Graded Discussion Assignments

Graded discussions allow teachers to create discussion-based assignments where students respond to a prompt and interact with peers. These assignments support participation, critical thinking, and collaboration while contributing to a student’s grade.

For example, an English teacher might use a graded discussion to encourage students to analyze and respond to a shared reading.

Create a Graded Discussion

In Faculty, you can create a discussion from:

• My Day, Assignment Center

• Classes, Assignments

• Calendar

Tip: You can copy or import graded discussions to reuse them.

To create a discussion:

1. In list view of the Assignment Center or class Assignments tab, select + Add, then Discussion.

   From calendar view, select +Discussion.

2. Complete the available sections:

   • Details

   • Evaluation

   • Attachments and links

   • Publishing options

3. Select Save or Save and add another.

Enter Discussion Details

The Title and Discussion prompt fields are required. All other settings are optional.

Available options include:

Show across all published sections: Make the discussion available to one class or all published sections.

Show comments to students: Choose when students can view comments (after posting or at any time).

Allow students to add attachments: Enable or disable file attachments.

Assignment type: Associate the discussion with an assignment type.

Set Evaluation Options

• Under Evaluation, configure grading settings:

• Enter Max points (based on the assignment total).

• Enter a factor, if applicable.

• Select grading options:

  • Add to gradebook

  • Add to cumulative grade

  • Publish grade

• Select Extra credit to exclude the discussion from standard grade calculations Grade Calculations use students' grades to generate Grade Point Averages, academic performance awards, and class rankings.

Add Attachments and Links

Under Attachments and links, you can include:

• Links

• Downloads

• Embedded content

Enter a URL or HTML embed code in the provided fields.

Set Publishing Options

When and where the discussion will be available:

1. Select the sections to publish to.

2. Enter an Assigned date and time.

3. Enter a Due date and time.

Note: Use the Publish dropdown to control when students can access the discussion. If set to Now, the discussion becomes available immediately after you save it.

When finished, select Save or Save & Add Another to save your discussion.

Student participation

Students access the discussion by selecting the discussion title. They can:

• Add a new response to the prompt

• Reply to other students

• Embed links in responses

• Attach up to three files (if enabled)

Once a student submits an initial response, the discussion is marked as complete, but they can continue participating until the due date.

Work with and Grade Graded Discussions

Graded discussions allow students to respond to a prompt and engage with peers while earning a grade. As a teacher, you can review the full discussion, evaluate individual student participation, provide feedback, and manage responses.

Open a graded discussion

You can access a graded discussion from:

• Assignment Center, select the discussion title.

• Classes, Assignments, then select the discussion.

• The course topic where the discussion is published.

This opens Discussion detail, where you can review and evaluate participation.

View the Discussion

When you open a graded discussion, you land on the Full discussion view.

From here, you can:

• Review all student responses.

• Reply to any student post.

• Add your own response to the prompt.

Respond to the Discussion

• Select Respond to prompt to add your own response.

• Select Add response under a student post to reply directly.

Manage Student Responses

From the Full discussion view, you can moderate responses as needed:

1. Select the pencil icon next to a student response

2. Choose one of the following:

   • Hide response

   • Delete response

• Hidden responses are not visible to students, but you can still view them.

• If a response has follow-up replies, those replies are also hidden.

Grade an Individual Student

To grade a student’s participation, switch from the full discussion to the student view:

1. Select a student’s name from the roster

2. Review their participation, including:

   • Their original response and replies.

   • Their replies to other students.

3. Select Add response to reply directly to the student’s post.

4. Select Add comment to leave private feedback.

5. Enter the student’s score in the Points field.

Best practices for grading discussions

• Review both original posts and replies to evaluate participation fully.

• Provide clear feedback to guide student engagement.

• Use moderation tools to maintain appropriate discussion content.

• Grade consistently based on your discussion criteria or rubric.

Delete a discussion

Deleting a discussion will delete the prompt, responses, and grades recorded for the discussion assignment.

To delete a discussion:

1. In Faculty,

   Select  My Day, Assignment Center.

   OR

   Select Classes, choose a class, then select Assignments.

2. In list view, select the context menu next to the discussion, Delete.

3. Select the sections to delete the assessment from.

4. Select Yes, delete for the selected sections to complete the deletion.