windows and Mac OS- Select the printer to use and click OK or Print. The report should now print.

Importing and Exporting of Students
Marks Manager allows the importing and exporting of the list of classes and students in the Essential Skills database. Imported files must be in ASCII delimited format. Exported files are saved in ASCII delimited spreadsheet format. All contemporary spreadsheet programs support the importing and exporting of the ASCII delimited format.

Importing Student Lists
To import a list of students from a delimited spreadsheet file, choose Import Students from the File menu. First you will be asked to choose the file to be imported. In the file choosing window, select the import file, and click on Open. You can open folders by double clicking them, and you can select a drive from the drop down list at the top of the window.

If the Marks Manager can correctly interpret this file, you will be shown the file layout window. This window provides an opportunity for you to specify how the information in the file will be added to the database.

The layout window shows part of the content of the file you choose to import. If this information, displayed in the grid area of the window, is garbled or incorrect, the file did not load properly.

For the importing function to work, the spreadsheet file must have a single row or column which contains the class name. Only one row or column can contain the class name. All the other columns and rows should contain the student names. This means that it is impossible to import two columns of classes from the same spreadsheet.

Select the row or column that contains the class names in the large grid area of the layout window. Click on one of the arrows at the top of the grid to select a column. Click on one of the arrows at the left hand side of the grid to select a row. The row or column selected for the class names will highlight. You should see every class name in the spreadsheet highlighted. The names of the students should not be highlighted.

The layout window also allows you to ignore the first few rows or columns. Some spreadsheets contain headings or other information that you do not want imported into the Essential Skills database. To exclude such information, enter the desired number of rows or columns to ignore in the boxes at the bottom of the layout window. The ignored rows or columns will turn gray. Once you have selected a row or column to represent the class names, and once you have set any rows or columns to be ignored, you can click on OK to begin the import.

A message window will appear, showing the results of the import. The number of students added to the database will be displayed here, along with any error messages.

Exporting Student Lists
When you export a student list from the Marks Manager, you are creating an ASCII delimited spreadsheet file which contains the names of all the students and classes. The classes will be arranged in the left hand column of the file, and the students in each class will be in the same row as their class name.

To begin, go to the File menu and click Export Students. A file selection window will appear. Use this window to select the name of the export file. Usually it is best to enter a new name for the file, rather than over-writing existing files. If you select an existing file from the file-choosing window, and then click Save, all of the contents of the existing file will be lost. If you enter a new file name, and click Save, the file you specified will be created.

Passwords

All of the Essential Skills teacher tools allow the setting of an access password. The Password is shared between all programs and all teachers. This means that there is only one password that everyone shares. If the password is not known, an override password can be found in the Teacher Tools & Installation Guide.

If a password has been set, you will be prompted for it when you launch the Marks Manager.

If you want to change the password, click on the Change Password button. You will be prompted to enter the new password twice. If you leave both boxes empty, the password will be erased, and you will not be prompted to enter one when you run the Marks Manager, or any other Essential Skills teacher tool.