Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Mario Gharib -
Number of replies: 8

Dear Moodlers, 

Following my initial discussion (Critical issue with online distance quizzes on Moodle.USJ). I would like to know if there is a plugin/tool or a JavaScript-code integrated into the attempt.php file, that actually can track students' activities ONLY during their attempts; By tracking I mean, to track if a student

  • opened a new tab,
  • minimized the tab, which browser used,
  • answered a question by selecting the radio button,
  • answered a question by checking a box,
  • answered a question by input some text, 
  • the timestamp of all the above activities,
  • etc.

Unfortunately, Moodle's logging is VERY LIMITED and doesn't give us all these details.

Besides, if we activate the logging on our database (Postgres), it will consume our quota, while for example if there exists a JavaScript-based plugin, it can track all users' activities and log it into files. 

Your answers are more than welcome.

Mario.

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In reply to Mario Gharib

Re: Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Giovanni Vosloo -
Hi Mario,

As a Moodle partner we have had some very interesting questions regarding student tracking and anti-cheating discussions. I am not sure what the purpose is of trying to find out if a user is doing what they should, but even if you can track the list you want to track, it will be 100% useless if the user is just making use of their cell phone to look for answers.

Once of the tools that might prove useful in this tracking is SCORM, I myself don't like it at all, but it does come with it's own reporting for an attempt with a fair bit of detail. only downside is that you will need to create the SCORM properly to avoid completion and grading issues in Moodle.
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In reply to Giovanni Vosloo

Re: Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Visvanath Ratnaweera -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Translators
I've too though the enquiry is about proctoring. But up to 1,200 candidates sit for the exam during the same time slot https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=404490. So proctoring is out of the question. I think, this is about expanding Moodle logs so that one can investigate certain disputes/complaints about past exams. See the case https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=420645 which OP has linked.

N.B. If that is the case, the question is not about Hardware and performance, unless of course, if those additional logging mechanisms deteriorate the performance and makes the service unavailable.
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In reply to Giovanni Vosloo

Re: Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Mario Gharib -
Thanks for replying Giovanni,

Totally right, a student can cheat easily. Actually the question here is about to get more logging during a quiz. What moodle offers as logging is very limited, and let's face it, we can't force for example all teachers to design their quiz like this : every question on every page.

I keep receive this as a suggestion, put every question on a page. It doesn't work like that.
We can't treat a quiz from only a technical aspect. Creating and designing a quiz is way more complicated than this.

Now concerning SCORM, never tried it. Not sure if it can be used instead of the activity QUIZ.
Anyway, I believe it's time for Moodle to evolve in terms of logging.
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In reply to Mario Gharib

Re: Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Rick Jerz -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers
It is typically recommended to break a long quiz into smaller "pages" so that when students click on "Next" (page), their current answers are saved, and a log entry occurs.

Realize that students can change their minds, pick different answers, and navigate forwards and backwards (a little based upon how you have configured the exam.) This might be why Moodle doesn't track every click or keystroke... there would be far too many events to track. Consider my reply to you... how many logged events would be needed to track every letter, backspace, corrections, etc. that I have made. This would also dramatically increase the load on the server. (Rick typed a R, then an e, then an a, then an l, then a I, then a z, then an e. I think that you see what I mean.)

Giovanni and Visvanath provide some useful tips.
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In reply to Rick Jerz

Re: Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Mario Gharib -
Thanks RIck for replying,

What you're saying is completely true. Now the purpose behind starting or actually asking this question in this form was based on the idea that "The world before this coronavirus and after cannot be the same" Again what you said is completely true. But, let's face it. Moodle must evolve in terms of logging and tracking.

Creating a long quiz into smaller "pages" is a great idea, but we can't force all teachers to create their quizzes like that. There are too many educational factors that the teacher actually consider while creating the quiz. For example, sometimes teachers design a quiz in which they don't shuffle the question or for example to put all question on the same page.

Now in terms of logging, yes that's true it will increase the load on the server, you're totally right. But I do believe and many others believe that this is a necessity and that we also need to increase our resources in terms of equipment.

In my personal opinion Moodle must evolve in terms of logging and tracking (especially during quizzes), unless it's against its policy since we're talking about tracking.
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In reply to Mario Gharib

Re: Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Rick Jerz -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers
Hi Mario, I am enjoying our discussion. Thanks.

The "old" solution (pre-COVID) of trying to control "cheating" was to have students take exams in front of the instructor, who was watching for cheating. Yes, there are third-party products that try to watch students take remote exams, still less than ideal. I am one who believes that the "new" solution is randomized exams, along with better-designed exams that cause students to think, instead of focusing on memory.

I hope that you can communicate to your instructors the advantages and disadvantages of breaking a long quiz into pages. And I hope that your instructors are smart enough to design good quizzes. Maybe you can design a quiz for instructors that illustrates good quiz-design principles that instructors must pass before they are allowed to teach. 🤔

A good question (for you) is, "What do you really need to know to catch a cheater?"  In my case, how a student picks answers, choice a, then c, then back to a, doesn't seem to be connected with cheating.  When I look for cheaters, I use the start/finish time, the student's IP address, and their grades.  This might be the best that any LMS could do.  (Incidentally, Blackboard and Canvas logs are very limited and cannot produce IP addresses!)

So, can the Moodle logs be improved?  Probably so. But the logs, right now, are pretty good.  They capture when the student begins their exam, what the student did before and after the exam, every time they click on a next button, when they prepare to submit, and when they actually submit.  This is a lot of very useful information.  When a student selects a radio button or enters text, you really don't know that they answered a question, nor would you know if they are "cheating."

My school has that Proctorio product, that tries to "observe" the student taking the exam.  I don't use it.  However, Proctorio is apparently very problematic to the point where my school is now restricting who can use it.

One solution is to teach students not to cheat.  But this is difficult when there are many examples of "grownups" getting caught cheating.  In the U.S., we had a recent election where a politician was caught cheating.  Yep, that happens!  And they set the example for students.  (Well, now we are into politics.  Ignore what I just said.)

Another solution is to design better learning and assessment methods.

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In reply to Rick Jerz

Re: Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Mario Gharib -
Thanks Rick for this long and detailed and informative reply smile

OK, maybe I didn't say it loud before so here I go. The main reason for me to launch this discussion, is it see if it's possible to track students' activities from the beginning of their attempt till the end of it, including all the information that I've mentioned above, that's it. I am not trying to catch a cheater or an attempt to cheat, just want to have more details about what the student did during his or her attempt. 

As you said, the logs provided by Moodle, especially for an attempt, is good. I also believe it would be amazing if the logs for an attempt can be more detailed because it will allow us to get more data for what students did during their attempts. 

Thanks !
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In reply to Mario Gharib

Re: Tracking students' activities ONLY during their attempts

by Rick Jerz -
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Great, Mario.

So I think the answer to your original question is "no," Moodle doesn't log many of the items that you asked about. You can always create a Tracker item with your request, if there is not already one created.

Also, I am not sure what your server's logs track. There might be a partial solution to your needs.
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