how to change assignment weights in canvas

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E-Campus Faculty and Staff

How-to: set up weighted grades in canvas gradebook.

By:   Gracia Ostendorf     

Setting up weighted grades in canvas.

Canvas uses what are called “Assignment Groups” to organize assessments,  and view grades, in different groups.  You can create groups for different types of activities (i.e. all Discussions, all Quizzes, etc.), different units or modules of your course (i.e. a Unit 1 group with a Unit 1 Discussion, Unit 1 Quiz, etc.), or any other way that may be appropriate for your course setup and grading scheme. Your groups can then be weighted with different percentages to determine students’ final grades.

To Create an Assignment Group in Canvas:

• Click the “+ Group” button to create a new Assignment Group
• Add existing Assignments to the Groups by dragging and dropping them on the Assignments page
• Clicking the “+” button in the group header
• Clicking the “+ Assignment” button and selecting the group in the ”Assignment Group” dropdown on that Assignment’s edit page
• Each Assignment Group will be represented with its own column in the Canvas Gradebook (found by clicking “Grades” in the left-hand menu of your Canvas course)

To Assign Weights to Assignment Groups in Canvas:

• On the “Assignments” page, click the 3 dots in the upper right-hand corner of the page, and click “Assignment Groups Weight”
• Check the box next to “Weight final grades based on assignment groups”
• Specify the percentage for each Assignment Group, then click “Save.” These percentages will be reflected in the group headers on the Assignments page, as well as the group columns in the Gradebook
• To edit these percentages, as well as other options like ignoring a certain number of high or low scores from an Assignment Group, click the 3 dots in the right-hand corner of an Assignment Group header, and click “Edit”

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Use Weighted Assignment Groups in Your Canvas Course

by Thomas Keith | Aug 26, 2022 | Canvas , Canvas Features/Functions , How-tos , Pedagogy

Introduction

• Create an Assignment Group

Weight Assignment Groups

Use weighted assignment groups to calculate the total grade, drop a low score from an assignment group, further resources and getting help.

It is good pedagogical practice to maintain a Canvas Gradebook that gives an accurate reflection of your students’ performance. Students frequently consult their grades in Canvas to get a sense of how they are doing in your course and of areas in which they need to improve. You can use weighted Assignment Groups in your Canvas course to help ensure that the grade calculated by Canvas is indicative of students’ actual performance.

Create An Assignment Group

An Assignment Group in Canvas is a means of sorting assignments according to the categories to which they belong in your syllabus. By default, new assignments created in your Canvas course will be added to a catch-all group called Assignments . (Note that “assignments” in this context refers to anything that is graded; this can be an Assignment proper, a Quiz, or a graded Discussion.)

You can create a new Assignment Group by going to the Assignments tab in your course and clicking the gray +Group button at the upper right.

It is a good idea to give your group a name that reflects the assessment categories on your syllabus. For example, if the group contains quizzes that are given each week of the quarter, you might call it Weekly Quizzes .

Once a group has been created, there are two ways to add assignments to it:

Assignment Groups are most useful when used to weight grades. With weighted Assignment Groups, you can make the organization of your assignments in Canvas match the organization used on your syllabus. You also have greater flexibility than is offered by weighting each individual assignment: if an assignment needs to be dropped or added, you can simply remove it from/add it to the appropriate assignment group, and Canvas will automatically recalculate the final grade accordingly.

For the remainder of this post, we will use as an example a course in which the grading is as follows:

• Five short quizzes: 20% of the final grade
• One midterm exam: 30% of the final grade
• One final exam: 40% of the final grade
• Attendance and participation: 10% of the final grade

To begin, the instructor creates four assignment groups, named Short Quizzes , Midterm , Final Exam , and Attendance and Participation .

She then clicks the column of three dots at the upper right and chooses Assignment Groups Weight .

She then checks the box next to Weight final grade based on assignment groups . This allows her to set the percentage weight for each assignment group.

Note that Canvas shows the instructor that the assignment groups add up to 100%. It is important to check this, as Canvas will not stop you if your groups add up to less than or greater than 100%.

Once the instructor has weighted her groups to her satisfaction, she clicks the maroon Save button. Canvas then indicates across from each assignment group’s name the percentage value of the total grade that it carries.

The instructor can now create her assignments and add them to the appropriate assignment groups by one of the two methods enumerated above.

An important caveat: If an assignment group contains more than one assignment, it is important that all assignments have the same point value for Canvas’ math to work out correctly. This avoids the risk of “double weighting,” which will occur if assignments within a group have different point values. For example: if a quiz worth 5 points and a quiz worth 50 points are placed in the same assignment group, the latter quiz will be worth ten times as much in Canvas’ calculations, which will greatly skew the result. In our example course, the instructor has avoided this risk by creating five quizzes within the Short Quizzes group, each of which is worth three points.

The Midterm and Final Exam groups each contain only one assignment. This can be an assignment of type Online Assignment if the instructor wishes her students to submit it through Canvas, or it can be an assignment of type On Paper if students will hand in a physical exam paper.

For the Attendance and Participation group, the instructor creates an assignment of type No Submission .

Remember that in Canvas, there is a one-to-one correspondence between assignments and columns in the Gradebook. Thus, if you wish to create a column for (e.g.) students’ attendance/participation grade, it is necessary to create a corresponding assignment. By making it of type No Submission , the instructor has ensured that students do not need to hand in any work, while still creating a Gradebook column where the grade is recorded.

Note also that if students need to submit work that will not be graded, such as an outline for an upcoming paper, you can create an assignment of submission type Online Assignment and check the box Do not count this assignment toward the final grade in the assignment options area.

