How to Create Exam Sections in Gradebook

Exam Sections

An Exam can have multiple sections that must be averaged together in some way to produce the total Exam grade.  

An Exam must - of course - have at least one section.  It can have as many sections as you need.
 

Exam Sections are created on the Gradebook>Gradebook>Exams>Setup screen.
  

Click the "Setup" tab under "Exams" to reach this screen:

Adding Sections to an Exam

To add a section, click the "Add New Section" link on the left side of the Exam's area on this screen.

This pops open the "Add Section" dialog box:

All fields are required.  Enter the following:

• A name for the Exam section.  E.g. Multiple Choice
• The "Max Possible Score" for the section - the number of points the sections the student can earn.  E.g. 100  or 250, etc.
• The "Grading Type" or how the section will be graded.  There are only two choices:  Numeric and Alpha.
• The Percentage of Exam this section is worth.  If there is only 1 section, it must be worth 100%.  If you are going to have multiple sections BUT are averaging them together in some other way (E.g. Total Points, or a simple score average), this value will not be important.
• The Sequence number for this section.  This has NO effect on grading:  it simply orders the Exam section in the list of sections.  Use numbers like 10, 20, 30...
• Click OK to create the Exam section:

Continue to create Exam sections until you have all the sections you need:

Note that you can edit the Section Name, Max Possible Score, Grading Type and Percentage of Exam at any time.  

However, if you do this after Exam grades have been reported to the Grading Module, your Gradebook will be out of sync with what was reported.

A change here does not automatically update an Exam grade after it has been reported.

If you are producing the total Exam grade by weighted sections, the percentages MUST add up to 100% or the total Exam grade will not be correct.

Determining How to Average Sections Together to Produce the Total Exam Grade

The control on the left side of the Exam setup specifies how the Exam sections will be combined to produce the total Exam grade.  

There are three options:

• Option 1:  Earned Points/Attempted Points - This is the "total points" technique.   The Maximum points for each section are summed, the students scores are summed and the total "Earned Points" are divided by the total "Attempted Points", producing the Exam average.
• Option 2:  Exam Section Weighting Percentages - This is the "weighted sections" technique. The student's scores for each section are combined using the percentages each section is worth.
• Option 3: Earned Points / Total Exam Sections - This is the "simple score average" technique.  The student's scores for the sections are summed up and divided by the number of sections.  If there are 3 Exam sections, as in the example above, then the sum of the student's scores is divided by 3.  If there were 4 Exam sections, the sum of the student's scores would be divided by 4.

If there is only 1 Exam section, the option you select does not matter.

To select an option, select it in the drop down and then click the  floppy disk Save icon.

When you have completed creating your Exam sections, each Section will appear as a separate column on the Exam's "Exam" screen: