Grade Point Scales and Marking Grade Sets

Grade point scales and grade sets determine which grades you can give to students in marksheets when marking your assessments.

• In most cases, you'll be able to use our out-of-the box grade sets. These are automatically included in our in-built summative and curriculum assessments. 
• We also have assessment templates you can download that include grader sets. Click here for Primaries or here for Secondaries.
• It's only if you have checked the above and you are sure you want to set up bespoke grade sets that you'd follow the instructions below.

What are Grade Point Scales and Grade Sets?

Grade Point Scale

A Grade Point Scale is what is used to mark your assessments, and is used to describe the range of values you would like your Grade Sets to sit within. You can choose the number of steps in-between each grade.

An example of a grade point scale could be Years 1-6 Emerging, Developing, Secure. If you wanted 1 step of progress between each grade that would give you a grade point scale of 18 (3 points of progress available per year group).

Grade Set

The Grade Set is the terms you use to describe attainment. Grade Sets can be words or numbers. You choose your Grade Point Scale e.g 1-100 and map your chosen grades to a value within the Grade Point Scale. 

For example, for a custom curriculum assessment, your marking scale will be used to show how well your students have understood each curriculum statement. For example, Emerging, Developing,  Secure. You can set up as many different grades as needed, but it's important to bear in mind that the more marks you have in your marking scale the harder it is for teachers to distinguish between two marks.

There are two types of Grade Sets:

• Marking Grade Sets - these grade sets are used to mark assessments on marksheets, and should be in the language teachers use to mark students.
• Display Grade Sets - these grade sets are optional to set up. They can be used to 'translate' your marking grade set into different language (such as in Report cards to parents) or to show how a grade maps to a less granular grade. For example, if your marking grade set has A-, A and A+, your display grade set can show all these grades as an 'A'. You can see how this works here: Display grades using different scales on marksheets

Setting up a new grade set

Adding a new marking grade set

You can set up bespoke grade scales by going to Students > Assessments > Assessment framework > Grade Sets.

To select a Grade Point Scale, click the drop-down menu.

Here you can then see all the Grade Sets in the Grade Point Scale.

To set up a new Grade point scale:

• click the Create Percentage Scale button to set up a percentage scale from 0 to 100%. Top Tip: If your Grade Point Scale already has a percentage scale set up, you won't see this button as you can't set it up again.
• click the green Create New Grade Point Scale button to set up your own scale. Enter the details.

To create assessments that use raw marks, just create a grade point scale to specify the minimum and maximum values and leave it without a grade set.

Please note: We do not support negative numbers. 

You can choose to use the Grade Set that comes with the Grade Point Scale or you can define your own.

• To use the Grade Set that comes with the Grade Point Scale, in the automatic slide over here you need to select Close.
• Alternatively, to use your own Grade Set you can set this up. 

In the section called Display Grade Set, select +Add. Add the details needed for the Display Grade Set, and select save. You can edit these details later if you want. You can then use these grade sets when setting up a new assessment.

If you do decide to add a marking grade set, you can specify a 'grade value' for each grade. The grade value is the midpoint value which then informs the 'grade range' e.g. if a grade has a value of 4 the range would be 3.5 - 4.5. 

When you have added your full marking grade set with the values associated select 'add grade set' at the bottom. This will now show each grade that will be available when marking your assessments, the numerical value associated will be used for progress and analysis.

Adding a new display grade set

Go to Students > Assessments > Assessment framework > Grade Sets, and click the drop-down menu to select the Grade Point Scale.

In the section called Display Grade Set, select +Add. 

A display grade set lets you set the specific lower and upper boundary of the grades (as opposed to a marking grade set, where you set the midpoint value of the grade). This means that any given value can be converted to a grade by finding which 'bucket' the value falls into. The lower boundary is inclusive in the range, the upper boundary is not.

As an example, we could have a display grade set for a 0-70 grade point scale with the following values.

• A score of 40 would fall squarely into the 'Pass' grade bucket.
• A score of 20 would also fall into the 'Pass' grade bucket, because the lower value is inclusive in the range.
• A score of 60 would fall into the 'Distinction' grade bucket, again because the lower grade value is inclusive in the range.

Add the details needed for the Display Grade Set, and select save. You can edit these details later if you want. You can then use these grade sets when setting up a new assessment.

Editing a grade set

To amend a grade set for the Grade Point Scale or view the numerical values with each grade, click on the grade set and click the orange Edit button.  

FAQ

How do we create an assessment that can have any number mark?

If you want to create assessments that use raw marks, just create a grade point scale to specify the minimum and maximum values and leave it without a grade set.

Can we set up negative grades?

We do not support negative numbers in grade sets, so you won't be able to add assessment marks that are below 0. 

What is the range?

The range shows you the minimum and maximum values behind your grades. Once set up this cannot be changed, so make sure your range covers the full number of grades you might need to use.