Recording Assignments

Enter your Class file's assignment information in this window.

NOTES: 

(1) It is a good idea to avoid entering assignments in advance, i.e., before you are ready to give students scores for those assignments, because this can falsely lower your students' grades, since all blank scores start out as incomplete. 

(2) Grade Machine interprets an incomplete as 0%. 

(3) However, if you do enter assignments in advance, you may want to read about the three different methods of doing so in the Avoid Penalties for Missing Scores topic.

(4) If your Class file has more than one grading period, then you'll notice that a thick horizontal line in the Assignments Window separates the assignments belonging to different grading periods.

Entering/Editing Information in Grade Machine

1) In Normal mode, you can use the arrow keys, as well as the mouse or the Tab key, to move between cells. 
2) To replace the contents of the active cell, simply move to that cell and begin typing.
3) You can double-click on any cell or press [F2] to enter Edit mode, which allows you to use the mouse or the keyboard, e.g., the Delete key, the Backspace key, etc., to edit part of a cell's contents. 
4) To get back to Normal mode, press [Esc] or [Tab], or click on another cell with your mouse.

Selecting Assignment Rows

1) In the Assignments Window, you can select individual assignment rows. 
2) Assignment rows must be selected before you can use the Cut, Copy, or Paste commands. 
3) Selecting specific assignment rows is also a useful way of choosing which students you want included in reports.

Adding Assignments to a Class

1) You can add assignments at any time by pasting from another class, or 
2) by choosing Insert Row from the Edit menu and typing in information for the newly created assignment. 
3) These operations carry along all scores associated with those assignments. 
4) Using Copy From you can copy assignments without scores.
5) To add a new assignment to the end of the list, move to the blank row at the bottom of an assignment list, enter the assignment's name and other information and press [Enter].

Here is information about the various parts of this window:
# (Row Number) Column

You can single click in this column to select an entire assignment row.

Description Column

This column contains the assignment's name which may appear on reports and that will appear in the header of the appropriate column in the Scores window..

Points Column

1) The maximum number of points possible for an assignment, barring extra credit. 
2) For each assignment, you must enter a value in the Points column that represents the total number of raw-score points possible for that assignment. 
3) An Extra Credit assignment may have 0 point possible. 

Weight & Adjust Columns

1) If you wish, you can assign a weight to each individual assignment. 
2) This weight is not a percentage, it merely changes the importance of an assignment in relation to other assignments. 
3) You can also change the relative importance of the assignments by setting up Category weighting .
4) The number that appears in the Adjust column for an assignment is equal to what appears in the Points column multiplied by the number in the Weight column. So if an assignment is worth 100 points and has a weight of 2.0, the number 200 will appear in the Adjust column.
5) When Grade Machine calculates grades, it will adjust both the points possible and the students' scores by multiplying them by the weight. So, in the previous example, you would enter a number between 0 and 100 in the Scores window. The number appearing there will be multiplied by the number entered in the Weight column in this window, i.e., the Assignments window.
6) For more information on assignment weights and adjusted points, see the Weights and Adjusted Points Help topic. 

Category Column

1) You can create up to 10 weighted Categories, e.g., Tests, Homework, Labs, in each Grading Period. 
2) Grade Machine will initially assign all new assignments to the first category. 
3) If you use more than one category, you must designate the proper category for each assignment. 
4) You do this by typing the category name in the Category column. 
5) You can also use the Category list box to select the category. Just click your right mouse button in the Category field, or press [F8]. 

Misc Column

1) The Misc column can contain any information that relates to this assignment up to 50 characters in length. 
2) Possible uses include keeping track of assignment dates or page numbers, and notes about the assignment. 
3) You can change the title of the miscellaneous column by using Assignment Data from the Style menu.

ID Column

1) The ID column can store Assignment ID numbers. 
2) These numbers are useful for importing from and exporting to certain School administrative packages, 
3) and when importing Discrete Scores.

NOTE: If your Class file has more than one grading period, then you'll notice that a thick horizontal line in the Assignments Window separates the assignments belonging to different grading periods.

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