The notifications for Assignments and Turnitin activities in MyCourses quickly become ignored by students, as they appear as soon as the assignment is set up and sit there indefinately. This could be enhanced by colour coding them in a traffic light system - Green for anything due soon (eg next week) Amber for imminent (eg next 24 hours), Red for anything that is late.
The timeframes suggested are just examples - ideally this would be configurable by the tutor, or based on proportion of time available to attempt the activity (eg turns green at 50% of time, turns amber at 20% of time remaining).
The same feature could be extended to any other time-sensitive activities and help students to prioritise pending work across different courses, personalising the user experience with customised notifications.
Regards, Gordon.