Using weighted assignment groups allows Canvas to do your math for you. A column will appear in the Gradebook for each assignment group. The Total column will be calculated by multiplying the value of each column by its percentage weight and adding the results. In the case of the student below, the grade is calculated as follows:

Short Quizzes: 12 out of 15 possible points = 80 * 0.2 = 16

Midterm Exam: 90 out of 100 possible points = 90*0.3 = 27

Final Exam: 80 out of 100 possible points = 80*0.4 = 32

Attendance and Participation: 100 out of 100 possible points = 100*0.1 = 10

Total: 16+27+32+10 = 85

If you wish, you can set an assignment group to drop one or more low scores (or high scores) automatically. To do this, go to the group within the Assignments tab and click on the column of three dots across from its name to open a dialog box. Then enter the number of low or high scores you wish to drop and click Save .

You can also specify that an assignment should never be dropped by clicking the blue +Add an assignment link next to Never drop: and choosing its name from the drop-down that appears.

For more information, please see:

• How do I weight the final course grade based on assignment groups?
• How do I create rules for an assignment group?

If you have additional questions, Academic Technology Solutions is here to help. You can attend our workshops to learn more about Canvas and other tools for teaching with technology. You can also drop into our Office Hours (virtual and in-person) to ask any questions you may have; no appointment is required.

(Cover Photo by Piret Ilver on Unsplash )

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Canvas Gradebook Tips: Grade Breakdown, Assignment Weighting, and Dropping Lowest Grade

Since we’re still close to the start of the semester, now is the perfect time to make sure your gradebook is set up properly. It may feel like you have lots of time left before this is absolutely necessary, but that’s not the case. If you take the time now, both you and your students will see accurate grades across the semester. So let’s talk about three things to check to make sure your gradebook is set up how you want. 

1. Setting up the grade breakdown

Canvas makes it easy to take your syllabus’ grading system in percentages and apply it to your course. You’ll set this up from the “Assignments” page in your course. 

• Make sure you have an assignment group set up for each category in your grading system. If you need to add assignment groups, check out Canvas’ “How do I add an assignment group in a course?” document.
• Click the three dots menu at the top of the assignments page and select “assignment groups weight.” 
• Enter the values for each group and click “save.” 

Canvas will even keep a running total of the values you enter so you can double-check that to ensure it all adds up to 100%. For more information about setting this up, check out Canvas’ “How do I weight the final course grade based on assignment groups?” document.

2. Weighting assignments inside an assignment group

Sometimes, you may have a place where you need to weight items inside one of your assignment groups. 

For example, you may have multiple exams in your course. You could make each one a separate assignment group, but you also want to easily see an overall average for the exams. 

Let’s say this is your grade breakdown: 

• Exam 1: 10%
• Exam 2: 10%
• Final Exam: 20%

You can easily use weighting inside an assignment group to accomplish all your goals. 

• Create a main assignment group worth the total percentage for the items (here this would be an “Exams” group worth 40%)
• Place all of the items (exams) in that group
• Adjust the total points for each item to match the percentages (Exam 1 = 10 points, Exam 2 = 10 points, Final Exam = 20 points). 

And you’re all set! You can use this same method for other scenarios – simply set the points to be equal to the desired weights.

3. Dropping the lowest grade in an assignment group

If you say in your syllabus that you’re going to drop the lowest grade in an assignment group, Canvas can easily do that for you. 

• Click the three dots menu for the assignment group where you need to drop a grade. 
• Click “edit.”
• Change the value for “Lowest Scores” to however many you need to drop.
• Click “save.” 

You’ll see some other options on the “edit” screen for assignments. To learn more about those, check out Canvas’ “How do I create rules for an assignment group?” document.

If you implement these things in your course, you’ll be in good shape. You and your students will see accurate grades across the semester, and you’ll have a simpler time submitting final grades. 

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University Center for Teaching and Learning

• Assignment Groups

How Do I Use Assignment Groups in Canvas?

In Canvas, assignment groups allow you to organize your assignments into discrete groups. For example, you may want to group all the essay assignments in your course within one assignment group titled ‘Essays’.

Assignment groups allow you to leverage a weighted grade scheme in your Canvas course. A weighted grade scheme allows you to distribute percentages of a student’s final grade across these assignment groups. Following our previous example, you may want the Essays group to account for 30% of the final grade. 

By default, Grade weighting is turned off for all Canvas courses. To turn on Grade weighting, please follow Canvas’ tutorial for weighting final grades based on Assignment Groups.

How do grade weights get distributed across an Assignment Group?

In Canvas, the weight of an assignment group is distributed proportionally across the assignments inside it. Because of this, assignments worth different points will be weighted differently if they are in the same assignment group.

Here’s an example of an assignment group in Canvas. This group is worth 30% of the total grade and contains three assignments with different point values. The table further below outlines how the assignment group weight of 30% is distributed across the three Assignments.

Here, since Essay Two is out of 200 points, it will count two times more than Essays One and Three.

***assignment group weight distribution for assignments with differing point totals.

If you want all assignments within a given assignment group to be worth the same weight, you have two options:

1. Make all assignments inside an assignment group worth the same number of points, as shown below.

***In this scenario, we have changed Essay Two’s point value from 200 to 100 points. Since all point values in this assignment Group are the same, each Assignment will be worth the same, 10% in this case.

2. Create new assignment groups for any outlier assignments if you cannot or do not want to change their point value.

***In this scenario, we have not changed Essay Two’s point values, so we will need to put it in its own assignment group worth 10% and change the first assignment group to be worth 20% so that all Essays are now worth 10% of the total grade.

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