Student guide to submitting scanned, handwritten assessments online

As part of an online assessment, you may be asked to upload handwritten workings, notes, or drawings.

This guide will take you through the steps to scan your notes and save them to a PDF format, ready to upload to Blackboard or eAssignment. You are advised to practice these steps ahead of an assessment.

1. Prepare your handwritten notes

  • Include your student ID and the page number at the top of each page. Do not include your name as marking may be anonymous.
  • Number your answers clearly to correspond to the assessment questions.

Are you submitting via Turnitin? –  you will need to include 20 words of typed text (add a cover sheet) IF your instructor has set the assignment to “Allow only file types that Turnitin can check for similarity” – check with you instructor if you are unsure.

2. Scan to PDF using a mobile device

You can scan your notes and save as a PDF using a mobile phone and a scanning app.

We recommend:

To Scan Using One Drive or Office Lens :

  • Lay the notes flat on a well lit surface.
  • Ensure the background contrasts to your pages so the scanning app can find the edges of the paper.
  • Open OneDrive or Office Lens and choose to capture a Document
  • Frame your notes carefully
  • Add each page of your finished work and then select Done
  • Give the file a meaningful Title.
  • Select Save to : PDF (If using Office Lens)
  • Save to OneDrive Files

Follow this link for more information on using the OneDrive mobile app

3. Save the PDF to a folder you can access from your computer.

If you are using One Drive or Office Lens apps, you can save directly to :

    • OneDrive* – OneDrive is your personal online storage drive where you can save, edit, share, and download files. To access your OneDrive log into your Office 365 account from any device using your University email and password. If you have used Office Lens, you will find your file in the OneDrive/Office Lens folder.
    • From the OneDrive screen, or if you opt to save to local phone storage, you can share the PDF file and add it as an email attachment or save it to a folder on your computer, such as Google Drive, or iCloud.

* Find out more about how to make the most of OneDrive and Office 365 at the Office 365 Support Centre