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Exams

The ASSESSMENT > Exams option allows face-to-face or remote exams. In one course we can create several exams (ordered sets of questions) and carry out several sessions of each exam.

New exam

To create a new exam and add it to the list of existing exams, click on the New exam icon (plus sign) in the upper left corner of the box where the exams are listed, or on the New exam button at the bottom of that box. A form will appear with the following fields:

  • Title. A title for the exam (for example Final exam).

  • Maximum grade. A positive real number (for example 10.0). The score obtained in a session of this exam will be scaled in such a way that the maximum score (which coincides with the number of questions) will correspond to this maximum grade.

  • Visibility of results. The amount of information offered to students in the results of exam sessions can be set selectively, by activating/deactivating each of the following check boxes:

    • Text of questions and answers: The text and optional multimedia elements of both the stem and each of the options (in the case of unique or multiple choice questions) are shown.
    • Feedback text: The optional feedback text written by the teachers is shown both in the stem and in each of the options (in the case of unique or multiple choice questions).
    • Right answers: It shows which are the correct answers set by the teachers. The answers given by the user are always shown, they cannot be hidden.
    • Score of each question: The numerical score of each of the questions is shown.
    • Total score: The total numerical score is shown (sum of the scores of all questions).

    This configuration will only be effective for each exam session once the teachers activate the visualization of the results of the session, which is initially deactivated.

  • Description. Brief optional description of the exam.

Once filled in these fields, press the Create exam button. A confirmation message, the same title and description edit box, and a second box to add one or more set of questions to the newly created exam will be displayed. The new exam will also be displayed in the updated exam list.

Edit exam

It is possible to remove, hide/show or edit each of the exams in the course.

To remove an existing exam, click on the Remove icon (red trash can). In order to effectively remove the exam you will have to confirm the removal by clicking on the Remove exam button. Removing the exam involves removing all of its question sets, sessions, and results.

To hide an existing exam, click on the Hide icon (eye). To show a hidden exam, click on the Show icon (strikethrough eye).

To edit an existing exam, click on the Edit icon (pencil). A form identical to the one shown to create a new exam will appear, allowing you to edit the title, the maximum grade and the description. When editing is complete, click on the Save changes button. If the exam has no sessions, you can also edit its questions. If it already has sessions, the question edition will remain locked until all its sessions are deleted.

Sets of questions

Each exam is made up of one or more sets of questions. A set of questions is made up of one or more questions imported from the question bank.

To create a set of questions, fill in the name of the set (for example Unit 1) and the number of questions to display n, which should be equal to or less than the number of questions N present in the set. The platform will choose k = min (n, N) randomly chosen and shuffled questions from the N present in the set. To maximize the variability of exams generated and thus minimize the possibility of copying when there are many students in the course or group, it is advisable that N is much greater than n.

To remove a set of questions, click the Remove icon (red trash). You will be asked for confirmation.

To move up or down a set of questions use the Up (up arrow) and Down (down arrow) icons. The sets of questions will appear in the exams that are shown to the students in the order indicated by the teacher.

If the exam already has sessions, it will not be possible to add question sets, edit them, delete them, or move them.

Questions

The questions of each set of questions are imported from the bank of questions.

To add questions to a set, click on the Add questions icon (plus sign) in the upper left corner of the Questions box or on the New question button at the bottom of the box. A box titled Select questions will appear, similar to the one for editing the bank of questions. Select one or more tags, one or more types of answers, and a range of dates, and click the Show questions button. If there are questions of the chosen types, that include any of the selected tags, and that have been edited in the indicated date range, they will be listed then. In the list of questions, select one or more questions and click on the Add questions button to add them to the set.

Normally we will not want the questions to be used to be available openly in ASSESSMENT > Tests. To prevent this, we can add a tag when creating or editing them, for example Final exam, and mark that tag as prohibited in ASSESSMENT > Questions > Tags.

Once the questions have been added, they will appear in the list of questions in the set, arranged alphabetically. The order of the questions in the set is not relevant because they are always chosen randomly in each exam for each student. The answers or options of a question can be shown in a different and random order for each student if this is indicated by activating the Shuffle box when [creating or editing the question] (ASSESSMENT.Questions.es#edit-questions).

If there is no session for the exam, in each set of questions we can delete a question with the icon Remove (red trash). If the exam already has sessions, it will not be possible to add or delete questions.

The content of each question is copied to the set of questions and even if it is later edited or deleted in ASSESSMENT > Questions, the question will not change in the exam.

Sessions

Once an exam has been created, several sessions can be held, for example one in each group of the course.

New session

To create a new session, the teacher (or non-editing teacher) has to go to the exam by clicking on its title. A Sessions box appears, and you have to click on the New session icon (plus sign) in the upper left corner, or on the New session button. A form appears to give a name to the session, which will be shown later as a title on the session screen shown to the student. The teacher can also select the range of hours in which the session will be open for the student to answer the exam, and if that session is open to the participation of any student in the course or only to students belonging to certain groups. Finally, you will have to click on the Create session button.

A non-editing teacher can create sessions, but not exams. And he/she can only delete or edit the sessions he/she had created.

Answer exam

Students can answer an exam by clicking on the session title in the exam session list. A student can only reply in a session if he/she belongs to any of the groups associated with that session.

Within a session, the platform generates a different exam for each student, maintaining the original order of the sets of questions.

Every time a student changes their answer to a question, the answer is saved in the server database. If the network connection is lost or if the student's computer or browser is blocked, everything that has been answered so far is preserved. The student will be able to continue answering the exam from the same device or from another one if he/she connects again, as long as the exam session remains open and on time.

Results

The results of each student in each session are stored in the database for later use as part of the assessment. Each student can see their results after finishing the session when the teacher decides.

The teacher can activate or deactivate the visibility of the results in the list of sessions in an exam by clicking on the icon Hidden results (crossed out eye) or on the icon Visible results (eye) located to the right of each session. By default the results are hidden until the teacher makes them visible.

  • If the results of a session are hidden (crossed out eye), the student will not be able to see any information about his/her outcome in that session, regardless of the current visibility settings of exam results. It is highly recommended to keep the results hidden at least while there is an exam session that has not yet finished.
  • If the results of a session are visible (eye), the student will see more or less information according to the current visibility settings of exam results.

If you are a teacher, you can see the results of each student by clicking on the icon Results (trophy symbol). Then select the students whose results you want to see, and click on the See results button. A first list will appear where you can change the selection of exams, and a second list with all the results for the selected exams. You can see the details of each result by clicking on the icon Result (on the right side of each row).

If you are a student, you can see your results by clicking on the icon Results (trophy symbol). A list will appear with the results in the selected exams. You can see the details of each result by clicking on the Result icon (on the right side of each row) if the teacher has allowed it.