1

Welcome

Grade software workshop

November 21, 2003

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Features of the software

• Print out individual reports for students

• Create grade distribution charts and stats for each test and for the overall grade

• Easily add and drop students from your records

• Test policies supported– Drop lowest– Replace lowest with final

exam score– Include all tests

• Quizzes– Drop lowest n quizzes

• Homework/projects– Drop lowest n

assignments

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Policy sheet: Test Policy

Even if your policy is to drop or replace the lowest test score, all test scores will be included in mid-semester grade calculation unless box is checked.

Note: For mid-semester reports, all test scores count unless box is checked.

Enter the total number of tests NOT including final exam: 4

Every test counts

Replace lowest test score with final exam score. Tests must be equally weighted.

Drop lowest test score, other than final. Tests must be equally weighted.

Test Policy

For mid-semester report, drop up to one test score of zero

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This number of quizzes will be dropped for progress reports and final grade calculation. You may want to start at 0 and increase this number as the semester progresses.

Drop the lowest 2 quizzes

Quiz policy

For mid-semester reports, only drop quizzes with score 0 (recommended)

Policy sheet: Quiz and Assignments Policies

Or, you may wish to only drop missed quizzes for the mid-semester report, especially early in the semester when there have only been 3 quizzes total. In that case, check the box.

There is an identical box for Assignment policy

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Policy sheet: Grade cutoffs

The numbers entered here will be used for all grade calculations

Enter the minimum score needed, as a percentage, to earn a grade of:

grade %

A 90

B 80

C 70

D 60

Grade cutoffs

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Policy sheet: Weighting scheme

Select "equally weighted" or else define your own scheme.

1 Test 1 100

2 Test 2 100

3 Test 3 100

4 Test 4 100

5 n/a

6 n/a

Final 100

Enter weights for tests 1 through 4 and Final

All tests count equally, including final

Define your own weighting scheme

Test weighting

50 points total

Quizzes are worth 50 points total

Note: if you have selected "All tests count equally", then each test is 100 points.

Assignments and quizzes combined are the equivalent of one test

Assignments are worth

Quizzes and homeworks weighting

For policies "Drop lowest test score" and "Replace lowest test score with final exam score" the tests must be equally weighted.

It is not necessary for the final to be weighted equally to the tests.

In the test policy, we entered 4 for the number of tests. That will override any information entered here.

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The Student summary

• Summary sheet in the Grade Template.xls workbook

• Not everything visible on the screen shows up on the printed report. You may view a summary by using the Print Preview button

• The summary report has 5 main sections:– Current grade

– Average grade needed

– Quizzes

– Assignments

– CommentsWe will discuss each section in

the next few slides.

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Student summary: The Current grade section

Current grade

score total

test 1 78 100test 2 52 100test 3 52 100test 4 N/A 0

Final exam N/A 0

Assignments 21 50Quizzes 40 50

Grade so far (%) 61 D

Grade so far is a weighted average of the components listed. There is an option to exclude missed tests for this calculation, but it does not drop the lowest test score for mid-semester reports.

Tests that have not yet been taken

Up to 6 tests, as indicated on policy sheet, show up here.

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Student summary: Average grade needed calculation

Average grade needed on remaining tests:

For a grade of: A B C DYou need an average of: - 96 76 56

This is the section where the test policy comes into play. If the lowest test score is dropped or replaced by the final exam score, that is reflected in this calculation.

The calculation assumes homework and quiz scores stay the same.

These numbers should be interpreted as percentage scores.

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Student Summary: Quizzes and Assigments

The first 16 quizzes will be listed. All information is taken from Quizzes sheet.

Up to 40 quizzes may be recorded.

Score uses quiz policy (drop lowest n or up to n missed)

In this example, all assignments count and the lowest quiz score is dropped.

The first 35 assignments will be listed. All information is taken from Assignments sheet.

Up to 65 assignments may be recorded.

Score uses homework policy (drop lowest n or up to n missed)

Assignments

# Description due datepoints

possible score

Total 40 151 1.1, 1.4 - 1.7 3-Sep 10 82 1.8, 1.3 10-Sep 10 03 1.2, 3.5, 1.3, &wks 17-Sep 10 04 2.1, 2.2, 3.2, 2.6 24-Sep 10 7

Quizzes

points

# Description date possible scoreTotal 30 21

1 1.6, 1.7 5-Sep 10 82 1.3 12-Sep 10 63 1.2 19-Sep 10 74 2.6 26-Sep 10 3

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Student summary: The Comments section

Comments are generated according to your test and quiz policy.

These help you keep track of what settings you used at the time you created the report. They also help explain the calculations to the students.

Comments:

GeneralThe "Average grade needed…" section assumes homework and quiz scores will not change.

Quizzes and AssignmentsThe lowest quiz score has been dropped to calculate your grade.All assignment scores are included in your grade calculation.

TestsThe "Current Grade" section counts every test score, except for up to one missed test, to calculate your grade.The "Average grade needed..." section allows for the lowest test score to be replaced by the final exam score.

