Buzz: Product Feedback

Hey Laurie-Ann, I would suggest having your authorized support contact submit a ticket regarding the bugs that you discovered. We will need some additional details to help us fully diagnose the issue.

I agree with the aesthetics and usability issues mentioned above. The new gradebook has a lot of white space and viewing columns is difficult without grid lines or alternating colors. I tried to customize the width of the columns, but the next time I open the gradebook, they've all been reset back to the original size!!! That is frustrating. This seems like pretty basic spreadsheet stuff -- reset the width of columns and have a function to evenly space them out.

Furthermore, I spent time yesterday editing the visible columns, headers, etc. just to come back in this morning and find that all my settings were reverted back the way they were. PLEASE fix this! I was sitting next to three other teachers yesterday as we were grading and they were all hating the look and functionality of this new update. 

I agree that the "updated" gradebook is definitely a big step backwards on usability.  I would ask that you go back to the format of the previous gradebook with alternating colors, less white space, more items fitting on a page, as well as the ability to choose columns like start date or percentage completed that can stay un-moved with the student name when you scroll to the right and look at assignments.   Honestly, the current version makes my work day longer, harder, and more confusing; whereas before it was really a very efficient and usable product.   I would plead for you to return the old layout as soon as possible.  This is not just a complaint because I don't like the way it looks or because it is different;  My complaint is that it is much harder to use as a teacher and slows down my efficiency.     I would also like to add that the only change I really needed on the previous gradebook was an easy way to give "retries" in quick edit.  That would be a very much appreciated upgrade!    Thanks for all you do, and please consider making a change on this current gradebook.  Not every teacher at our school is writing to you in this Discussion, but I can assure you that they are all chatting with each other about how much they dislike the new gradebook.  The consensus is overwhelming!!

YES, I also agree that the new gradebook is a big step backwards, and I also ask that you go back to the format of the previous gradebook with alternating colors and less white space. The current version is confusing, whereas before it was efficient and usable. PLEASE consider going back to the old gradebook formatting! Thank you!

PLEASE return to the previous gradebook design which was so much easier to navigate with the alternating colors. The enormous amount of white space currently is not helpful visually. As teachers our time is very limited so the details are extremely important to us. Thank you for your consideration. 

The new grade book is simply not as functional as the previous version. On my Chromebook I do not have access to a side scroll bar which makes it impossible to see more than a couple assignments without clicking on an individual student. Please, please go back to the previous version of the grade book. 

I know that I'm also not alone in wishing there was a way to give retries and excuse assignments from the 'quick edit' view of the grade book. It would save so much time and hassle for teachers! But again, with the current grade book 'quick edit' is pretty much useless for me and many others because I can't scroll sideways to view any assignments. 

We really appreciate your continued input and feedback regarding Buzz. Today, we made several improvements to the new Gradebook that I hope are welcomed additions. Please continue to voice your concerns and suggestions for making this a better learning and teaching platform.

Some of today's enhancements include:

• Updated the screen to save changes made to column sizes and placements.
• Returned column grid lines.
• Updated column headers to show underline style to linked activities on rollover.
• Updated column headers titles to wrap text.

We will continue to improve the Gradebook over time but hope these are some welcome additions.

Thank you!  These are very welcome changes.  It does help to be able to change the column width to narrower.  And the grid lines are good!

I still really miss the alternating colored horizontal rows.  When you work everyday with these gradebooks, it is amazing how something small like that can make it a lot easier to track information.  I would love to have that back!

I also would really like to have a way to give retries from the quick edit. Or, at least, I would like to be able to enter a zero and a retry at the same time in the regular gradebook. Right now, I have to click into an assignment square and open the assignment. I give it a zero.  Then I have to save that zero and click back into the assignment a second time and push "retry".  As you can see, that is a lot of clicks to just give a zero with a retry!!!   I would love to either have a quick edit function OR be able to go into the assignment once and click a zero and retry at the same time!!  That would take half the time.   :)  :)

My life now:  Imagine me going through numbers of students and giving zeros and retries to maybe 50 assignments at a time --think of how long that takes when I have to go into the assignment TWICE to do EACH ONE!   lol!    Help would be appreciated!

Brad, Here is an example of the problem I mentioned above, with having to enter a zero and then go back in to do a retry from the gradebook.  (It does not do this when I grade an assignment from the Grading To Do List, only from the Gradebook.)

Notice how when I enter a grade, the "Allow Retry" button is grayed out and not usable.   I have to enter the grade and then go back into the assignment AGAIN to enter the retry.  It takes double the time.

If you could make the "Retry" button usable on the first insertion of a grade from the gradebook that would be AWESOME!

Thanks so much for responding to the other feedback on this thread.  Let me add my voice in agreement that the former gradebook view was much easier to use, especially alternating colors for rows  It's difficult to track back without some better visual cues than are existing in the updated grade book.  The glaring issue I see with the new format is the unnecessary swathes of white space around assignment titles,and well, everything:  Student Names, Assignment Names, Grades; it's not helpful.  It decreases the amount of information I can see on my screen at one time.  This is a solid example of "less is more."  Thank you for working to fix this and return us to the level of functionality and accessibility we enjoyed in the former design.

It would also be very helpful to once again have the option to lock the first columns in place while scrolling. 

Hey Laurie-Ann, you can drag the columns to be pinned if you want them to stay permanently visible.

That was really helpful, Brad. Glad that those rows can be fixed.  Thanks!

