Moodle in English: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Jay Melton - Monday, March 3, 2008, 5:20 PM

Hello:

I'm preparing courses for an April start, and I'm starting on the transition from version 1.8.4 to 1.9. I haven't been able to figure out how to maintain the category weights that I have become accustomed to. I typically have categories and weights like this:
Quiz, in-class, homework 50%
Attendance & Participation 25%
Exams 25%
I assign each part of the courses to one of the above, and moodle calculates the final grades for me.

I have created a sample course with the above categories in 1.9 (a screenshot is attached). I cannot make out how to assign weights to the categories. Can anyone walk me through what I need to do or point me to a docs.moodle page or video, please? I have looked everywhere, but cannot find anything yet.

Jay

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Gary Anderson - Monday, March 3, 2008, 9:35 PM

Jay:

It would be best to use the released version of 1.9 (it was just released today) so that you are sure these instructions will work.

1. On the Gradebook page Edit Categories and items where you have Basic English I-b, click the edit icon. Set the aggregation to "Weighted mean of grades".
2. Now, when you add categories, you can set the weight you want for each category. But since you already have those set up, click the edit icon for these and put in the weight you want. Keep aggregation to "Simple weighted mean of grades" for your categories.
3. Note that weights do not have to add up to 100 (but they can). It will just give each category the proportion of the total.

The above should give you what you need. We have been using 1.9 in our classes for a few months, and it is pretty flexible once you get use to it.

Enjoy!

--Gary

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Jay Melton - Tuesday, March 4, 2008, 1:32 PM

Hi Gary,

Thanks for the quick response. I was using literally the last beta yesterday when I was working through the new features. I upgraded to the latest release before attempting your suggestions. Today I'm seeing a different set of screens when I edit the categories. Yesterday several choices were grayed out. Now Item Weight is there in all its glory, and my moodle life is returning to normal.

Another question, in your #1 you have "Weighted mean of grades" and in #2 "Simple weighted mean of grades." Why should they be different?

Thanks again!

Jay

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Gary Anderson - Tuesday, March 4, 2008, 4:06 PM

Glad it is working for you, Jay.

"Simple weighted" means that activities are weighted based on their point values.

"Weighted" means that categories are weighted based on the weight value tht you assign to the category (or item if you want to get really complicated).

--Gary

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Jay Melton - Wednesday, March 5, 2008, 9:33 AM

Hi Gary,

Thanks again for the reply. I understand the weighted part. I was curious why you suggested one to be "simple weighted mean of grades," and the other to be "weighted mean of grades." I'm wondering what the differences are between the two and how choosing different ones (or the same ones) would have an effect.

Jay

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Gary Anderson - Wednesday, March 5, 2008, 12:42 PM

Jay:

The computation is different. "Simple" was the term that some of the developers thought was appropriate when the weight is based on the number of points possible. Weighted mean is the case when you specify the weight within the gradebook.

So, categories use the Simple type, but the whole course uses Weighted mean of grades where you specify the weight to be given to each category.

--Gary

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Jay Melton - Thursday, March 6, 2008, 4:40 PM

Hi Gary,

Thanks for the explanation!

I wonder if that information could be added to the docs. I'm guessing others are going to need some advice on how to transfer their grading schemes over to 1.9. I could not make it out with the changes in both the gradebook and the terminology.

Jay

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Tim Hunt - Friday, March 7, 2008, 5:03 AM

Of course it could be added to the docs. The docs are in a wiki, which means that anyone can add things to them - even you!

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Jay Melton - Friday, March 7, 2008, 10:10 AM

Hi Tim,

I understand that the docs are in a wiki and that I can edit them. To tell you the truth, I'm just following along with the new gradebook features at this point, so I'm not in a position to write about them yet. I was trying to be a bit proactive in my previous post to save some time on the forums.

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Gary Anderson - Friday, March 7, 2008, 12:44 PM

Jay:

I'll write up something this weekend for the docs. If you could review them and let me know if they would make sense to a teacher with similar questions, that would be most helpful (and suggest or revise as needed).

Our school got involved early in the Beta process and made a number of usability suggestions for the gradebook. It is not 100% there in terms of usability, but i think is close enough to be workable with appropriate instructions. And there is a great deal of power and flexibility for those who may need it.

Take care,

--Gary

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Jay Melton - Friday, March 7, 2008, 1:40 PM

Hi Gary,

That sounds like a great plan. Thank you. I'm comfortable in the editing role for the docs, and the process of reading along while I try out the new system will be a great good way for me to learn about it.

Jay

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Brian Pool - Monday, March 10, 2008, 12:00 AM

How are you liking 1.9? I installed it on our test bed and decided I would have to spend about 1 million training hours to get all our teachers up to speed. There are a few items I like, but all and all I think it is far too complicated for the average user.