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Student summary: The controls

Select a student's name from this list box to view his or her summary

Print reports easily using one of these buttons

I recommend viewing summaries for several students on-screen before printing for entire class, just to make sure they look right.

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Tour of the remaining sheets

• We will visit the following sheets:

– Attendance

– Assignments

– Quizzes

– Tests

– Stats

• The sheets listed below are only used for calculations and you never need to look at them:

– Students

– Calcs

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Tour: The Attendance sheet

The absences column counts the blank spaces in each row.

Mon Wed Mon Wed Mon Wed Mon WedLast name First name absences 15-Jan 17-Jan 22-Jan 24-Jan 29-Jan 31-Jan 5-Feb 7-Feb

1 Dennison Matt 2 x x x x - -

2 Doherty Shannen 0 x x x x x x - -

3 Ganson Chris 4 x x - -

4 Gonzales Maria 4 x x - -

5 Gray Matt 0 x x x x x x - -

6 Grayson Harvey 1 x x x x x - -

7 Harper Gary 3 x x x - -

8 Johnson Edmund 0 x x x x x x - -

9 Perrin Lee 2 x x x x - -

10 Rodriguez Jonathan 1 x x x x x - -

11 Roosevelt Jeff 2 x x x x - -

12 0 - - - - - - - -

13 0 - - - - - - - -

week 1 week 2 week 3 week 4

Include number of absenses on student summaryPolicy sheet:

Add Students Delete Students

Reinstate Drop Students

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Tour: The Assignments and Quizzes sheets

points possible: 40 10 10 10 10

description: pret

est

1.1

- 1.

3

2.1,

2.4

1.4,

1.5

, 2.5

Last name First name Total 15-Jan 22-Jan 29-Jan 5-Feb 12-Feb 19-Feb 26-Feb1 Dennison Matt 30 10 10 102 Doherty Shannon 34 5 10 10 93 Ganson Chris 30 10 10 104 Gonzales Maria 5 5 x5 Gray Matt 30 10 10 106 Grayson Harvey 30 10 10 107 Harper Gary 26 9 9 88 Johnson Edmund 17 7 109 Perrin Lee 24 8 10 6

10 Rodriguez Jonathan 35 10 10 9 611 Roosevelt Jeff 4 412 013 0

IMPORTANT: Fill these in when you enter scores for an assignment. This is how the program knows there was an assignment that week.

The description entered here will show up on the student summary

A non-numeric character means the student is excused from that assignment. Student's grade will be calculated as though the assignment did not exist

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Tour: The Tests sheet

You must click on this button to update the information below.

points possible: 100 100 100 0 0 0 0 50 50

Last name First name Test 1 Test 2 Test 3 Test 4 Test 5 Test 6 Final HW Quizzes1 Dennison Matt 66 52 54 38 25 59 F2 Doherty Shannon 80 81 73 43 40 79 C3 Ganson Chris 80 68 63 38 45 73 C4 Gonzales Maria 66 77 8 45 65 D5 Gray Matt 85 92 98 38 50 91 A6 Grayson Harvey 67 75 75 38 35 72 C7 Harper Gary 101 94 71 33 45 86 B8 Johnson Edmund 78 52 52 21 40 64 D9 Perrin Lee 83 62 30 45 73 C

10 Rodriguez Jonathan 91 85 99 44 43 90 A11 Roosevelt Jeff 67 75 75 5 45 67 D12

Grade

Calculate grades

IMPORTANT: Fill in the "points possible" when you enter scores for an assignment. This is how the program knows the test has been taken. (This number does not need to match the weight.)

This is the same information that is on the Summary sheet.

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Tour: The Stats sheet

Mean score

total: 11

59 F A 18% mean 7479 C B 9%73 C C 36%65 D D 27%91 A F 9%72 C86 B64 D73 C90 A67 D

0000000000000

Overall

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

A B C D F

A grade distribution can be viewed for each test and for the overall grades.

IMPORTANT: Click on the "Calculate grades" button to update this information before viewing this summary

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Some basics

• All blue cells are intended to be filled in by you.

• White cells are not. You may, in some cases, overwrite white cells. In most cases it is not advised.

• The best way to add and remove students is by using the buttons.

• The dates are set to a default (weekly, semi-weekly) from the start date selected by you. These can be over-written.

• Each name must have the same spelling on each sheet. The names must also be in the same order on all sheets. The Summary sheet will give a warning if they are not.

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Some precautions

• Do not cut and paste text.

Instead, you may copy and paste, then delete the original.

• Do not assume a cell that appears blank has no contents.

Always check contents before writing (not necessary for blue cells)

• Do not rename worksheets

The macros refer to the worksheets by name and will not work if you change it.

• Do not delete a student from one page without deleting him or her from the system.

Best way is using “Delete Students” or “Drop Students button.

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Thank you for attending the workshop.

• Please direct any of the following to me– questions

– comments

– suggestions

– suspected bugs

• Also, make sure I put you on my mailing group if you are using the software. That way I can inform you of:

– significant improvements

– found (and hopefully fixed) bugs

Christy Downs cdowns@austincc.edu (512)223-6124

http://www.austincc.edu/cdowns