Rubrics provide an efficient way to deliver feedback and clarify grading rationale. A well-constructed rubric offers detailed insights for each score and allows targeted feedback in Canvas, promoting student understanding and a growth mindset. They streamline grading for instructors, ensuring fairness and consistency. Rubrics also empower students to self-assess, identify strengths, and recognize areas for improvement, fostering a transparent and supportive learning environment that encourages continuous progress. Using the rubric-building tool in Canvas offers a range of benefits for both instructors and students by making grading more transparent, consistent, and efficient. Here are the key advantages:
Clarity and Transparency: Rubrics lay out clear expectations for students before they begin an assignment. When students know exactly what’s being assessed—whether it’s organization, analysis, formatting, or creativity—they’re more likely to meet those standards.
Faster and More Consistent Grading: Instructors can select performance levels with just a click in SpeedGrader, which saves time and minimizes grading inconsistencies. This is especially helpful in large or multi-section courses or when multiple graders are involved.
Constructive, Structured Feedback: Students receive targeted feedback aligned to specific criteria, helping them understand their strengths and areas for growth. This feedback is built into the rubric, reducing the need for lengthy written comments.
Supports Revisions and Learning: When paired with assignments that allow resubmission or reflection, rubrics help students self-assess and make focused improvements based on where they lost points or didn’t meet expectations.
Aligns with Outcomes and Assessment Goals: Canvas rubrics can be tied to learning outcomes, which helps with program-level assessment, accreditation, or internal reporting. It also keeps course design aligned with measurable goals.
Reusable and Customizable: You can save and reuse rubrics across different assignments and courses, tweaking them as needed. This helps maintain consistency in grading while adapting to different tasks or learning levels.
Using Canvas rubrics is not just about grading—it’s a teaching strategy that supports learning, improves transparency, and promotes fairness. Rubrics streamline the grading process in SpeedGrader. They not only provide a grade according to the rubric criteria but also deliver insightful feedback to students within their grade book.
Faculty members benefit from understanding how to leave effective feedback in Canvas because student feedback is a core part of the learning process not just a grading formality. The submission comment box in Canvas allows instructors to leave personalized, timely, and clear communication for each student directly alongside their assignment.
Through this feature, faculty can:
Offer clarification or encouragement tailored to student performance
Explain grading decisions that may not be obvious from the rubric alone
Direct students to resources or suggestions for improvement
Choose the best communication method—text, file attachment, audio, or video—for different learning styles or accessibility needs
The Canvas Guide and visual breakdown of the comment box help faculty understand all available options and use them intentionally. Knowing how to navigate these tools ensures instructors can maintain a strong teaching presence, build rapport with students, and foster ongoing dialogue, especially important in online or hybrid learning environments where written feedback is often the primary connection between instructor and student.
The picture below breaks down the parts of the submission comment box and how you can best utilize it.
The SpeedGrader Annotation feature, powered by Canvas DocViewer, is a valuable tool for providing direct, in-context feedback on student submissions. When a student submits a file (like a Word doc or PDF), instructors can open it in SpeedGrader and use annotation tools to highlight text, strike through errors, add comment boxes, or draw directly on the submission, similar to marking up a physical paper.
This type of feedback is particularly effective because it shows students exactly where they did well or need improvement, making your comments more meaningful and easier to apply. It's also a time-saver: rather than downloading files, adding feedback in another tool, and re-uploading them, you can annotate directly within Canvas.
Instructors can also track whether and when students view their annotated feedback via the assignment details section of the sidebar, which adds another layer of accountability and engagement. This insight helps instructors identify which students are actively using feedback to learn and where follow-up might be needed. Overall, DocViewer enhances the feedback loop by making it faster, clearer, and more accessible for both instructors and students.
Canvas DocViewer is a tool that allows annotations on online assignment submissions in Canvas. You can use DocViewer to view files and assignments in SpeedGrader. You can view when students view annotated feedback in the
If you click the image below (which explains the main parts of the toolbar), you can view the guide that explains how to use annotations to provide specific feedback for your students:
