Introduction

Once you have familiarized yourself with the Assignments Index Page and set up your Assignment Groups (with attached weights, if so desired), you are ready to start exploring the different types of assessments available to you in Canvas. This page will introduce you to the different assessment types and provide you with some pointers on how to choose which assessment type to use for different teaching situations.

On this page:

1. Learn the 3 Assessment Types available in Canvas
2. Choose which type of Assessment best meets your Learning Goals

Learn the 3 Assessment Types available in Canvas

There are 3 types of assessments available in Canvas, each of which serves a different purpose. Click the links to each type for more information from the Canvas website (a more in-depth exploration of each assignment type will be provided later in this Module):

Assignment: Use Assignments as an online "dropbox" to collect student work via online submission or as a place to record grades for an activity or assignment given "on paper" outside of Canvas. You can also create Assignments in order to add columns in the Gradebook that technically have no submission, which you can use to grade participation or other forms of activity.
Quiz: Use Quizzes to create online only assessments with a variety of question types to test your students' learning in an exam format. There are also options to create practice quizzes and surveys that can serve as low-stakes, formative assessments that help you and your students evaluate the teaching and learning process throughout the semester.
New Quizzes: New Quizzes is a quiz engine that integrates with Canvas currently available with classic quizzes functionality existing in Canvas. It will eventually replace classic quizzes.
Discussion: Use Discussions to evaluate students' engagement with specific course topics through their text, audio, or video-based responses to questions and prompts posed by you and/or their peers.

Choose which Assessment Type best meets Your Learning Goals

Preview or download our printable guide to assignment types in Canvas below:

Guide to assignment types in Canvas (PDF)

Use the decision tree below to help choose which type of assignment to create based on your purpose:

Decision Tree: Choosing an assignment type (PDF)