Understanding Moodle 4.0 Gradebook: A Complete Guide for Teachers
If you’re a teacher using Moodle 4.0, you might be wondering how to make the most out of the Gradebook feature. Whether you’re new to Moodle or need a refresher, this blog will walk you through everything you need to know about setting up and customizing Gradebook, so it’s tailored to your course and students’ needs.
What Is Gradebook in Moodle?
Gradebook in Moodle is a tool that allows instructors to track and manage student grades for various course activities. As a teacher, you can customize the way grades are calculated, displayed, and organized within Moodle, providing a better experience for both you and your students. In this guide, we’ll explore how to add activities, manage grade items, adjust weightings, and improve the Gradebook’s overall usability.
Getting Started with Gradebook in Moodle 4.0
To understand how the Gradebook works in Moodle 4.0, let’s first take a look at a fresh, blank course and how the Gradebook appears without any activities.
What Does Gradebook Look Like Initially?
In a new course, the Gradebook is pretty basic. By default, when you navigate to the Grades section, you’ll see:
- No students listed.
- No grades.
- Just a “Grade Total” column that will show a blank slate.
If you switch to the student role, the view is the same — no data, nothing to report.
Adding Activities to Populate the Gradebook
To make the Gradebook functional, you need to add some activities to your course. Activities like assignments and quizzes are commonly added to Moodle courses and automatically appear in the Gradebook once they are created.
- Adding an Assignment
- To add an assignment, go to your course page, turn on editing, and select Add an Activity or Resource.
- Choose Assignment, give it a name, and set the important parameters, such as the grade scale.
- For the Grade section, you can select Point (e.g., 100 points). You’ll also set the grade to pass (e.g., 80%).
- Once saved, the assignment will appear in the Gradebook with a grade range of 0-100.
- Adding a Quiz
- Next, you can add a Quiz. The steps are similar — choose Quiz, name it, and set the grade to 10 points (for variation).
- Once the quiz is saved, it will appear in the Gradebook with a grade range of 0-10.
At this point, your Gradebook will have:
- Assignment 1 with a range of 0-100.
- Quiz 1 with a range of 0-10.
- No grades yet, just the structure in place.
Using Scales Instead of Points
If you prefer a scale-based grading system (e.g., Competent/Not Yet Competent), you can set up scales in Moodle. For example, when creating Assignment 2, you could use the Default Competence Scale, where students either:
- Receive a 2 for being Competent.
- Get a 1 for Not Yet Competent.
- Or get a 0 if no response is given.
Now, when you look at the Gradebook:
- Assignment 1 will be graded from 0-100.
- Quiz 1 will be graded from 0-10.
- Assignment 2 will show the scale-based values.
What Does the Gradebook Look Like for a Teacher?
After adding activities and students, you’ll want to see how the Gradebook works when it’s populated with real grades. Here’s a quick overview:
- Teacher’s View: As a teacher, you can go to Grades to view the Grader Report. This shows all students’ grades in a tabular format, with columns for each assignment, quiz, and total score.
- You can also use Grade Overrides to manually edit grades directly in the Gradebook, assuming your Moodle settings allow that.
What Does Gradebook Look Like for Students?
When students log in, they can view their grades in two key formats:
- Overview Report – This provides a broad view of all courses.
- User Report – This shows detailed grades for their specific course.
Students can see:
- Assignment and Quiz scores (e.g., 100/100, 8/10).
- Competency levels if scales are used.
- Total percentage or grade.
Customizing the Gradebook
- Reordering Items: You might want to reorder assignments and quizzes for a clearer presentation. To do this:
- Go to Gradebook Setup.
- Use the arrows to drag and drop activities into your preferred order.
- Using Weightings: Weightings let you assign specific percentages to each activity. For example:
- You might set Quiz 1 to 10% of the final grade.
- Set Assignment 1 to 60%.
- Set Assignment 2 (Competence scale) to 30%.
Moodle will automatically adjust the totals to reflect these weightings.
- Grade Display Options: You can change how grades are displayed to students (e.g., percentage, letter grade). To do this:
- Go to the Gradebook Settings.
- Select Grade Display Type and choose your preferred format (e.g., percentage with letter grade in brackets).
- Hiding Columns: Sometimes, not all columns are necessary for students to see. For example, you may want to hide the weighting or feedback columns. This can be done under Course Grade Settings.
Wrapping Up
Moodle’s Gradebook is an incredibly powerful tool that allows teachers to customize how they track and report student grades. By adding activities like assignments and quizzes, using weightings, and adjusting grade views, you can create a gradebook that’s both informative and easy for students to navigate.
Remember, you can always fine-tune how students see their grades and offer a more meaningful experience by adjusting the settings to fit your course’s needs. So, whether you’re just starting with Moodle or looking to improve your current Gradebook setup, there’s a lot you can do to make grading simpler and more transparent for both you and your students.
Make sure to stay tuned for the next video in this series, where we’ll dive into Course Completion and how to track whether students have completed all necessary activities in your course!
