Grade an Assignment

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Overview

  • Grade an Assignment
    The Assignment tool is used by instructors who would like students to submit a file for a graded assignment. Students may upload Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel, or any other file type that the instructor can work with. Blackboard provides an easy method for grading each submission and providing feedback to the student.
  • Streamlined Grading Methods
    • Step 1: Download Submissions for Offline Review
      This option allows you to download all the students' submissions for a particular assignment by zipping them up and downloading the zipped file to your hard drive so that you may grade on the submissions independent of Blackboard.
    • Step 2: Enter Grades in Bulk
      Use the Grade Book tool to enter the grades into Blackboard's grade book if you already have all of the grades recorded externally for an assignment.
  • Edit Existing Grades
    Use the Grade Book tool to give a grade to a student who submitted their assignment to you via email or some alternative means external to Blackboard.

Grade an Assignment

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Step 1: View Submissions

  • Under the Teach Tab, go to Assignments
  • Click the ActionLinks icon next to the assignment you wish to review
  • Select View Submissions


 

 
NOTE: If you do not see the Assignment you are looking for, it may be displayed on the next page. At the bottom of the window, you will find Next Page and Previous Page icons you can use to navigate through the list of Assignments.

  
Can't find what you're looking for?
There are several possibilities:
  • Are you in the correct Tab (Build, Teach, Graded, Submitted, etc.)?
  • Is it on the next page? Permanently increase the default number of items displayed per screen by modifying your global Bb's Paging Preference.

 

Step 2: Sort & Open Submissions

  • Go to the All tab
  • Sort your list of students by Name by clicking on the Assigned to header
    NOTE: There is a known bug which will cause the assignment list to become
              unsorted if you leave and come back to the submissions page.
  • Click on the ActionLinks icon next to the assignment you wish to grade
  • Select View Submissions (this will display each students submission)


 

Status & Due Dates
Submitted indicates the assignment has been submitted, but not graded
Not Started indicates the student has NOT started the assignment
In Progress indicates that the student has started, but has not submitted assignment
Graded indicates that the assignment has already been graded
Late indicates that the assignment was submitted after the due date, but before the cut-off date
Missed indicates that the assignment was not submitted before the cut-off date

Note

Anyone who has not already submitted their assignment will be moved from the “Not Submitted” tab to the “Submitted” tab after the assignment cut-off date and will be marked as "Missed".
  If a student completes their assignment, but forgets to press the Submit button, their submission will show up as "Missed". You will still have access to the submission for grading.

 

Step 3: Review & Grade Submissions

  • Your student's submissions are in the submission box. This may be text or an attachment. If you are unable to open the attachment:
    • Check that your computer is setup properly for Blackboard.
    • Check that you can open the file type your student delivered. If you can not open that file type, contact the student and have them submit a different file type. Use the Return to Student for further editing option to give the assignment back to the student.
  • Enter your grading comments and add any necessary attachments
  • Are you using Grading Forms?
  • Select the Return graded submission... radio button, and fill in the appropriate grade
    • REMINDER: You must Release the column in the Grade Book for students to view their grades
  • Click Save

NOTE: Use the Grade Book tool to give a grade to a student who submitted their assignment to you via email or some alternative means. See Modify/Override Grade.
 

Streamlined Grading Methods

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  • Step 1: Download Submissions for Offline Review
    This option allows you to download all the students' submissions for a particular assignment by zipping them up and downloading the zipped file to your hard drive so that you may grade on the submissions independent of Blackboard.
  • Step 2: Enter Grades in Bulk
    Use the Grade Book tool to enter the grades into Blackboard's grade book if you already have all of the grades recorded externally for an assignment.
 

Step 1: Download Submissions for Offline Review

It can be more convenient to download all the students' submissions for an assignment to your hard drive so that you can work on them independent of Blackboard. The steps below outline the process of zipping up and downloading all the students' submissions for a particular assignment.

  • Under the Teach Tab, go to Assignment Dropbox (1)
  • Make sure you're on the Submitted tab
  • Change the View by (2) drop down menu to the Assignment you want to download and press the Go button
  • Select the Check Box (3) at the top of the list of submissions. This will select all the submissions displayed on that page at once.
  • WARNING: Verify that all of the submissions are displayed on the page. If they are not, change your paging preference to increase the number of items displayed on the page. TIP: Permanently increase the default number of items (e.g. submissions) displayed per screen by modifying your global Bb's Paging Preference.
  • Press the Create Printable View (4) button. This will compile all the assignment submissions into a single screen from which to download.
 

  • Press Save to File

  • Press OK

  • Under the Build tab, go to the File Manager
  • Select My Files at the top of the screen
  • Click on the ActionLinks icon next to the Assignment Submissions Zip file that was generated
  • Select the Download option from the drop down menu

  • Press Save

  • Navigate to the location you would like to save the assignments to
  • Press Save

  • When the download is complete, press the Open button

  • You will be able to view a folder containing the assignments of each student
  • Press the Extract all Files option under Folder Tasks
  • Extract it to the same location the zip file is stored

  • Once extracted, you can read and modify the students' submissions from your hard drive

  • When you're ready to enter grades for each student, follow the next steps of this tutorial
 

Step 2: Enter Grades in Bulk

The following tutorial shows how to enter the grades in bulk through the Grade Book tool. This method also allows you to give a grade to a student who submitted their assignment to you via email or some alternative means, and not through Blackboard.

  • Under the Teach Tab, click on Grade Book.
  • Click on the ActionLinks icon of the column, and select Edit Values
  • NOTE: If you do not see all of the students you are looking for, they may be displayed on the next page. At the bottom of the window, you will find Next Page and Previous Page icons which you can use to navigate through the list of students. Permanently increase the number of students displayed per page with the Grade Book tool's Page Preference Page Preference icon—also located at the bottom of the window. (The Grade Book tool uses a separate paging preference setting and does not use the global Bb's Paging Preference setting defined in Bb's My Settings.)

  • Enter your student's grades. Once you have finished, press Save

Reminder: In order for students to see their grades, you must first Release the column in the Grade Book

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Still have a Question? Click Help in the top right corner of your Blackboard course.