Facilitating Collaborative Grading
What is it?
When creating an assignment, you can choose to set up an assignment with moderated grading. Moderated grading allows multiple reviewers to grade a student's work and create draft or provisional grades for an assignment. For instance, you may want to allow two Teaching Assistants to grade all assignments, and you can review their assessments before determining the final grade. Moderated grading is also useful for creating a sampling of students for assignment review to ensure grading is consistent and allows secondary grade reviews.
In moderated grading, anyone with assignment creation permissions can specify an assignment submission to be reviewed by one or multiple graders, edit the assignment if necessary, review the grades, and select which grade should be set as the final grade for each student. For each moderated submission, the user set as the moderator is the only user who can specify the final grade for each assignment. Any grader can be specified as the grader who can determine the final grade as long as they have the corresponding permission, but the moderator does not have to personally grade the assignment. Once the assignment is created, only the moderator and admins will be able to change the assigned final grader. When an assignment reaches its maximum number of graders, the grading notification will be removed from the Dashboard for graders who have not yet assessed the assignment; however, submissions can still be accessed through the Gradebook, if needed. SpeedGrader displays submissions in a read-only mode to hide all student names and submission details.
Why is it important?
Moderated assignments are essential for ensuring fairness and consistency in grading, particularly in courses with multiple reviewers. By allowing several instructors or teaching assistants to evaluate student submissions, moderated assignments promote a collaborative approach that helps mitigate individual biases and enhances the reliability of grades. This process not only fosters a more equitable assessment environment but also encourages diverse perspectives on student work, ultimately leading to more comprehensive feedback. Furthermore, moderated grading can help maintain high academic standards by providing a system of checks and balances, ensuring that all students are evaluated based on the same criteria and expectations.
How do I do it?
Watch: How do I add a moderated assignment to be graded by multiple reviewers? [3:04]
Open Assignments
In Course Navigation, select the Assignments link.
Add Assignment
To create an assignment with all assignment details at the same time, select the Add Assignment button.
Edit Assignment
If you want to edit an existing assignment that has not yet received student submissions, click the name of the assignment.
Add Assignment Details
Add details to the assignment.
Select Moderated Grading
Select the Moderated Grading checkbox.
Select Number of Graders
In the Number of Graders text box [1], enter the number of graders who should grade the submission. If the number of graders is changed to a higher number, the page displays a message that there are not enough course users with grading permissions to fulfill the desired number of graders [2].
- Canvas allows for a maximum of 10 graders. If you enter a number larger than 10, the page displays a message that only 10 graders are available in the course.
- A moderator does not have to specify which specific graders in the course can grade submissions. If a course includes a surplus of graders higher than the desired number of graders, any grader can assess an assignment submission until the specified number of grades has been achieved. When an assignment has reached the specified number of graders, remaining graders will not be able to access the assignment anywhere in Canvas.
- The moderator is never included in the number of available graders since the moderator does not traditionally grade individual submissions. However, the moderator may choose to provide a custom grade instead of selecting a grade from one of the graders.
Select Grader Visibility
If you want to allow graders to view each other's comments, select the Graders can view each other's comments checkbox. This option is selected by default.
Note: If anonymous grading is also enabled for your course, selecting this option displays the Graders cannot view each other's names checkbox in the anonymous grading assignment options. This option allows graders to view comments from other graders but not view the name associated with each comment.
Select Final Grader
In the Select Grader menu [1], select the name of the moderator, or the grader who determines the final grade. The Select Grader menu displays the names of course graders who have been given permission to determine the final grade. This permission is assigned to one or more roles at the account level. If you have permission, you can select your own name as the final grader. To allow the final grader to view other graders' names, click the Final grader can view other grader names checkbox [2]. This option is selected by default.
Save Assignment
If you want to notify users about any future assignment changes, click the Notify users that this content has changed checkbox [1]. Select the Save button [2].
Note:If your assignment has not yet been published, the assignment will show the Save & Publish button. The Save button will create a draft of your assignment so you can publish it later.
Further Helps
How do I review moderated assignments in SpeedGrader as a moderator?