label element for selecting radio buttons

label element for selecting radio buttons

by Jerry Lorenz -
Number of replies: 4

Back in 2005 there was a forum topic:

label element for selecting radio buttons by clicking text.

https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=26139#p123240

I wanted to add a little discussion to that issue but it appears that I cannot so I started this topic.

I am using Moodle 3.2 and have been using moodle since 2.0. We have a lot of multiple choice questions. And would get complaints from students that they selected the correct answer because it was so obvious.  And then after submitting the quiz, the answer would have a different answer selected and hence marked as incorrect. 

This is hard for the student to prove. But I finally had a student that posted in the course forum to other students to be careful when taking a quiz.  He posted:

"Just a note to everyone who is testing, be extremely careful when you review your answers. I changed answers on nearly every test as I scrolled down on my review by moving the mouse over the test - and I was not aware that I changed an answer until it was too late.  I think using the arrow buttons on the right side of your computer screen will help eliminate this - but on my last test, I changed 4 answers from right to wrong.

Just please pay attention - it was my fault - but hopefully I can share this with everyone and help."


Essentially what I think is happening is the student takes the quiz and selects their answers by clicking the radio button. Then upon review, they are scrolling over the text part of the questions and answers believing that that is a safe thing to do. If their mouse is over any part of the text portion of an answer and they start to scroll down, they may without knowing, change their answer by an accidental click.

So while being able to click on the label to select the answer is more convenient, It is causing some issues when students review their quiz.  

Is there a way to remove the labels. I am not afraid of getting into the code if someone can tell me where to look.

Thanks 

Jerry Lorenz
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In reply to Jerry Lorenz

Re: label element for selecting radio buttons

by Tim Hunt -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Peer reviewers Picture of Plugin developers

This sounds like a problem with the web browser our mouses that you are using. Moodle is just using a standard radio button here. There is no way that scrolling should change the selection, but if it does it in Moodle, it will do it in other places too. It would be much better for you to address the root casue problem with scrolling.

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In reply to Jerry Lorenz

Re: label element for selecting radio buttons

by Marcus Green -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Plugin developers Picture of Testers

What theme are you using?

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In reply to Marcus Green

Re: label element for selecting radio buttons

by Jerry Lorenz -

I am using the More theme. But the same response happens in any theme. I have used Clean and Boost as well. 

Here is a sample of the html of an answer option:

<input type="radio" name="q781746:1_answer" value="0" id="q781746:1_answer0" />

<label for="q781746:1_answer0" class="m-l-1">a. It tells of frequently rejecting God's rule and provoking God's punishment.</label>

because there is a label for="q781746:1_answer0 designated for the radio input  id="q781746:1_answer0 it connects them together. So now instead of having to click just the radio to select your answer, you can click on any part of the answer text and it will select that radio.  If the label was not connected to the radio button you could only make your selection using the radio input, not the text.

The students are selecting the Radio Button during the selection of their answer. The as a student review their answers. They scroll up and down over the quiz with their cursor over the text portion of the answers. As they scroll using the wheel on the mouse, finger on the tablet, or trackpad. They review their answers, see that it is correct. Then as they start to scroll down they might accidently click on the text portion of the answer which then changes their answer. 

The do not notice the change in selection because they are now focused on scrolling to the next question.

I am not saying it happens to everyone but it is happening, most student's figure they selected the wrong answer after they submit the quiz and get it wrong.  So if a student complains about marking a quiz question correctly and then gets it wrong after submitting this is what may be happening. 

I have had this complaint over may years and could not understand how it was happening. But it has happened with students I trusted and I go back and give them credit for the answer.  It may be considered a positive usability option as it was in the post from 2005 but I am trying to do what I can to help our students and reduce helpdesk calls.

I would be curious if anyone else has had this experience. 

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In reply to Jerry Lorenz

Re: label element for selecting radio buttons

by Tim Hunt -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Peer reviewers Picture of Plugin developers

It's not a direct solution to your problem, but it might be worth considering: The problem would not arise if you used the How questions behave: Immediate feedback setting. With that, students submit each question one at a time as they go.

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