• Canvas

    Canvas New Quiz Settings Update – Saving Settings without Entering the Quiz Build Page

    Reading Time: < 1 minuteCanvas recently updated how to access New Quiz settings. With that update, you could easily get to the settings, but you also had to go through some extra clicks to get back to where you started in Canvas. This is now simplified in the update being pushed out April 28.   Now when you access the New Quiz settings page, you’ll see three options – “Cancel,” “Save,” and “Build.”   “Cancel” will not save any changes made and will return you to your previous page. “Save” now saves any changes and returns you to your previous page instead of pulling you into a page to add/edit quiz questions. And “Build” now saves…

  • Canvas

    Why Did Some of My Grades Disappear in My Gradebook?

    Reading Time: < 1 minuteLet’s imagine a scenario. You have an assignment in your course. Most of your students completed it, and you graded their work. One student didn’t complete the assignment, but you agreed to give them an extension. You went into the assignment settings, opened the assignment back up to them, and merrily went on your way – until you later went to grade their work and discovered you could no longer see the submitted work from any of your other students. You checked the gradebook, and sure enough, the grades you’d previously entered were no longer there either.   Even though this is a scary scenario, this can be…

  • Canvas

    Canvas Update: Accessing New Quiz Settings

    Reading Time: < 1 minuteIn the latest update, Canvas made it easier to access the overall quiz settings for a New Quiz. Previously, you could set the overall points and due date for the quiz when you initially created it, then there was only a single, very specific method to access those settings again.   With the update, you can now access those settings from almost anywhere in Canvas. Previously, you’d click on a New Quiz and immediately go to the “Build” page. Now when you click on a New Quiz from the Assignments, Quizzes, or Modules pages, you will be taken to the overall quiz settings page where you can adjust the quiz name, number of points, and due date/time.   From…

  • Canvas

    Best Practices for Using Essay Questions in New Quizzes

    Reading Time: 2 minutesCanvas New Quizzes have many features that are helpful for administering assessments, but there are some quirks to how this tool works. Today, we’re going to look at some best practices that’ll make working with essay questions easier in New Quizzes.   Make note of which New Quizzes contain essays or other manually-graded questions.  Currently, those assessments do not show up in your to-do list, so you’ll need to check them in order to assign the points for the manually-graded questions in the quiz.   Set your New Quizzes to manually release the grades instead of the standard automatic release.   New Quizzes automatically “grade” the essay questions by assigning zero points to them until you…

  • Canvas

    Canvas Update: New Quizzes and the Modules Page

    Reading Time: 2 minutesIn the new Canvas update, you’ll see some new functionality with New Quizzes on the Modules page inside Canvas. Previously, if you tried to add a quiz from the Modules page, your only option was a Classic Quiz. If you wanted a New Quiz, you needed to create it from the Quizzes page before going back to the Modules page and adding it to your module.   But with the March 20 update, the content selector for a module will now show you which quizzes in your course are Classic Quizzes and also allow you to create a New Quiz. Let’s take a look at each.   Identifying Classic Quizzes  In the new Canvas update, you…

  • Canvas

    How Do I Create and Edit Questions in an Item Bank and Add Them to a New Quiz?

    Reading Time: 3 minutesLast week we talked about the Top Three Things to Know about New Quiz Item Banks. Today, we’re looking at the next step in that process – creating questions in the item banks, editing questions, and adding questions to a New Quiz.   Creating Questions  From a QTI File  If you have a test bank in  QTI format (such as a test bank from a publisher), you can import it into a New Quiz Item Bank.   Individually  If you don’t have a QTI file of questions, the other option is to add the questions manually. For this method, you’ll also want to be in the “Manage Item Banks” view.   Editing Questions  When you have questions in an item bank, the…

  • Canvas

    Top Three Things to Know about New Quiz Item Banks

    Reading Time: 3 minutesWith Canvas continuing to move to New Quizzes, today we’re going to look at an important piece of that puzzle – item banks. Item banks are the best way to organize your quiz or exam questions, and they will help you manage your assessments well. We’ll be talking about adding and editing questions next week, but this week we’re going to focus on the bigger picture of item banks.   Item banks are accessed through a New Quiz and only through a New Quiz. If you access “manage question banks” through the Quiz page, you’ll get the Classic Quiz question banks. Note that the terminology is different – question banks is Classic Quizzes, item banks is New Quizzes. And with that detail covered, we’re…

  • Canvas

    How Can I Reopen a Quiz for a Student (New Quizzes Makes It Easy!)

    Reading Time: < 1 minuteAs we’re progressing through the semester, you may have a student come to you and ask to be let back into a quiz. Canvas makes it simple to do this, especially in New Quizzes. As a reminder, it’s easy to tell which quizzes are New Quizzes – they have the solid rocket ship icon (not the one that’s just an outline).   New Quizzes has a built-in “reopen quiz” feature. With the click of a button, Canvas will allow the student back into their existing attempt. Since this is the existing attempt, students will pick up where they left off. All the questions they’d already answered will still be…

  • Canvas

    How do I give a student extra time on a quiz or exam?

    Reading Time: 2 minutesWith the changes of this semester, you may have moved some in-class quizzes or exams into Canvas. And with that change, there’s a feature you’ll need to use – moderating quizzes to give a student extra time for an accommodation.  Even though the steps are a little different depending on whether you built your assessment as a Classic Quiz or New Quiz, the basic idea is still the same. You need to update the availability and due dates as well as give the student the extra time. Let’s look at how to do this in each quiz type. Remember: the Classic Quiz icon is just outlined, and the…

  • Canvas

    Canvas New Quizzes and SpeedGrader

    Reading Time: 2 minutesEven though it isn’t a feature that’s advertised by Canvas, SpeedGrader can still be accessed and used with New Quizzes – it just takes a couple of extra clicks now.  Let me diverge with a brief illustration: Imagine you’re going to pick up a tin of cookies from a friend’s house (you do this regularly). Typically, you would walk up to the front door, and the tin would be right there on a little table waiting for you.  But then the process changed.  You can still get your cookies; but now you need to walk around the house to the back door, knock three times, whisper “cilantro,”…