Gradebook Overview

Accessing the gradebook

1. Access the gradebook from your course homepage by clicking Grades from the Navigation menu at the top of your course page.

  • The default view when accessing the gradebook is the “Grader report,” which displays students as rows and graded items as columns. When Edit Mode is on you will be able to quickly edit any student’s grade for any assignment.

2. To navigate between sections of the gradebook, use the drop down menu on the top left of the page.

3. “Gradebook setup” allows faculty to add structure, categories, graded items, and weighting to the gradebook.

4. The “Overview report” is only relevant for students and displays a student’s grades for all Moodle courses that he/she is enrolled in.

5. The “User Report” is the default view for students and displays a specific student’s grades for each graded item in the course.

6. The “Grade Summary” gives you the average grade for every assignment/activity in your Moodle course.

7. The “Rubrics Report” gives you a breakdown and downloadable option for specifically selected Rubrics and their associated grades, feedback, and outcomes.

Overview of gradebook functions

Categories – Categories are sections in the gradebook that can be weighted differently than other categories. For instance, say a course grade consists of 20% quizzes, 20% homework, 50% exams and 10% participation. In the gradebook, the instructor would create a category for quizzes, one for homework, one for exams, and one for participation. The instructor could then enter the weights for each of these categories so that final grades would be automatically calculated with the weights.

Items – An “item” is the Moodle term for any activity for which a grade is received, whether it’s an exam, a paper, an online lesson, or a participation grade. Items are automatically created for Moodle activities (such as quizzes or assignments), but can also be added for offline activities.

Aggregation – The default aggregation method is called Natural. This is the only aggregation method available for Moodle. This aggregation method uses the natural weighting of point values to sum all grades. You can assign specific weights to certain categories or grade items as well as award extra credit with this aggregation method.

**If you imported an older Moodle course, you may find that the gradebook defaults to the older aggregation method, “Simple Weighted Mean of Grades” instead of “Natural”. This can cause unintended issues when Moodle attempts to calculate student grades.

Grading items – Of course, Moodle allows instructors to enter grades by hand for items that are not automatically graded for Moodle. Instructors also have the option to override automatic grades given on quizzes, lessons, etc.

Exporting and importing grades – Moodle makes it very simple to export and import grades from Excel spreadsheets, plain text documents, etc. With just one click, you can duplicate the grades from your Moodle course. This is especially helpful for instructors who feel more comfortable doing final grades in Excel, or for holding the grades for safekeeping.