Grade Items are the work items submitted by the students that are scored and when combined make up the student's final grade in the course. Some of the Grade Items are Assignments, Quizzes, and Lessons. Grade Items can be either automatically graded or manually graded. The grades submitted can be changed at a later date should that become necessary.

Grade Items are listed in columns, and we will see later how the Grade Items are displayed in the Gradebook.

Grade Categories are a number of Grade Items, which are combined into a single category to make up a percentage of the student's total grade. For example, using a Grade Category would allow you to take several tests and combine them into a Test Category, which was worth a set percentage of the student's grade. It is important to note that each Grade Item can only added to a single Grade Category. So, you can't have your Algebra of Vectors test as part of your Participation category and your Test category.

There is no limit to the number of categories you can have in your course and there is also no limit to the number of nested categories that can be used. For example, if you are planning on giving several quizzes and you want them to be worth a percentage of the Testing Category, you can put them into a Quiz Category, give the category the value you want, and nest it inside of the Testing Category.

The top category in each course is called the Course Category, and all other categories are necessarily nested inside of it.