Grades | How to create a Grade Item/Grade Category

Grade Items are all components of a graded course and will be visible in the grade book. Grade items are used to:

  • grade students' performance on their study performance
  • keep an overview of student results
  • control the way results are communicated to students

Grade items can be used to grade assessments; including assignments, quizzes and discussions. These assessments can only be graded when linked to a grade item.

Categories are a way to organise different Grade Items by linking them together to the same Category, which can be used in the Final Grade Calculation. This will also group them in the Enter Grades and Manage Grades windows.

This article shows how to:

It is highly recommended to create grade items before creating assessments

Navigate to your course, in the green navigation bar,

  1. Click on Grades 

It is also possible to create a grade item through an Assessment. For clarity, it is often easier to create all grade items first.

Navigate to your course, in the green navigation bar click on Grades

This will open the Grades homepage,

  1. Click on the Manage Grades tab
In the Grades homepage, click on Manage Grades tab

The Manage Grades homepage will open,

  1. Click on the blue button New, a drop-down menu will appear
In the Manage Grades homepage, click on the blue button New, a drop-down menu will appear

In the drop-down menu,

4. Select one of the following options:

OR

 

In the drop-down menu, click on Item or Category
Creating a Grade Item

After clicking on Item, in the New Item homepage,

Selectbox grade items are only available for course grade schemes, not for organisational schemes. When trying to use an organisational scheme, please go to More Options in the Schemes window, and click Copy. This will create a copy of the scheme on a course level.

Assessments (assignments, quizzes) can only be linked to Numeric grade items. It is highly recommended to only use these grade items, even when using a Pass/Fail evaluation, by using the Pass/Fail grading schemes that are available as Organisation Schemes and creating a course-level copy of this scheme.

New Item homepage, choose Grade Item Type
  1. Choose a Grade Item type, the following options are available:
  • Numeric - to create a grade item that evaluates students by assigning a value
  • Selectbox - to create a grade item that allows evaluation to be selected from a pre-set list. This list can be generated by using a course-level grade scheme.
  • Pass/Fail - to create a grade item that evaluates students with a simple pass/fail scheme
  • Formula - to create a grade item that uses a Boolean formula to calculate the evaluation score
  • Calculated -  to create a grade item that uses a calculation using multiple grade items
  • Text -  to create a grade item with a text output that is not included in the final grade

Numeric Grade Item type

On the New Item homepage,

  1. Click on Numeric
New Item homepage, click on Numeric

On the New Item homepage,

  1. Give the grade item a Name
  2. (Optional) Give the grade item a Short name
  3. (Optional) Select a Category
  4. (Optional) Give the grade item a description
  5. (Optional) Tick the box - to allow users to see the description given to the grade item

To keep a good overview, it is recommended to use a clear description of the grade item in the Name, for example, Report Practicum 1

The Short Name is for convenience in the grade book: the names of the grade items and categories are displayed horizontally in the grade book. When using a Short Name, Brightspace will display this Short Name in the grade book to prevent long columns. This Short Name will not be visible to students.

New Item homepage - Give a name, (optiona) give the grade item a short name, a category, a description

Depending on the Final Grade Calculations Settings the New Item can be different for Points-based and Weight-based systems.

Under the heading Grading,

  1. Enter the maximum number of points that can be attained by the grade item
  2. (Optional) Tick the box if the Grade Item can exceed the maximum number of points, for example by having a bonus grade while having achieved the highest number of points. This will only be relevant if the higher grade is part of a final grade calculation in which the higher-than-normal points will have to be included
  3. (Optional) Tick the box if the points of the Grade Item will be awarded on top of the normal grade calculation, rather than being part of it
  4. Click on the downward arrow, a drop-down menu will appear
Under the heading Grading, Enter the Maximum Points and other grading options can be selected

In the drop-down menu,

  1. Select one of the Grade Scheme options

For further information about Grade Schemes, please visit: What are grade schemes

Select a Grade Scheme for the grade item

Under the Rubrics heading,

11. (Optional) Click on Add Rubric to add an already existing rubric

OR

Click on Create Rubric in New Window to create a new rubric

For further information about Rubrics, please visit: How to create a rubric

Under Rubrics, it is possible to add a rubric or create a rubric in New window

Further Display options can be select, under Student View and Managing View,

Display options
  1. Display class average to users - to allow students to also see the average score of the grade item in the course
  2. Display grade distribution to users - to allow students to see the distribution of scores
  3. Override display options for this item - for users to view grade information for this item differently from other items in the grade book
  4. Select the information to be displayed:
  • Points grade - to allow students to see the points achieved
  • Grade scheme symbol - to allow students to see the grading scheme output
  • Grade scheme colour -  to include the grade scheme colour (if applicable)

Override display options for this item has the same options for both Student View and Managing View

  1. Click on Save and Close to save the item and return to the Manage Grades homepage
Save and Close
Creating a Grade Category

Be aware that a Grade Category as such is not graded; only the Grade Items within a Grade Category are graded

After clicking on Category, the New Category homepage will open,

  1. Give the grade item a Name
  2. (Optional) Give the grade category a Short name
  3. (Optional) Give the grade category a description
  4. (Optional) Tick the box - to allow users to see the description given to the grade item

The Short Name is for convenience in the grade book: the names of the grade items and categories are displayed horizontally in the grade book. When using a Short Name, Brightspace will display this Short Name in the grade book to prevent long columns. This Short Name will not be visible to students.

New Category homepage

Depending on the Final Grade Calculations Settings the New Category Menu will be different for Points-based and Weight-based systems.

  1. (Optional) tick the box if the users' grades for the category can exceed the maximum value for the category
  2. (Optional) tick the box if all the grade items in the category  should be worth the same amount
  3. (Optional) Enter the Distribution across all items
    • Points per item - to enter the value that the grade items in the category should contribute towards the final grade
    • Number of highest non-bonus items to drop for each user -  to drop users' highest grades in the category from their final grade
    • Number of lowest non-bonus items to drop for each user -  to drop users' lowest grades in the category from their final grade

Both options Number of highest and lowest non bonus item to drop for each user can only be used  if all grade items in the category are worth the same amount

Under the heading Grading, more options are available

Under Display options,

  1. Click on Show Display Options
Display options - click on Show Display Options

Further Display options can be selected  under Student View,

Display options will appear
  1. Display class average to users - to allow students to also see the average score of the grade item in the course
  2. Display grade distribution to users - to allow students to see the distribution of scores
  3. Override display options for this item - for users to view grade information for this item differently from other items in the grade book
  4. Select the information to be displayed:
  • Points grade - to allow students to see the points achieved
  • Grade scheme symbol - to allow students to see the grading scheme output
  • Grade scheme colour -  to include the grade scheme colour (if applicable)
  1. Click on Save and Close to save the item and return to the Manage Grades homepage
Save and Close

 

Now you know how to create a Grade Item/Grade Category in Brightspace!

Want to know more about the Grades tool in Brightspace?

Please visit:

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