October 2024 technology updates

SpeedGrader: Enhanced Commenting Features

Canvas has introduced new Rich Content Editor (RCE) features in SpeedGrader, enhancing feedback opportunities. Now, when commenting, you can use the following RCE tools:

• Headings
• Bold
• Italic
• Underline
• Font color
• Insert Hyperlink
• Bullets

Additionally, comment drafts can also be edited via the RCE, ensuring clear and comprehensive feedback. Both instructors and students can view these formatted comments wherever they access comments.

Why this matters

These new features allow for more detailed and visually organised feedback in SpeedGrader. By highlighting key points, structuring information clearly, and linking to external resources, feedback becomes more actionable and easier for students to understand and implement.

Read the Canvas release notes.

Introducing the AI Chat Assistant

Feedback Fruits has launched a new AI Chat Assistant, designed to answer user questions efficiently while providing a clear pathway to speak with a human agent if needed.

New Chat Flow:

The chat service now includes a triaging flow to help you get the right support quickly. From the new chat landing page, you can choose from three options:

• I have a question
• I found a bug
• I want to request a new feature

How it works

• Triaging Flow: Click on one of the three options to start.
• AI Chat Assistant: Available in the “I have a question” flow, it will always offer the option to talk to a person after providing an answer.
• Learning and Improvement: The AI Chat Assistant learns from public resources and past conversation solutions, ensuring it provides accurate and helpful responses.

Group contribution grading update: Customisable grade adjustment rules

Major update to the Group Contribution Grading feature in Group Member Evaluation, as you can now customise grade adjustment rules based on students’ Group Contribution Factor or Group Skill Factor, offering more flexibility and control.

Key benefits

• More control and flexibility: You can now choose to multiply grades by a factor, add or subtract points, or opt not to adjust grades at all. This ensures grading rules are fair and tailored to specific needs.
• Time-saving: Previously, custom grade adjustments had to be done manually through analytics export. Now, these adjustments can be made directly within the tool, saving time and reducing administrative workload.

How to use

• Configure directly: Set up grade adjustment rules directly in the Group Member Evaluation tool.
• Existing assignments: Suggested grade adjustments in existing assignments with Group Contribution Grading enabled will remain unchanged.

Additionally, key terms like “Group Skill Factor” and “Group Contribution Factor” now have simplified explanations, making it easier to understand how these factors are calculated.

Visit the FeedbackFruits release notes.

Marking 2.0 navigation and workspace refresh

Inspera has restructured its workspaces to better align with common grading workflows, making the process more intuitive and efficient. Here are the key improvements:

• Organised Workspaces: The workspaces are now connected to reflect different evaluation perspectives, improving usability.
  • Menu Structure and Breadcrumbs: These aids enhance orientation and context awareness.
  • Connected Workspaces: The ‘Grading overview’, ‘Candidate in focus’, ‘Marking’, and ‘Questions’ workspaces are now linked with context-specific hyperlinks for easier navigation.
• Shortcut Cards: Introduced in the ‘Grading overview’ (formerly ‘Overview’) to guide user actions.
• ‘Candidate in Focus’ Workspace: This new workspace replaces the ‘Results’ workspace, improving usability and providing a clearer use case for evaluating a candidate’s performance.