For most of the Internet assignments, you’re being graded for simply doing them. For most assignments, you get one point for each response you’re required to post. When you’re told to take a practice quiz, that’s not really worth a point because it’s for your own practice.

1-POINT ASSIGNMENTS

For 1-point assignments, this is roughly how the grades are scored:

1 point – Post your response. Follow the instructions. Do not plagiarize.
1/2 point – You followed some of the instructions correctly but did not follow them all, or you simply did poor work (which could be worth even less).
0 point – You responded but followed instructions barely or not at all. If instructions say something such as not to use a topic or term already covered by any other student, only the one who did it first gets the point. The later person gets 0.
-1 point – You get negative credit for not doing the assignment at all, and this contributes to your risk of getting dropped from the class. That means you did not post the response where you were supposed to post it. Emailing it to your professor does not count at all.

So if you just do the assignment and follow directions, you get a point. It’s that simple when you do it. Note, though, that if the instructions say some thing like “read the chapter” but your response indicates that you did not actually read the chapter, that means you did not follow the directions.

The professor may adjust any of these grades based on work quality.

MORE THAN 1 POINT

When an assignment says to post one response, as mentioned, that’s one point. Sometimes the assignment tells you that it is simply worth more based on the amount of work, probably 2 points. That might simply be graded like the 1-point assignment but with everything doubled – 2 points for full credit, 1 point for partial credit, 0 for problems mentioned above, -2 if not done at all.

More often, though, the instructions direct you to do multiple tasks. For example, the instructions might direct you to post two different responses on the discussion forum; or they might require that you both write a study guide about an article and also record a video in which you relate its content to your life. Those are just examples. Your professor determines which kind of 2-pointer the assignment is. Just follow the instructions and do what you’re supposed to do, and you’ll get the full credit.

2 points – Do both tasks correctly. Follow instructions fully.
1 point – Do both tasks but incompletely, poorly, or without following all directions.
0 points – Do both without following any instructions, or do one task but not the other. Doing only one would earn 0 points total because 1 minus 1 = 0 (one point for the task you did, minus one for the task you did not do).
-2 points – You did not do the assignment at all.

On a few rare occasions, usually late in a semester, there might be some worth more, such as a 4-point assignment. Do all four parts. Each part completed correctly is worth 1 point, each part done poorly might be worth 1/2 or 0, and each part not done at all would be worth -1. Those get added together just as if those were four different assignments.

LATE WORK

As the syllabus says, you get half credit for up to three (3) assignments completed late, within one day after the deadline and no later. The system will not let you post them later than that. Some assignments will not be accepted late at all. Do not ask the professor to reopen them no matter how great your reason is, so do not ask to reopen them – period.

If you are unable to post your assignment on time for any reason, do not email it to your professor. Emailing it does not count. The syllabus already said this, but it’s worth repeating. When it comes time to grade your assignments, your professor will only look in the place where the instructions told you to put it. Nobody gets special treatment for failing to follow instructions or extra time for waiting until they did not have enough time left to complete and post by the deadline.