Atomic Assessments Introduction

Atomic Assessments has customizable question options and settings beyond those available in the built-in Canvas quizzes. It integrates with Canvas Speedgrader and Gradebook and is available for all Utah State faculty in Canvas.

On This Page

Should I Use Atomic Assessments?
Question Types
Customizable Question Types
Supplemental Tools
Embed Questions in a Content Page
Student Performance Reports
Customizable Assessment Layout
Other Features

Watch a two-minute feature demonstration or explore the Atomic Assessments overview page. Atomic Assessments from Atomic Jolt on Vimeo .

Should I Use Atomic Assessments?

There are five great reasons to use Atomic Assessments (Canvas Quizzes don't have these options):

To embed an activity or assignment in a Canvas page containing other content
To provide immediate feedback after a student answers a question
To allow students an option to try answering a question again after feedback is given
To utilize various question types that aren't available in Canvas Quizzes
To get detailed reports about how students answered specific questions

For the following assessment types, you could use these features of Atomic Assessments:

Assessment Type	Embedded in Canvas page	Immediate Feedback	Added to Gradebook	Auto-Graded
Activity	✓	✓		✓
Assignment		✓	✓	*
Quiz		✓	✓	✓ *
Exam			✓	✓ *

* could include questions that are not automatically graded

Question Types

Atomic Assessments has 10 question categories with 4+ question types each, including interactive and customizable options for fill-in-the-blank, images, math, graphing, chemistry, and more. See images of these categories and types in the questions overview.

Compare question options with Canvas Classic quizzes and Canvas New Quizzes to find the best option for your course.

Customizable Question Types

Questions and assessments can be customized at the code level. In Canvas quizzes, an HTML editor is available with the Rich Content Editor , but this does not change the format of the question type itself, as is possible in Atomic Assessments.

Arrow pointing at Source button with code source preview.

Supplemental Tools

In Atomic Assessments, instructors can enable on-screen features such as a protractor, ruler, line-by-line text reader, and scientific calculator.

Besides question types, Canvas Classic quizzes provide no built-in feature options. New Quizzes in Canvas provides a calculator option

Arrow pointing at Features button in Item Options in Atomic Assessments.

Embed Questions in a Content Page

Atomic Assessment assignments can be embedded in lesson and assignment pages. The only equivalent option is a Design Tools multiple-choice option on lesson pages; however, only Atomic Assessment questions on lesson pages can be added to students’ grades.

Atomic Assessments quiz in a Canvas page.

Student Performance Reports

Atomic Assessments generates five different reports per assignment: Summary, Item Scores, Item Statistics, Responses, and Errors.

Atomic Assessments scores and statistics

Compare reports with Canvas Classic quiz reports and New Quiz reports to find the best option for your course.

Customizable Assessment Layout

Using a customizable format and the “passage” feature, instructors can build entire graded or ungraded lessons within an Atomic Assessments assignment.

Atomic Assessments customizable layout

If you are interested in a simpler layout feature, New Canvas Quizzes also offers a side-by-side passage and question(s) option .

Other Features

Print a copy of the assignment or answer key
An in-quiz “Check answer” button for individual questions
Multiple attempts for individual questions

Additional Resources

Accessibility Considerations from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Atomic Assessments flier

While Atomic Assessments has many sophisticated and exciting options, it may exceed your current course needs or interests. Explore the options and tutorials to see if it is a good fit for you.

Before copying a course using Atomic Assessment: You need to enable Atomic Assessment in the new course before you copy the content into the new course.

Reference

“Atomic Assessments – Documentation .” Atomic Jolt. Accessed 25 February 2020.

Atomic Assessments - Get Started

The following list of pages will guide you through getting started with this tool. The current page is listed in bold.