How Do I Configure the Delphinium Course Settings?

Delphinium centralizes some settings that are used by multiple Delphinium components in the Delphinium Course Setting tab. Not all Delphinium layouts contain components that use all, or even any, of these settings. However, it is good practice to configure these settings at the beginning of each semester or term when you first set up your Delphinium page. These settings include:

  • Start Date

  • End Date

  • Total Points

  • Grading Period

  • Grading Style

Open the Delphinium Settings

On the Delphinium page, in Teacher or Periscope View, click the Settings icon in the top right corner of the page


The "Settings" dialog will open.

Click the Delphinium Settings Tab

Click the Delphinium Settings tab in the tab bar at the top of the Settings dialog.

The “Delphinium Settings” tab will be displayed.

The Delphinium Settings tab has two sub tabs, "Course Settings" and "Component Settings". If necessary, click Course Settings.

The "Course Settings" subtab will be displayed.

Configure Start and End Dates

Set the Start Date and End Date for the course.

Note: These should be the first and last day that students can earn points in the class. These values will be used by Delphinium components to show students their progress in the course. For example, the Milestone Tracker, Grade Tracker, and Course Count Down components use these values to track a student's progress.

Note: If you configure these values in the Canvas course settings before you load the course Delphinium page for the first time, Delphinium will copy these values from the Canvas course settings.

Note: You can type the date directly into input field or you can use the date picker popup that appears when you click in the input field

  • Use the arrows to navigate months

  • Click the month and year title to skip directly to a month or year

  • Click a date to add it to the date input field


Configure Total Points

Set the Max Points for the course.

Note: The Max Points for a course should equal the number of points considered a "perfect score" in the course. This value depends on how you design your course. For example:

  • For most courses, this will be the sum of all of the points possible on assignments

  • For a cafeteria-style course, this number is the "max score" from which grade levels are computed

  • In a 0-based-grading course, you might create an effect similar to "extra-credit" by setting the Total Points lower than points possible on assignments so that there are more points possible than the configured "perfect score"

Note: The "Max Points" setting is always required for 0-based grading courses.

Note: Some layouts do not include components that require this field

Select a Grading Period

If your Canvas account uses grading periods, then you can select the grading period to display in Delphinium. Learn more about grading periods in Canvas here:

In Delphinium, grading periods are used to filter which assignments to display. When a grading period is selected, only assignments with due dates that fall within that grading period will be displayed in Delphinium components and the Delphinium Gradebook. Items with no due date are displayed in the last grading period.

Each grading period has its own Start Date, End Date, and Max Points. You must configure each by selecting the Grading Period from the drop down list and updating the fields. Start and End Date will be prepopulated using the Grading Period dates, but the teacher can overwrite these values.

Teachers can select which Grading period to view in their own view, and they can use the Set all students to this Grading Period check box to change all students' grading period view at the same time. Students can also change which grading period they are viewing in the Student Settings.

Select a Grading Style

Select whether or not your course uses 0 or % based grading.

Note: If you answered the layout coach questions to select a layout, this option will be selected for you and will be disabled. If this is the case, to change this setting, return to the layout coach and deselect the Grading Style option there, or select a different option.

Select How Course Content is Organized

Save Delphinium Course Settings

Click Save to save the Delphinium course settings.

The page will reload.

Advanced Delphinium Course Settings

Click Advanced to open advanced Delphinium course settings.

Note: Most courses will not use these settings, they are available for advanced users. You should not use any of these features unless you are sure they will improve how Delphinium works in your course.

Three more settings will appear:

  • Student Filter - Filter which student data to include in Delphinium components by indicating how many days of submissions to include (Use "0" for all days). Students who have not submitted an assignment in that range will not be included in components that show data from multiple students at the same time, like the Leaderboard or blue dots in Grade Tracker. This setting is useful for courses in which students can add and conclude at any time and that operate for long periods of time.

  • Custom CSS - Users with an understanding of CSS can inspect Delphinium's HTML elements and change the appearance of Delphinium in this course by adding custom CSS to override the default CSS settings. We do not recommend this option. Delphinium's CSS has been designed to be ADA compliant and visually consistent to improve usability. Any custom CSS should be carefully considered.

  • Display Weighted Points in Delphinium - Display points and points possible as their true value in Delphinium using Canvas assignment group weights. This allows students to understand how each assignment truly affects their final grade. The calculation for converting weighted scores and points possible is as follows:

    • Total points in the class = 100% of the points

    • Total points in an assignment group/total points in class = Group's actual weight

    • Canvas group weight/Group actual weight = Factor to convert to "true" values for group's assignments

    • Factor * assignments' points possible and score = "true" values

    • True values are displayed in Delphinium

Note: The best option is to not use assignment group weights and give assignments their true point value directly. But if you must use assignment group weights, this setting will let you show each assignment's true value in Delphinium. However, this setting will not affect how assignments' points and points possible are displayed in Canvas. The difference between the two may cause some confusion for students. If you enable this setting, you will need to educate students, so they understand why the values are different.

  • Bleeding Edge - This setting is a way for us to get customer feedback by activating unfinished upcoming features in this course. We are always working on new ways to improve Delphinium. By setting Bleeding Edge to "on" you can get a peek at what we are working on. But you should NOT use bleeding edge features in a live course. These features are NOT ready for prime time and will almost certainly break. When features are ready, we will move them out of Bleeding Edge mode for you to use.