In the past, I've done grades by hand (using a spreadsheet) and have used a penalty model (long story). The course would have five units, each worth a set percentage of the course. The homework leading up to the grade for each unit was "assumed" complete and not graded. However, if not all the homework was completed, the student lost points off the score on the unit's capstone assignment. For example . . .
| Unit | Capstone | Homework (max penalty -10%) | Practice (max penalty -5%) | Points earned | Penalties | Final |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 100 | -10 | -5 | 85 (B) | -6 | 79 (C+) |
| 2 | 150 | -15 | -7.5 | 143 (A) | -10.5 | 132 (B+) |
| 3 | 300 | -30 | -15 | 240 (B-) | 0 | 240 (B) |
| 4 | 300 | -30 | -15 | 249 (B-) | -15 | 234 (C+) |
| 5 | 150 | -15 | -7.5 | 97.5 (D) | 0 | 97.5 (D) |
| Totals | 1000 | -100 | -50 | 814.5 (B-) | -31.5 | 782.5 (C+) |
My students are now using Canvas (we are in a face-to-face course, however), and they want to be able to track their progress on the grade page. I want that too.
My question:
How do I set up the assignments to result in the above system, in which, essentially, the homework is worth a percentage of the SCORE you earn as opposed to the total available points. Does that make sense? Right now, students' grades are very inflated because they haven't yet turned in their first capstone assignment.
(In case I seem super mean, the homework is ALL process-related and graded on a complete/incomplete basis. The student simply has to show up and try to get full points; it should be a slam dunk easy 100%.)
Thank you!
Teeka,
You're not going to be able to automatically do this with native Canvas capability. It doesn't really make penalties easy (rubrics and quizzes build towards the total possible rather than taking points away), although you can simulate the penalty by have assignments worth 0 points and then enter negative values for them.
I'm not quite sure from the post, but I'll work under the premise that these 5 capstone grades for 1000 points are the only grades in the course. If not, it may complicate things even more.
There are two ways I envision being able to do this, other people will probably chime in with other solutions.
Weighted Gradebook
If you want to use a weighted gradebook, then you make categories for Capstones, Homework, and Practice and make them worth 100%, 0%, and 0% respectively. You then create the grades like you've outlined except you make the penalties positive points to illustrate the maximum amount possible. They're in an assignment group worth 0%, so it doesn't matter what they are. Then you add in 5 assignments for the penalties and make them worth 0 points.
It could look something like this. The highlighted rows in yellow represent the assignment groups
You would need to manually combine the homework and practice penalties and enter them under the appropriate Penalty in the Capstone assignment group. When you enter it here, it becomes a negative value.
Note that I say manually, but Canvas has provisions for exporting and importing the gradebook as a CSV, so you could still use a spreadsheet to do the calculations for you. What I mean by manually is that Canvas won't automatically do it for you.
You could also break down those homework and practice points further if you like so there is a score for each individual one rather than for all of the homework for unit 1 combined.
Points Based
The second option is to not use a weighted gradebook but use a points-based system.
The trick here is that you cut out the assignment groups (the highlighted in yellow rows) and create all of the assignments as shown above. When you set up each of the Homework 1 - 5 and Practice 1 - 5 assignments, you check the box to not count the assignment towards the final.
Note that this option is not available for Canvas quizzes, but it doesn't sound like that will impact you.
The rest of the process is the same. You enter the points missed for the homework and the practice as positive values. Then you manually transfer those over to the corresponding penalty column as a negative value.
Summary
With either approach, the idea is to
With this system, the students shouldn't show a grade until you enter grades for the first capstone
Finally, note that when you enter the negative value into the Penalty 1 - 5 assignments, Canvas will warn you that you just entered a negative. It's a consistency check since most people don't mean to do that. In your case, that's what you want, so just ignore those messages and they will disappear after a few seconds.