I wish 1.84 could move around items in the gradebook display and import. Those are the only two I see as an advantage.

I was just wondering how the average user (no computer dude) view it.

Brian

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Gary Anderson - Monday, March 10, 2008, 12:39 AM

Brian:

We also found the new gradebook daunting at first. I think the trick is to get teachers to ignore most of the options that they won't use, and to focus in only on the essential features that are important to them.

A couple features we have found especially helpful.
1. Not having items be factored into a grade (by default) until a grade is entered. This also makes exempting a student from a task easier -- you just add a comment like "exempt" or "absent" to explain the omission.
2. Being able to override a grade or enter one manually directly into the gradebook. We might use this, for example, when a student takes an alternate quiz on paper, etc.

Both of these tasks were difficult in previous versions and are now made much easier.

I am working now on a short tutorial for docs. I would be interested in knowing if that helps.

--Gary

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Shirley VerStraete - Thursday, October 18, 2012, 10:29 PM

Hi Gary,

I realize I'm coming to this discussion a couple of years late.We're using Moodle 2.2.4.

Just wondering if you completed the tutorials you mentioned you were going to work on. Were they added to Moodle docs somewhere? If so, where abouts and if not, where could I find them.

We are in a fairly unique Moodle environment in that we purchase course content from 3rd party vendors which includes Gradebooks already setup. Our instructors do NOT create their own gradebooks and we get alot of questions such as "what's the "best" aggregation method to use?

Generally the vendors have not set up weighted categories - only a course category, and perhaps an "ungraded" category.

I suspect that "mean of grades with extra credit" would give us the Grade average we are looking for, however I'm not an educator and am unfamiliar with educational pedagogy around assessment grading.

So the gradebooks we get often have up to 100 activities in the gradebook without any categories. And we are looking for a students Average Grade for the entire course. Am I correct that we need "Mean of grades" in the Main course category?

Also regarding items in an "ungraded" category - wouldn't each item have a maximum grade of 0 (instead of the default of 100)?

Thank you!

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Shirley VerStraete - Friday, October 19, 2012, 11:13 PM

Oh, we are a K-12 environment.

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Denise Trujillo - Monday, June 2, 2008, 2:57 AM

I am not only new to 1.9, but also new to Moodle. I am trying to figure out how to move items around in the Gradebook display, but can't figure it out. Can anyone direct me to a docs page that explains it in a way that a newbie can understand?
Thanks!

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Richard Tunstall - Friday, May 15, 2009, 10:06 PM

Dennis, you must click on "Categories and Items" in the drop down box in the upper left hand corner of the gradebook to do what you want to do. Create categories and move the grade items into categories. Then you can arrange the grade item order as well as the category order. Once categories are established, you can even hide the individual grades in each category to shrink the horizontal size of the book.

Re: Grade categories and weights 1.8 to 1.9?

by Cathy Theys - Tuesday, January 13, 2009, 12:41 PM

I liked on the edit next to the catagories (and the items) but there is no field to fill in a weight... where exactly is the weight blank?

Can not see the hand icon

by soumya maitra - Wednesday, December 3, 2008, 3:48 PM

Hi this is Soumya

I am very new to moodle .I am using 1.9.2 virsion of moodle.I have added courses and added lesions to them.
Now what I want is to see my students grades.
Can any one help me to find out this step by step?
When I click on grade icon after selecting a course I can see student names on it but can not find the 'Hand' icon (as the picture above in this forum) there and I was offered by moodle to insert grades for my students manually.But I have added grades to my questions and I hoped that the system (moodle) will automatically add % grades to an assigned student which is not happning .Can any one tell me what is the reason for this or where am I making mistakes (if possible by an example?).

Regards,
Soumya Maitra

Needing help with Gradebook-site level or administrative level?

by Carmen Christie-Bill - Thursday, April 30, 2009, 10:22 AM

Helllo,

Our school division is very "green" with using Moodle as we have just started to use it this Spring. I am having a hard time figuring out how to manage the gradebook to assign categories and weighting of assignments. I am trying to do this from the course level and do not see the options that I need to be able to allow teachers to modify their categories and weights for there own courses, but notice at the site level, as an administrator I have more options in the grades area.

We do not want teachers to be able to have full admin rights on the site, so any information you can provide on how to enable a teacher to access the functions needed at their course level would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you for any help you can provide on this topic as I find this whole gradebook management very confusing.

Carmen

Re: Can not see the hand icon

by Richard Tunstall - Friday, May 15, 2009, 10:01 PM

You must click the "Turn Editing On" button at the top to see the hands.