Module 4. Assessing in Canvas

Introduction to the SpeedGrader Tool

Clipboard with a checkmark Plan to spend a little extra time on this section of Module 4.

The tool that instructors use to assign grades and give feedback to students is called SpeedGrader (it's awesome!).

Use SpeedGrader to give students feedback on any Assignment, Quiz, or Graded Discussion. SpeedGrader allows you to look sequentially at each student's work and give feedback (text and/or audio/video comments and a grade or score). It shows you your progress for that item.

When grading an Assignment for certain file types (MS Word, MS PowerPoint, and PDF), you can provide inline commenting on student submissions. These annotations cannot be viewed by screen readers, so for students who use screen-reading software please provide the same information in the comments field of the sidebar.

One terrific feature is the ability to "mute" an item until you've finished grading the entire class (thus eliminating emails that say "Tony got his grade; where's mine?!"). Other options include exporting and importing scores, viewing the grades of students who have been dropped from the class, and excusing a student from an assignment so that it is not included in that student's overall calculation. You can hide student names to help reduce bias in grading. Finally, you can also write notes about particular students that are separate from any particular grade item.

Students can view feedback in two ways:

Via their submission view if the graded assignment was online (Graded Discussion, Quizzes, and online Assignments)
Via the Grades link in Course Navigation

Students can only see their own grades, not those of their classmates. The student view includes a nifty "What-If" feature that allows students to forecast future grades based on upcoming assignments. It also shows both their current score (based on assignments graded) as well as their total score (including all points possible for the course).

For instructors, the same Grades link on the course menu displays the entire Gradebook, with all students and all assignments for the class. Scores and comments can be directly entered either from the Gradebook page or by using SpeedGrader.

Check out the Canvas Guides and watch the short video below, before moving on.

Canvas Guides & Videos