Again, this experience was a mix of both enjoyment and frustration. I enjoyed the challenge and opportunity to create quiz questions from scratch (since the course I am creating in Moodle is completely non-existent). This activity made me sit down and really consider the topics I would ideally cover in my fictional course modules and create a quiz based on it from there.
Straight off the bat, one of my challenges was that I had envisioned this course to be one that was hands-on and consisting of a mix of assignments (chunked into parts) and discussion activities. However, for the purposes of this activity, I was prepared to add a 10% quiz to the mix. I therefore added a note to the beginning of the quiz, reminding/informing students that this quiz would assess their understanding/recollection of the information they came across in the first part of the course, but that it would also be helpful to them in writing their final reflection, where they would need to provide a rationale for the design of their unit of learning. The quiz would take place latter in the course than I would ideally want, but due to the number of topics I was trying to cover it made sense to have it take place in the eight or ninth week of the course. (Students would already have received feedback on at least a few discussion postings and minor assignments by this time, so they would have some idea how they were doing in the course.)
Another challenge was using the Moodle quiz tool. This being my first time creating a quiz in the system, I found that I needed to tweak some of my questions around to accommodate the technical requirements/constraints of the tool. For example, matching isn’t the same as categorizing (which I conveniently forgot when composing one of my quiz questions), so I had to move out my original idea for identifying a series of statements and labeling them as goals or objectives and convert this into a multiple choice type question). Additionally, the auto-assessment, weight functionality and feedback display for short answer and essay questions were not intuitive in Moodle (I think I mentioned I’m not a fan of help guides, so I played around with these features, hopefully getting them right—or so it seemed in the quiz preview). I will end on this point by mentioning my confusion that each test question had to be labeled with a name. I found this explanation on Moodle Answers: “It is used to by Moodle to identify your questions. Question names should be different for each question. The name of the question is not the same as the actual question.” (I think that it is unnecessarily complicated to have both a question and question name, so I felt free to use the same label/name for different questions in my quiz.)
A third challenge was the requirement to use an image or graphic in one of the questions. I went with a simple use of the image, but could have incorporated something a little more exciting given more time. To be honest, the challenge here was the fact that I have rarely had a quiz or test with an image in it, so this took some consideration.
I took this quiz as an opportunity to incorporate some formative assessment in the course, which is why I ended up providing a lot of feedback for the incorrect responses. One of the frustrations I have as a classroom learner is when I complete a test, but have to hunt down the source or unit where a certain theory or concept was covered in the course. This is one of the advantages of online testing: providing prompt feedback to students that can guide them to further information. Though I guided learners back to the module that covered the relevant topics, I also provided more specific ideal responses, rather than just the module title itself.
I followed some of the recommended practices that I’ve come across in my online research when constructing the test questions. For example, the Center for Teaching site of the Vanderbilt University, provides a laundry list of guidelines such as avoiding the use of complex choice items, avoiding the use of the options labeled as “all of the above” and “none of the above” and designing questions that focus on higher order thinking. I tried to follow as much of the suggestions as possible (without going overboard, as I took this activity as an opportunity to explore the test design feature in Moodle as my primary goal). Case in point, I tried to bring examples into the multiple choice and matching question options, rather than easily memorized definitions. I especially wanted to ensure my question options were unique, because of a statement in Gibbs & Simpson (2004-5), which compared coursework to exams, “Presumably the kind of learning that coursework involves has long term consequences while the kind of learning involved in revision for exams does not.” I think that if a test or quiz can be somehow connected to other coursework, where students are applying the theories and concepts they are tested on in the tests/quizzes, then the test or quiz is indeed meaningful (as students need to learn to analyze, synthesize and evaluate based upon some sort of principle, theory or concept).
I think overall I am happy with the way the quiz turned out. The tool was a tiny bit crude in its display of some of the questions and options, but with programming, this interface design can be improved a bit, I’m sure.
References:
Gibbs, G., & Simpson, C. (2005). Conditions under which assessment supports students’ learning. Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, 1(1), 3-31. Retrieved from http://www.open.ac.uk/fast/pdfs/Gibbs%20and%20Simpson%202004-05.pdf
Adding to the Question Bank. (n.d.). Retrieved March 4, 2014, from Moodle Answers: http://moodleanswers.com/index.php/instructor-resources/activities/19-adding-to-the-question-bank
Writing Good Multiple Choice Test Questions. (n.d.). Retrieved March 4, 2014, from Vanderbilt University: http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/writing-good-multiple-choice-test-questions/