Setting Up the Grade Book

Setting up the Gradebook (through the Assignments tool and with Assignment Groups)

In Canvas, "Assignments" refers to any scored student work--submitted assignments, unsubmitted activities, Discussions or even Quizzes. Assignments can be grouped to make grade weighting easier, and teachers can quickly and easily score Assignments using the SpeedGrader.

Setting Up Assignment Groups

Creating Assignment groups is an easy way to categorize and manage multiple assessments. Assignment Groups also let you set final grade weights for different groups.

To create an Assignment Group:

Click on the Assignments button in the course.
Click on Add Assignment Group from right hand side menu.
Type in a name in Group Name, click Update.
Add any additional groups as needed.

Groups are weighted by checking the Weight the final grade based on assignment groups check box, located above the Assignment Groups.

Once enabled, percentages can be assigned to each group on the table that appears on the right hand side.

Rules can also be applied to Groups for flexibility. The three rules that can be applied are:

Drop the Lowest
Drop the Highest
Never Drop

Retrieved from "http://canvaswiki.uen.org/wiki/Assignments (Links to an external site.)" CC By-NC, Utah System of Higher Education Consortium: canvaswiki.uen.org

Setting Up the Gradebook: Screenshot Walkthrough

Gradebook columns can only be added through the Assignments area. In Canvas, an "Assignment" is any graded student work, and could include papers, projects, quizzes, discussions, participation, attendance, etc.

Ignoring Ungraded Assignments

By default, students' cumulative grades ignore ungraded assignments--this gives you a better picture of where they are at any given time in the semester. You can change this in the Options menu:

Final Grade Weighting & Percentages

Final grade weights are based on Assignment Groups. You can establish the percentage weight for Assignment Groups by clicking the Options menu and choosing Manage Group Weights:

Dropping the Lowest/Highest X Scores

How do I drop the lowest 1 or more scores?

Custom functionality like dropping the lowest X number of scores is done from within Assignments by editing an Assignment Group.

Changing Column or Row Order

The Options menu lets you sort the gradebook by rows and columns. You can not manually change the order of gradebook columns except by sorting.

Column Options

Clicking the drop-down arrow atop any column will show the column options:

Assignment Details takes you to the Assignment itself.
Set Default Grade lets you insert a default score for all students in that column. This doesn't necessarily overwrite existing scores.
Hide Column hides the column from your view.
Publish makes your grade input official to the students.

Entering or Editing Scores

To enter or edit a grade for a student, simply click in the field and type the score:

Canvas saves the score immediately, with no need to click a "submit" button.
You can access a student's assignment details by clicking the dialogue bubble in the corner of the field:

This allows you to quickly enter comments and view submission files (as you would do through the SpeedGrader).

Retrieved and adapted from "http://canvaswiki.uen.org/wiki/Grades (Links to an external site.)" CC By-NC, Utah System of Higher Education Consortium: canvaswiki.uen.org