Assessment Tools
May 15th, 2009 by Michele Brannon-Hamilton
Creating a Quiz in Moodle
Purpose
In order for students and the instructor to understand their progress in my literacy based course, I used several quizzes throughout the course modules. I started with a non-graded pre-test to determine how much students know about the topic before starting the units. There are also non-graded quizzes in each unit for the students to self-test. I believe it is very important for literacy learners to realize how much they have learned along the way. Also, learners can use the quizzes to determine if they need to go back over a particular lesson. Self-assessment helps learners gain independence. I have also included a graded test to help instructors gage student progress. This graded test can be found in the June 15 – June 21st module. I called it Graded Test 1 so students can differentiate between the self-assessment quizzes and the graded test. The accompanying description explains what the test is testing.
The Graded Test
After 3 modules, learners will be tested and graded on their knowledge so far in the course. The instructor can use this mark in the final grade to determine progress in the early modules. I used a selection of question types including matching, short answer, multiple choice and short essay.
First, I created a bank of questions covering topics from the first 3 lessons. Some questions were asked a second time in different ways so I could double-check what students really know. I named the questions using their type and topic to ensure I would find them again easily. For example, Multiple Choice 3 Visual is a multiple choice question about visual learners.
There are 5 multiple choice questions in which the learner must determine the right answer to the question. Multiple choice questions allow learners to recognize correct answers and view answers that may be similar. Matching questions ask students to match definitions of important terms with the correct word. Students use one or two words to answer the short answer questions. Short essay questions allow instructors to determine the depth of knowledge their students have gained.
The Format
Using graded tests with a variety of questions address the different learning styles of literacy learners. Instructors can determine which areas give students difficulty and find out who knows information in depth.
Feedback
I added feedback to most of the questions. It is important to reward students with positive feedback for correct answers to questions and to guide them with feedback when they give wrong answers. I started the feedback with either “correct” or “sorry, wrong answer” so there would be no confusion. Then I explained why the question was right or wrong. I did not add feedback to the essay questions because this needs to be added during marking.
With the final results, I used graded feedback in 20% increments so students would get a different response for each grade range achieved on the test.
Challenges
I found building a full test with different types of questions interesting. I had to keep in mind the types of learners that would be using the test. I was concerned that they might become confused so I chose very clear questions and added feedback for guidance. If I were giving this to a real literacy class, I would not use a timer. I think the students would feel pressured with the timer following them around the quiz. Also, literacy learners often have learning disabilities and may need extra time on tests. Timers usually stop people from cheating but I don’t think this is an issue for literacy topics. Students will be showing their English skills and timing them has no positive affect on this. I would also be concerned that students lacking in computer literacy skills may suffer if they are timed.
I disliked the feedback options because I found there were too many places to add feedback. I like the feedback for each answer but didn’t like the general feedback for each question since it remained the same despite the answer to the question. I had a bit of trouble with the graded feedback but found my answers in the Moodle manual.
Testing
I tested, edited and retested the graded test many times to ensure it would work properly. Then I gave the test a 15 minute time limit which is just over a minute per question. I set up the test to display all the questions on one page at once so students could choose what questions they wanted to answer first.
Attempts
I gave the students 1 attempt to write the test because I don’t want students to change answers after looking up information. They have many chances to self assess with the non-graded quizzes in each module. Therefore, they get one attempt and the grade will appear after that attempt.
Conclusion
Overall, I found the quiz tool very useful. I think I would add more images to my test and try to develop some audio questions for auditory learners. Also, I would probably not call the test a test since literacy learners often have negative school experiences. I might call them “check-ins” instead. I liked the ease of putting the test together including developing a bank of questions that I can use again. I would also have the questions ready in hard copy before trying to write the test in Moodle.
References
Course notes ETEC 565
Anderson, T. (2008). Towards a Theory of Online Learning. In: Anderson, T. & Elloumi, F. Theory and Practice of Online Learning. Athabasca University. Accessed online 3 March 2009 http://www.aupress.ca/books/120146/ebook/02_Anderson_2008_Anderson-Online_Learning.pdf
Anderson, T. (2008). Teaching in an Online Learning Context. In: Anderson, T. & Elloumi, F. Theory and Practice of Online Learning. Athabasca University. Accessed online 3 March 2009 http://www.aupress.ca/books/120146/ebook/14_Anderson_2008_Anderson-DeliveryQualitySupport.pdf
Gibbs, G. and Simpson, C. (2005). “Conditions under which assessment supports students’ learning.” Learning and Teaching in Higher Education Accessed online 11 March 2009 http://www.open.ac.uk/fast/pdfs/Gibbs%20and%20Simpson%202004-05.pdf
Jenkins, M. (2004). “Unfulfilled Promise: formative assessment using computer-aided assessment.” Learning and Teaching in Higher Education , i, 67-80. Accessed online 17 March 2009 http://www.glos.ac.uk/shareddata/dms/2B72C8E5BCD42A03907A9E170D68CE25.pdf.
I think you’ve integrates so many key pieces here with respect to assessment–formative assessment particularly. The feedback function is something that is often over-used or under-used. My tack is to give hints for wrong answers and simple validation for correct ones. I don’t use the overall feedback tool at all: if a student gets 50% they already know they need to work a bit harder on some of the materials. But a lot of educators like this feature, which is why I asked you all to explore it. 🙂
Probably after the course…I suggest you consider writing up some question banks in Word, organized around themes or topics. At some point you can populate them in advance, or just pull some from that file as needed. Often struggling students appreciate re-taking a quiz…but also taking a similar one to reinforce learning.
Finally the balance between the time it takes to set up quizzes versus their contribution to teaching and learning is also important. In asking you each to set up 3 multiple choice and 3 matching questions, I hoped you’d be able to, as they say, create future ones in your sleep. From my experience, once I gain an intuitive sense of how to use a tool, the tool is just that–something that makes my job easier. And, hopefully, me a more effective teacher.
Hi John,
Thank you for your reply. I did answer your reply in the Vista discussion and email but I forgot to answer it here. I will have to make sure that if I use blogs in my class that everyone understand their interactive nature – me included! As for your post, I too don’t like the overall feedback tool. It doesn’t make sense to me since everything I would say could fit in the answer to each question.
I agree with your point about the quizzes. In the literacy classroom I might use pretests and quizzes. I could find out what the students needs to learn and then assess the learning after. Yes, I think making up the quizzes will become intuitive with time and then it’s just a matter of plugging them in.