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I've had one major issue with the Canvas gradebook for years, which is that I cannot hide the total percentages for a given assignment group. I (like many instructors I know) use a total points based system, and do not use percentages or weighting for any part of my grading scheme. Canvas allows a switch to points-based grades, but still displays an un-editable, un-removable column in the gradebook displaying a percentage for each assignment group:
Worse still, when a student checks their own grade, they also see these percentages at the bottom of the table, right above their total points:
These percentages are NOT representative of the student's total grade, since the assignment groups are worth different total points, and are incredibly misleading to all but the most attentive and math-inclined students. I have written posts in these question forums in the past regarding this issue, and responded in sympathy to other instructors across the nation who have posted their frustrations about this issue. And before anyone brings it up, no, I can't just remove all assignment groups because I need to use the "drop lowest score" feature for both quizzes and exams. This has caused enough confusion in my courses over the past few years that I even have a statement built into my syllabus, specifically telling the students to ignore any percentages they see when they look up their grades.
Fast forward to this quarter, when I see that there is a gradebook overhaul incoming which adds many features and options. I was excited by this until actually switching over to the new gradebook... where I see that these percentage category totals are STILL THERE AND STILL CANNOT BE REMOVED! It truly cannot be that difficult to program an option to simply hide these percentages in the gradebook or to students. Please please help us instructors that use points-based grading!
Also just to get out in front of another common answer that is not helpful: the option to "hide totals in student grade summary" is not an option either. Because while that hides these percentages, it also hides the student's total course grade at the same time! Argh!
Our college is dealing with this same frustration. Many faculty members grade using points and having the assignment group columns displayed to students as percentages is really confusing to our students. I wish the option in "Settings" (see below) ONLY hid the assignment group totals, NOT the final total.
If this option could be modified that would be extremely helpful to students!!!
Hi Trisha,
I think that this exchange kind of highlights how the Canvas team is still not really seeing the user need expressed in this thread.
Many of us have moved away from grading systems based on percentage achievement on a set number of assignments. Instead, we give the students numerous "opportunities" to demonstrate learning, and the students choose which ones they want to complete. Final grades are determined based on the number of points accumulated. In my case, these points have to fit into different categories -- with each category mapping to a major learning outcome in my course -- so there's a "cap" on the number of points in each category that students can apply to their final grade.
I have managed to create a really wonky work-around by using the "Grading Schemes" feature and checking off "Grade by Points". You'll notice that it looks a lot like yours:
I did this by specifying a single grade category called "Graded" that ranged from 0 to 1.
What's important to notice here is that Canvas still wants to grade by percentages, because that is all that it is programmed to do. My "0 to 1" grading system is simply picked up by Canvas as an invitation to create a fraction rather than a percentage, but we are still talking about numerator-denominator grading here.
What we on this thread are asking for is grading without a denominator. Just points, just thresholds for achievement based on points accumulated on assignments listed on Canvas. This workaround doesn't do this for us... I will still have to find some other way (spreadsheet? 😳) to communicate final grades to students.
I want to reiterate that this is a major design flaw in Canvas because it is such a value-laden algorithm for grading. Don't believe that grading based on percentages is a pedagogically sound way of motivating students? Well, your way of thinking about teaching just doesn't fit into the system that Canvas has created. In an age where there is a lot of rethinking of grading, that exclusion of alternative grading systems is highly problematic. I daresay it is political!
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