Set Default Grade- Include Excused, Late, & Missing

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(30)

The "set default grade" is a great tool.  However, with our current hybrid model (some at school and some at home) we are running into a bit of problem with managing assignments.  Some of this may originate with how our sections are integrated with Canvas, but that is not something we as teachers have control over.

Each class has a single section that is linked the SIS.  Teachers are not allowed to manage their sections.

If teachers would like to give an assignment to only the online learners or only the in class learners they have to enter the names individually & manually (we have not found a way to copy and paste in a list from a notepad or other document).

A relatively simple work around (if it worked) would be give the assignment to the entire section, assign the default grade as excused, and then remove the "Excused" code from students that are not excused.  The problem is "set default grade" does not accept "Excused" or any of the shorthand for excused.  This would also be faster and more convenient that editing each daily assignment to add a student to the assigned list if they are absent.  A teacher could quickly move through the gradebook, remove the "excused" code and the assignment would then appear for the absent student. (If I have understood correctly, setting and assignment as "excused" actually hides the assignment from the excused student.)

This would be a feature that would simplify life for many teachers.

If someone knows of a better work around, please share 🙂

33 Comments
LynnKittridge
Community Member

Please, please, please!  It is too many clicks to mark individual assignments as missing, and then again to remove the missing once a student submits the assignment.  

CZaccagnino
Community Member

We need this!

cindyk
Community Participant

Please add this ability.  I teach a yearlong class but at semester, some students changed teachers.  I need to go back and assign some core content that I covered 1st semester to just these students and excuse everyone else.  I need to assign to everyone so my grades sync to our SIS.  It's not a big deal excusing just 4 students but excusing 80 over all the affected assignments for the unit is tedious.

As step in the right direction, I would accept a keyboard shortcut or a dropdown.  What really takes the time is having to open up the radio button select menu window for each student for each assignment.  

cindyk
Community Participant

I have a slightly different but related problem.  I have excused several students from an assignment.  I want to set a default grade for the remaining students.  When I do so, the excused flag is removed and the default grade goes in.  This is not intuitive.  An excused grade should stay excused.

aboom
Community Participant

YEs Please!!!!

KellyWest
Community Member

It would be helpful to be able to change an assignment from "Missing" to "None" or
"Excused" en masse. The default missing setting is lovely and all, but after a unit is over, I update all the "missing" work to "none" so that students only focus on the available unit. I'm having to change status one by one and it takes quite a while. This would also help with assignments that I've had to create just for my Covid-quarantined students.

powerss
Community Member

While I'm not a teacher myself (am Network Admin), I can definitively say that this would be a great feature to add!  I've had several questions and requests from teachers for a way to set an assignment status to a default for various reasons.  While being being able to set a default grade is handy, it would be just as useful to be able to set a default assignment status.

bgesin
Community Member

I use a lot of external tools for assignments, but unfortunately Canvas's current grade book setup makes my grading much more difficult as a result.  

It would be EXCELLENT and extremely useful if "Set Default Grade" also included the options MISSING and EXCUSED.  I have my late policy set up to mark assignments as 0 and MISSING when the due date passes, but this does not work for external tool assignments. 

Once the due date passes for an external assignment, I need to mark MISSINGS manually.  This takes considerable time for a lot of students in various classes, but it is the easiest way for them to see what work they need to complete by clicking on their grade book and seeing MISSING in red. 

Being able to add MISSING in bulk using "Set Default Grade" would be an amazing addition to the grade book. 

thompsli
Community Champion

This would be incredibly useful for me as well, particularly if I could bulk-include a comment as well as autofill missing. Right now, I'm spending a lot of time in Speedgrader going through students one by one to set everything as missing and add comments, simply because the gradebook does not seem to have a reliable way to even sort by blank so I can do it going down the column myself from the gradebook since it inter-mingles the "excused" students with the "-" students when I sort by grade low to high or high.

The only way I can cluster the "-" students together for manual "missing" entry is in Speedgrader if I have it sort them by submission status, and since Speedgrader has no keyboard shortcut for changing assignment status it is a clicking-intensive process to do something that other gradebooks I've used have had an an autofill option.

MeganSantos
Community Novice

I would like to be able to mark an assignment as missing for multiple students at once. When we put in zeros, it no longer marks the assignment as missing. I want to be able to click all these zeroes at once and mark them all missing. It takes a long time to remark them all as missing individually.

beckh2
Community Member

It would be nice to have a "set default" grade to missing instead of having to click on grade and select missing. 

The missing autofills for canvas assignments, but not paper and external tool assignments, It would be nice to have a faster work around

 

KimFranco
Community Member

It looks like this has never been resolved, but we are running into the same issues. We are a K-8 school on revolving enrollment. It is beyond frustrating for teachers to go in and have to excuse ALL assignments for a student prior to their start date. I don't understand why this hasn't been changed or resolved yet! Why can't there be an option for us to put when the student started so they only see assignments from that day forward? That would be ideal. Please resolve this issue!!

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Instructure
Instructure
Status changed to: Archived
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