Restrict assignment submission attempts

Currently there is no way (that I am aware of) to limit the number of times a student may submit an assignment. This functionality is available for quizzes, but not for other assignment types. It would be very helpful for our instructors to be able to set the number of times a student may submit an assignment, whether for a revisions process or simply to limit the number of files they need to comb through in grading.

This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas

For details, please read through the https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-18579-canvas-release-notes-2020-04-18 

78 Comments
sadenniston
Community Contributor

Why is the status for this archived? As a K-12 school, I want to avoid confusing students as much as possible. If I don't want students to submit more than one version of an assignment, give me the option to indicate this when setting up the assignment.

What happens if I grade a student's work prior to the due date or availability date? What if he thinks he can resubmit the assignment after it has been graded, and does, because there is a glaring blue box telling him he can resubmit?

This behaviour doesn't make sense. If a piece of work has been graded, why should the student have the ability to resubmit? The messages being sent to them are confusing.

kona
Community Coach
Community Coach

 @sadenniston ​, it's archived because there is an official response from Instructure - "This is a very logical idea. As we explore some basic updates to assignments, this is something we can certainly consider." - that indicates that it's not a no to this, but a not right now. If you check the Canvas Studio there are a lot of big ticket things (redoing quizzes, the gradebook, and speedgrader) that are currently being focused on. My guess is that once they work through this they'll start looking at other areas like this.

sadenniston
Community Contributor

I'm trying to articulate to my staff the reason why students can indefinitely resubmit, and have been doing so, even after their work has been graded. We are talking junior secondary here. I can't find a rationale for the feature anywhere apart from the statement in the guides that "students can always resubmit". Nine times out of ten in K12, the situation does not call for a student to resubmit after having been graded, yet this is the behaviour in Canvas

Could someone one who has experienced the same perhaps provide something for me...?

jlvaughn
Community Novice

Would love to see this up for voting again. It will confuse my students to be allowed to indefinitely resubmit within the time frame of the assignment. It fosters a sense that they can turn in drafts or in progress work, which is certainly not the case in my class.

kona
Community Coach
Community Coach

 @jlvaughn ​, this idea wouldn't go up for vote again because Instructure has already responded to the viability of the idea with the following, "This is a very logical idea. As we explore some basic updates to assignments, this is something we can certainly consider." Given this information it sounds like this would be something that could happen when Instructure makes updates/changes to Assignments.

Hope this helps!

a_craik
Community Contributor

 @jlvaughn ​ I actually did unwittingly put this idea up for vote again " modifiedtitle="true" title="here yesterday, having not found this original submission when I was searching! My suggestion has already been archived, so I now join this existing crusade Smiley Happy.

On my now archived idea, I'd suggested creating additional resubmission options that offer full customisation, hopefully to cover every pedagogical/organisational requirement (that I could think of anyway :smileylaugh:). I did a mock up too:

Canvas Request.png

The current lack of customisability is a big concern for me, as we are about to roll out Canvas and will have to make significant amendments to our existing faculty policies and procedures on assignments - and it's difficult to justify the reason for this this as "because our new LMS can't adapt, we must bend our existing policies to fit new system capabilities".

BTW, I would like to point out that I actually really do like Canvas!

kona
Community Coach
Community Coach

I like then idea of other options, but what does bespoke mean?

a_craik
Community Contributor

Hi Kona

Maybe "defined" or "unique" would have been better a better choice of terminology, but by "bespoke" I mean a specific number (i.e. you could use these settings to permit 5 resubmissions before the deadline, and 1 resubmission one after the deadline)

jlvaughn
Community Novice

Thanks  @kona ​! I guess the "Archived" status threw me off since I thought that meant "Not Currently Planned". But happy to hear that it is potentially in the works. Would be a wonderful thing!

jlvaughn
Community Novice

I like the way you are thinking through the options,  @a_craik ​! I can imagine that for certain courses resubmissions are helpful, for my courses they are the exception but having well thought out future options is great.