[Gradebook] A better way to give individual grades in Group Assignments

[elliott]

USE CASE: I do a lot of small “group” exercises in the classroom.  I need the ability to grade the submissions as a group (which is there), but I also need the ability to provide individual grades (to students who were absent, etc.)  That functionality is also kind of there.  But as it stands now, I have to grade, then edit the Assignment to allow for individual grades. 

If I try to override a single student's grade in the Gradebook, it assigns that grade to everyone on the team.  There's no way that I have found to give an individual score to a student without editing the Assignment.

But then the Assignment has to stay that way for the rest of the semester.  The problem is that when I copy one course into another, I have to go into each individual assignment and make sure the Individual Grade option is turned off.

Also: when I separate it out into individual scores I THINK it removes the non-submitting team members’ ability to view the submission.  (I haven't found a way to really test this other than having a student show me their interface.  I cannot add "Test Student" into a Group.)

IDEA: It would be great if the SpeedGrader or Gradebook interface could allow me to enter a default grade for the team, but then show a list of team members who I can assign an individual grade to while in SpeedGrader.  That way the assignment stays the same (no editing) but I can assign different grades to individuals (overriding their team grade) in real time.  Or something like that.