Canvas Update: New Quizzes Can Build on Last Attempt 

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Canvas has allowed instructors to give students multiple attempts on quizzes for a while, but they recently modified this feature. Now, Canvas allows instructors to choose whether a student must re-do the entire quiz in subsequent attempts or if they only need to answer questions they had previously gotten wrong.  

Accessing this feature 

This feature is already live in Canvas and can be accessed in the settings page for a New Quiz. Toggle “allow multiple attempts” on, then check the box for “Build on last attempt.”  

When this feature is enabled, students can reattempt questions until they either get it correct or run out of allowed attempts – whichever comes first. If “build on last attempt” is selected and a student gets all questions correct in a quiz, they will not be able to re-attempt it. 

Use case 

Faculty may want to enable this setting to mitigate technological issues while taking a timed quiz. They may also want to use this setting with mastery quizzes that have more than 10 questions. With quizzes of this size, faculty can use this setting to allow students to quickly move through the mastery quiz by only retaking questions they missed. Regardless of the strategy, “build on last attempt” is a very useful addition to New Quizzes.  

Rob McDole contributed to this post.

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