The Gradebook in Moodle can help you organize and manage information about the students in your course. For example:
- Students can view their own grades in individualized reports that protect student privacy.
- You control which grades are visible to students, and when.
- Course members with Teaching-Assistant (Non-editing Teacher) level access are considered graders and can enter scores.
- When grades are awarded from within a Moodle activity, scores are automatically added to the gradebook.
- Scores can also be manually added or edited (Overridden) in the gradebook.
- Grades can be sorted and displayed according to groups (set up in Moodle)
- Scores in the gradebook can be imported and exported. You can upload data from other sources or download scores to calculate grades in external software tools (such as Excel).
- Moodle records a history of changes made in the gradebook allowing you to audit who made changes and when.
How Grading Works in Moodle
In order for Moodle to easily aggregate scores automatically, entries in the gradebook are numeric by default. (Letter grades can be displayed based on percentage using a grading scale you set up). The default score for each activity is 100. You can then control the weights of individual activities, or categories of activities, to aggregate a final score for the class.
If you go along with Moodle’s methods, grading can be very easy. If you prefer to follow your own methods for grading, it is possible, but may require extra steps and workarounds.
Alternate Grading Methods and Feedback
Some activities (Moodle Assignments) allow you to use a rubric or grading form to calculate a score.
If you prefer to grade only with letters and do not wish to enter numeric scores, manually-added grade items (but not Moodle activities such as Quizzes or Assignments) can be set to allow you to type or import actual letters. Note that if you use this method, no numeric scores are involved and Moodle cannot aggregate a final grade for the course.
For most Moodle activities, you can provide feedback using a (verbal) Scale such as “unsatisfactory”, “satisfactory”, and “outstanding”. Note that there is a number behind each Custom scale value, so you will need to plan for how those values aggregate in the final grade for a course.
You can add written feedback for students to see next to their grade. For some activities (such as Assignments, Quizzes, and Workshops) there is a field for providing written feedback when grading from within the activity. You can also enter feedback for grade items in the gradebook.
Gradebook Support Articles
Set Up Your Gradebook
See Configure the Gradebook in Moodle for a detailed introduction of ways to set up your gradebook and descriptions of major gradebook functions.
Support Center articles regarding how to set up your gradebook are listed below:
- Configure the Gradebook to Calculate Grades
- Additional Gradebook Options & Grading Methods
Enter, Import, & Export Grades
See Record Grades in Moodle for a detailed overview of different strategies for entering grades either through assignments, manually editing the gradebook, or for uploading grading spreadsheets.
Support Center articles regarding how to enter grades are listed below:
- Grade Moodle Activities
- Manually Edit Grades in the Gradebook
- Review Grades