You will access your assigned Gateway activities, aligned with your Carolina Science Lab Kit, through links your instructor has provided in your course. You don’t need a separate account, codes, login or even your lab kit to access these digital materials.
The link in your course will automatically take you to the Gateway activity in Carolina Science Online (CSO). Click the play button to start the activity, which begins with the Pre-lab section.
The Pre-Lab section gives you important background information for each activity.
For hands-on labs, it provides important safety information and an Activity Overview including a video. You will have the background information you need, and you will know exactly what materials are required before you begin.
This section ends with a Pre-lab Quiz. Gateway will prompt you to keep taking the quiz until you have answered all the questions correctly. After each attempt you will be directed to review, then re-take the quiz until all your answers are correct.
You can only access the Procedure and Lab Notebook once you have passed the quiz with 100%, but you have as many attempts as you need to pass this quiz.
After passing the Pre-Lab quiz you will view the Preparation and Procedure sections. This is where you will find step by step instructions for performing the activity and collecting data.
Data will be entered, and any required images uploaded, to the Lab Notebook. The Lab Notebook becomes available once you begin the Procedure. To upload an image it must be saved on your device, and it must be an acceptable file type (HEIC and PDF files will not upload).
You can use the ”X” to close it or the Save & Close button in your Lab Notebook at any time to return later right where you left off. Just use the link in your course to continue an activity. If the activity has been idle for more than 15 minutes restart the activity.
TIP: Do not have Gateway open on more than one device at the same time if you are making changes, it may not save properly. When you reach the end of a hands-on activity you will find detailed information about proper clean up and disposal. After confirming you have entered all your data and answered all the questions you will SAVE AS A PDF. You may also be required to SUBMIT your work for grading within Gateway. We recommend saving a PDF each time you edit your Lab Notebook for your own records.
For submitting your lab notebook to your instructor as a PDF you will first need to save it.
To download a PDF of your Lab Notebook click the PRINT button on the last page of the Lab Notebook.
Your device will then give you the option to SAVE AS PDF.
Now saved, you can upload the file as required for grading.
To SUBMIT your completed Lab Notebook in Gateway/CSO first SAVE & CLOSE, then EXIT.
After exiting the Lab Notebook, you are on the Assignments page, and must SUBMIT that specific Lab Manual. You will then be prompted to confirm you have completed it (changes cannot be saved after this.)
The submit page also allows you to add attachments and comments by using the + symbol, these may be required by your instructor.
You cannot make changes after you submit:
What if my Carolina Online Gateway lab manual doesn’t load?
- Switch to a different browser. While Gateway is designed to work on all browsers and devices, the specific settings in your browser may be interfering with Gateway’s ability to load.
- Allow third party cookies in your browser settings for carolinascienceonline.com. This can usually be found in the “privacy and security” settings within your browser.
- Disable any Ad-blocker software or make an exception for carolinascienceonline.com. Because Gateway uses cookies to save and track progress, ad-blocker software can mistake this for an ad and not load the content to the page. Settings for ad-blockers will be found in different locations based on which software you are using. Some might be found in the browser security settings. Others might be added as an extension or add on. Ad-blockers may also be a feature of your wifi or antivirus software.
How to Use Gateway Lab Manuals Video
Navigate to your course page in Canvas.
Select the module in which you would like to add your lab assignment and then click the “+” button.
Under the “Add” dropdown, select External Tool.
Select the tool for Carolina. It should be called “Carolina Science Online” or something similar. If you cannot find the tool, contact your LMS admin.
Select the Lab Manual you wish to add. Any Virtual and Dry labs will be found in the “Virtual and dry lab library”. The lab safety and Intro to graphing labs are found under “ Introductory materials”.
Click “CREATE ASSIGNMENT”
Enter a title in the “Title” field. Note the title of the Lab Manual will be added to the end of whatever title you give the lab.
Enter a Description in the “Description” field. These will show up to students as instructions when they open their lab. It is recommended you include information on how you want students to submit their lab notebook and how it will be graded.
You can select whether you would like the lab to create a column in the gradebook:
a. This column is a manual entry and will accept a score entered into it from the Gateway or Carolina Science Online teacher portal. This score can be used as the lab notebook score if you would like to grade within the Gateway Instructor portal, or as the pre-lab score if you would like to grade the PDF of the lab notebook within Canvas. The pre-lab score will be 100% for all students who complete it. In either case, the grade will need to be entered by the instructor. No grade will be auto-generated. If this case, you must select a number of points.
b. Please note, if you want to grade the PDF of the lab notebook in Canvas instead, you will need to set up a separate assignment that can accept file submissions.
c. If you do not wish for this assignment to create a column in the gradebook (only assigning a grade for the PDF lab notebook), check the box to not include in the gradebook.
Click “CREATE ASSIGNMENT”
Click “Load in a new tab”
Click “Add Item”
Click on the symbol below to publish the assignment and make it visible to students.
Click “Lab 1 – Determination of Water Hardness Lab Manual”
Click the grey box to launch the lab. When you open the lab as an instructor, you will be taken to the assignment page in the instructor portal. When a student clicks this link, they will be taken directly to the assignment.
An instructor can also access the student version of Gateway with this link when “viewing as a student” in Canvas. However, in the regular Instructor view they will link to a teacher dashboard instead.
Overview videos,
Knowledge Check Questions,
Experimental Design Diagrams,
and a Pre-lab Assessment.
In order for a student to access the Procedure and Lab Notebook pages, and perform the experiment, they must answer all Pre-lab questions correctly, they have an unlimited number of attempts to do so.
In order for students to submit their PDF, they will need to click “Print” on the final page of their lab notebook. This will allow them to save the notebook as a PDF. Students can then submit this PDF to an assignment you have created in Canvas.
If at any point students need to leave the lab and come back to it, they can click the “SAVE & CLOSE” button.
In the teacher portal, you will be able to view your student’s progress. Please note that your students will not be pre-populated into the portal. They will only be added to the assignment once they have first accessed the lab.
In this portal, you will be able to see whether the student has submitted the lab.
their score on the pre-lab,
the time spent in the lab to this point,
whether the assignment has been graded in the portal
and how much of the lab they have visited. In order to view the specific student’s version of the lab, click this percentage under R1.
If you want to grade in the portal, you will need to click the “Lab Notebook” and open the student’s lab notebook to grade their score.
You will be able to view what the student has entered in their lab notebook and grade using your answer key.
In order to grade the lab in the platform, students must submit the lab. You can also “Close the lab for grading” in order to force submit all of the labs for all students.
Once a lab is submitted, you can click “GRADE” and enter a score. This score will pass-back into your gradebook if you have enabled grading. This score can be for either the pre-lab or the lab notebook depending on how you set up your course.
To grade the lab notebook in Canvas, you will need to create an assignment for students to upload their PDF lab notebook to.
This assignment will need to be set up to allow “File Uploads.”
The assignment can then be graded using Canvas “SpeedGrader”.
And all of the tools such as Rubrics and comments will be available to help you grade the assignment.
To open the answer key in the portal, click the home button.
Then select the name of the assignment you wish to grade.
Select the “Instructor Key” to open it.
From here you can view the answers to the Knowledge check question, pre-lab assessment and
And lab notebook. You can also skip straight to the procedure without having to answer the questions.
Please reach out to your Carolina Distance Learning Team with any questions.
