Hello.
In my online computer courses part of the grade that I will be giving is based on participation. Answering discussion questions in the forums etc. What is the best way to do this? Is there a "free form" assignment where I can just enter grades subjectively?
Thanks.
Scott.
Yes. You can either set the forum for you to grade their contributions there or else you can set up an offline assignment (add an activity>assignment>offline) which is basically just a space in the gradebook for you to add grades as subjectively as you want 
Thank you very much Mary!
In addition to Mary's comment, I have found it useful to make these types of graded assignments "Online text" rather than "Offline activity".
I am still free to assign a grade to these activities even if the student does not submit anything, but it also gives the option of optionally having the student of reflect on their work (or behavior, effort, attendance, etc.) Students then take responsibility for their own progress and I have documentation from the student of any circumstances that I might not have been aware of in assigning a participation grade.
I also learn if my perception of the student's effort is different from my own, in which case we have something to talk about to make things more effective moving forward.
--Gary
I am still free to assign a grade to these activities even if the student does not submit anything, but it also gives the option of optionally having the student of reflect on their work (or behavior, effort, attendance, etc.) Students then take responsibility for their own progress and I have documentation from the student of any circumstances that I might not have been aware of in assigning a participation grade.
I also learn if my perception of the student's effort is different from my own, in which case we have something to talk about to make things more effective moving forward.
--Gary
I like to use rubrics and copy them into an offline assignment. Until Friday each week students have to reply to at least one forum question with a substantial answer. Then they are asked to interact with each other until the following Wednesday. I found that this rubric provides a good balance between quantity and quality.
With kind regards,
Hartmut
With kind regards,
Hartmut
Hi,
Thanks for the search engine! I was going to start a new thread but I think this might be OK. Like the rubric. Need to grade students on a course in order to get a simple metric of useful participation (rather than just have time spent online). Any ideas? I have a course where students have all my rights except gradebook
. They are making their own learning environment so effort/participation etc. is all important. I can do it subjectively but they might well argue against that (even worse, they might win!). Any objective proxy that anyone knows of?
Thanks,
Paul
Thanks for the search engine! I was going to start a new thread but I think this might be OK. Like the rubric. Need to grade students on a course in order to get a simple metric of useful participation (rather than just have time spent online). Any ideas? I have a course where students have all my rights except gradebook
. They are making their own learning environment so effort/participation etc. is all important. I can do it subjectively but they might well argue against that (even worse, they might win!). Any objective proxy that anyone knows of?Thanks,
Paul