Brad, I am checking to see if you found out anything about the gradebook issue where I cannot put in a grade and choose the retry button at the same instance from the gradebook?   I had posted images of the problem above.   If this could be fixed it would save me so much time.    This morning I was zeroing out a student's unfinished assignments and giving her a retry as well, and I had to go into each assignment 2 times to get it done. :)

@Wendy:

After testing your reported behavior, this is expected behavior. When a student has made no submission, the teacher gradebook activity grader will not allow a teacher to pass a score and a retry at the same time since they are two separate processes. The reason why it works in the to-do list is because the student has made a submission. The intended function of the retry button is that it will be available after the student submits or after a teacher submits a score to a student. To be able to pass a score and a retry at the same time when a student has not submitted an activity will require an enhancement to the system. 

Brian, 

Thank you for looking into the retry function.  We are aware that it is expected behavior.  I think the point that Wendy is bringing up is that it would be a great addition to the functionality of the gradebook, and it would be a very beneficial time-saving feature.  We are frequently faced with having to give students zeroes so they see the consequences of not submitting.  The retry also has to be placed because we are mastery-based and we want our student to have the opportunity to retry the assignments.  If we could perform both operations at the same time, it would be very helpful.

Yes, Thank you, Brian.  Laurie-Ann stated it perfectly above!  Yes, I understand that this is normal function for the Gradebook at the present time, but it would be a wonderful change to be able to give a score or a zero and a retry at the same time.  It would cut in half the amount of time spent on entering the needed info into gradebook.  If it was an easy fix, it would be much appreciated to have that functionality on the Gradebook just as we do in the To Do Grading list.

Thanks for bringing this up to your team.  You would have many happy teachers here at our school if you made this update to the Gradebook.  :)  :)  :)   

Hey Wendy, I believe that latest report is a bug. I have asked our team to look into it.

Now that a new school year has started and I've started using the new grade book I have to agree with everyone above that there is way too much wasted screen real estate. On my 15" laptop at its native resolution (1366x768) with a full-screen window (which I prefer not to use) I can only see 7 student rows. Making the columns as narrow as possible while still being able to read the titles I can only see 6 assignments. That results in a lot of scrolling. It also makes it difficult to see grade trends at a glance, such as the number of incomplete assignments (black zeros/paper icons) or failing (red) scores on a particular activity. I know there are other screens that show that information, but it takes several clicks to get there. Then multiply that by the number of assignments. It quickly becomes onerous.

Many teachers in my building have expressed this same concern to me.

I hate to keep bringing this up, but as my student work load increases I am really struggling with this new gradebook that:

1.  Does not work correctly on the quick grade function.  Instead of staying in Quick Grade, it is going into the assignment and then the whole screen jumps to a new location and reloads.  It used to just stay put while I entered quick grades.

2.  When I sort students by percentage completed and then want to zero out skipped assignments, the screen jumps to a new place every time I enter a grade.  This is TAKING ME SO LONG TO ZERO OUT ASSIGNMENTS NOW, whereas it used to be easy when the gradebook stayed sorted and filtered.  Brian, you have said that IT is working on this glitch, and I just want to say that this glitch is a real time sucker and I will be so happy when they can fix it.  :)

Great thread - this is helpful. It is great news that we can freeze overall grade alongside the student's name. Is there a way to do this for all courses at once?

I agree there is too much space wasted vertically with such thick rows.  Perhaps a 'compact display density' similar to what Gmail provides would help.

And trying to save space with horizontally adjusting the width of each column individually takes time and you end up losing some of the assignment names well before the available space is utilized. Perhaps writing the assignment titles at an angle would help like in the screenshot below. 

The issue of poor use of space in the gradebook seems to be exaggerated in the MOS student view. You can see in the demo screenshot below. 

The columns are also not adjustable here.

Thank you.

Brad,

One of my teachers is saying that the size settings are not sticking again. Are you all seeing that too?

She writes:

This year the columns in my Buzz gradebook are huge.  I know how to make them smaller but how do I save the setting?  I have squished the columns more than once and a few days later they are back to the original size – am I missing a save button somewhere?  Could it be a setting on my new laptop?

Thanks,

Jeremy

In today's update, we have made several enhancements to the gradebook. Specifically:

• The rows have an alternating color.
• The columns resize based upon their content. For example, if you are only displaying points or a percentage, the column will be much smaller.
• The retry button can now be used on the first time you are grading an activity.

Thanks for enhancements to the gradebook. I have two additional suggestions for consideration:

1) When I am in a larger class where the gradebook has a right scroll bar, I can always grade or get detail on previous grades/comments for a student and then will be taken back to my current place in the gradebook. That is fantastic, especially when I'm reviewing the performance of a single student. This works perfectly - except when I happen to be looking at the last few students on the page. When I close the grade detail for those bottom-of-the-gradebook students, it takes me a few lines up in the gradebook. I then have to touch-pad navigate over to the right scroll bar and pull down to see the student. Much easier when I'm using a mouse w/ scroll wheel but more difficult when I'm on my laptop with no mouse available. If closing the grade detail would always take me back to see the student line I was reviewing, that would be great!

2) I like the feature where clicking on the student submission will open their google drive assignment attachment in a new tab. Would it be possible to have that same functionality for the Activity link which appears at the top of the grading page? If the assignment instructions would also open in a new tab, that would make it much easier to grade with the instructions in one tab and the grading page/ feedback screen open in a second tab. I know I can use the browser "Duplicate Tab", but one less click would be nice!

Thanks,

Annette