The LTI Integration Process

The LTI Integration Process

OVERVIEW

Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) is a specification that establishes a standard way of integrating rich learning applications, called tools (delivered by LTI providers) with platforms such as learning management systems, called LTI consumers. It allows for content from the LTI provider to be embedded into a course on the site of the LTI consumer. 

In order to provide you with a complete picture of this integration process, this support guide describes the steps that need to be taken by both a Pluto LMS LTI provider and a Pluto LMS LTI consumer. 

USE CASE EXAMPLE:

Integrating an External Assessment Tool via LTI

Scenario: You are an educator who uses Pluto to deliver online courses, and you want to incorporate an advanced assessment tool from an external provider into your course. This external tool offers more robust assessment features than what Pluto's built-in quiz system provides, and you want to seamlessly integrate it within your Pluto course.

Solution: You can use the LTI standard to integrate the external assessment tool directly into your Pluto course. 

LTI PROVIDER 

Step 1: In the relevant course, click on "Enrollment methods."



Step 2: On the Enrollment methods page, from the "Add method" drop-down list, select "Publish as LTI tool."



Step 3: You can now configure your LTI tool settings.

In the "Publish as LTI tool" section; (1) give your enrollment instance a name and (2) select "Course" as the tool you wish to publish.

Optionally, you can also (3) enable and set a period of time for which enrollment will be valid, (4) enable and set dates for when enrollment must start and end, (5) set a maximum amount of users that can enroll and (6) set the roles that will be assigned to the teacher and students from the LTI consumer site. 



In the "Remote system" section, you will find (1) the secret that must be shared with the LTI consumer in order to provide access to your LTI tool. This secret can also be found with the other LTI publish details that need to be shared with the LTI consumer in "Course admin" - this is described in step 4 below.

Optionally, you can also (2) decide whether or not you want to share grades with the consumer and (3) whether or not this synchronization should depend on course or activity completion by students. You can furthermore (4) select to synchronize users from the consumer site by means of a scheduled task ("Yes") or whenever a new user from the consumer site accesses the tool ("No") and (5) select your preferred synchronization mode. 



Note: Optionally, in the "User default values" section, you can set default profile values (such as country and city of residence, timezone, preferred language and institution) that will be applied to all new users who enroll into your course via this enrollment instance. 

Once you're happy, you can scroll down and click on "Add method."

Your LTI tool will now be displayed on the "Enrollment methods" page as a method by which remote users (from the LTI consumer site) can enroll into your course. 


Note: Should you wish to share your course with two/more different LTI consumers, you can add a different enrollment instance for each consumer in order to keep track of and organize remote users in your course. 

Step 4: Retrieve the LTI publish details that need to be shared with the LTI consumer by clicking on "Course admin", followed by "Published as LTI tools."



Here you will find all the details that you need to provide the LTI consumer with in order for them to access your tool.



LTI CONSUMER 

Please note: Provided below are the steps for Pluto LMS as the LTI consumer. This process (and the publishing details used) will differ slightly depending on the learning management system used by the LTI consumer you choose to integrate with. 

Step 1: In the relevant course, click on "Edit course material" to turn on editing mode and then "Add course content" in the section of the course where you wish to add the LTI tool. 



From the content picker, select the "External tool" activity.



Step 2: Give (1) your activity a name and add the LTI details by (2) selecting for automatic tool configuration based on the tool URL and (3) entering the Cartridge URL. 



You can then click on "Show more" to enter the (4) consumer key and (5) shared secret. 
The consumer key is not generated by the system; you can make this up yourself. It can be anything you'd like as long as the field is not left empty - we recommend that you keep it short and simple.



Step 3: You can now continue to define the activity settings as you would for any other activity. You can always come back and edit these later.



Once you're happy, you can click on "Save and display" to see the content from the LTI provider embedded into your course.



PREVIEW THE LEARNER EXPERIENCE

We highly recommend that you collaborate with your chosen LTI provider/consumer to test this integration before making it live. To see how learners will experience the integrated activity, you can;

(1) Create a test user (make sure to note their login details) and enroll them into the relevant course on the LTI consumer site.



(2) On both the LTI provider and consumer sites, log out of the site admin profiles that you have been using to set up the LTI tool. 


(3) On the LTI consumer site, log in to the account of the test user created in step (1).



(4) Navigate to the relevant course and activity to see the embedded content from the LTI provider.



Should you experience any issues connecting with a 3rd party LMS, please be proactive in reaching out to that LMS provider for assistance as Pluto LMS will not be able to provide support with 3rd party tools and services. 

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