I am a Canvas newbie but I know what I am asking was possible in my previous gradebook (from Haiku/ PowerSchool Learning) so I am hoping there is a way to do this in Canvas as well.

I give a weekly class participation grade which I might or might not want to hide from students. Either way, I certainly don't want the Gradebook entry titled "Participation Week X" to appear for students on their To Do list as it would for a regular assignment. How can I make an entry so it is a column I can grade in my gradebook which I can grade but does not show up for students in their To Do list or under Assignments? I tried adding it as an Unpublished Assignment but this did not help since I was then not able to make a gradebook entry.