What's really the problem here is the lack of a formative assessment solution in Moodle. In this day and age, where formative assessment is so important, it's hard to believe this is not accommodated easily in Moodle.
If one were to allow LONGER responses with the short answer tool as part of a formative assessment, then the teacher could use the asterisk wild card to mark all answers correct. The point is for the student to compare their response to the feedback the teacher has entered, they can then be encouraged to initiate contact with the teacher if they still don't understand.
Another way this could be handled is for Moodle to add an asterisk wild card autocorrect (or equivalent checkbox or whatever to automatically grade all responses as correct) to the essay response questions. Again, allowing the student to answer without limitation, be automatically graded as correct (the grade does not matter, it counts for ZERO, this is FORMATIVE assessment), and then compare their response to a suggested answer entered in the feedback by the teacher.
Very frustrating trying to doing formative assessment with Moodle's current tools.
