Group Assignments

Overview


Group assignments in Canvas not only help organize students, but make it easier to grade group work. Creating group assignments are most useful for when instructors are wanting to grade student groups altogether though, the option of grading students individually is also an option. This page walks you through the creating of such group assignments as well as how to set these up for grading students individually and as groups.


Sort Students into Groups Automatically

  1. From the People tab in Canvas, select +Group Set.

  2. Name the group set. ex. Groups for Assignment 1.

  3. Select "Split students into __ groups".

  4. Enter the number of groups you want to make.

  5. Canvas will automatically assign students into groups of the same size.

Assign Students to a Group

  1. From the People tab in Canvas, select +Group Set.

  2. Name the group set. ex. Groups for Assignment 1.

  3. Select the option "I'll create groups manually" and save.

  4. You will be automatically re-directed to the new tab for your group. Here, you can create groups within the group set and assign students to the groups.

  5. To create a group, select +Group, name the group and indicate the maximum number of students.

add group pop-up window
  1. Assign students to groups by dragging their names from the Unassigned Student columns into a group. Click the group name to see a list of students in a group.

Allow Students to Make Their Own Groups

  1. From the People tab in Canvas, select +Group Set.

  2. Name the group set. ex. Groups for Assignment 1.

  3. Select "Allow self sign-up".

  4. There is an option to create groups now and limit the number of students in a group. You can enter values into these fields or leave them blank.

  5. If you want to have a group leader for every group, select an option under the Leadership options.

  6. Hit Save.

  7. You will redirected to you new group tab. Students can go into this tab and assign themselves to groups. If you choose not to pre-make the groups, they will be able to create their own groups here as well.

Create an Assignment for a Group

You can either create a new assignment or edit the settings of a pre-existing assignment to make it a group assignment.

  1. In the assignment's settings, select "This is a Group Assignment".

Group Assignment Settings
  1. Choose whether to assign a single grade to the whole group or assign grades to each student individually.

  2. Choose a group set.

  3. Save changes.

Additional Resources