I made this video based on what I have been learning about the new question banks in Moodle 5. I plan to revise this video frequently with new or updated information. Right now, the title slide shows “March 2025.”
I welcome questions, comments, and suggestions for improvement.
Nice !
I've watched the whole thing and have these comments:
You say (6'25") that question-level "mini-banks" is a new feature in Moodle 5.
That is not (exactly) true; such containers have always existed, only the difference now is that they cannot be named "share-able" in Moodle 5's terms. I recognize, though, that the way you present it like this makes the whole story simpler ;) .
7'50" - Probably worth advising that after a course is duplicated, the quizzes in there could be renamed slightly (by the teacher), so the quiz names don't repeat in the question instances report. An improvement suggestion to the devs could be for the question instances reports to also list course names (eg. short course names) & links to them?
8'18" - the fact that changing the question in a later / duplicated course / quiz does not change the earlier question instance can be an ASSET. I would not want to auto-update courses that already took place and are closed. (Of course, with question history enabled, and specific versions rather than always "latest" versions of questions used in a quiz, we can "protect" older, "archived" courses also if (shared) (course-level) question banks are used).
I like how you conclude that "Kathy is happy" and that she can continue improving the course over time
Great idea of the "honesty question" ;)
10:48 - yes, that duplicated name of the question bank after course duplication IS confusing. I think maybe "(copy)" should be added to the back of the original question bank's name in a course copy ? (BTW: what's not yet stated yet is that question banks can be "default" for a course, but one can also add more than one...)
11:48 - BY the way : Quizzes without questions in them could - in the course editing mode - bear some warning flags, I think. Another improvement suggestion for the developers perhaps...
12:40 - Maybe I would add here that such decisions need to be taken carefully; after you move questions from quizzes to course-level question banks, there's no easy way back.
14:03 - caveat - the author if the imported question is now Kathy , NOT the original teacher. Creation date is the date of the import.. Maybe a point worth mentioning with your final notes , like the one about copyright?
Overall, you mention question versioning a little, perhaps sufficiently. For me, though, this is a feature I have yet to learn how to explain to my users best, and how to control it if needed. Your caveat note at 17:00 is good; but when you once refer to that question version here - 14:35 - I thought : hmm, why alert the viewer about this fact specifically here, all of a sudden? What's the significance ? So, maybe in the next version of the video you could treat the question versioning aspect more systematically along the way? Hmm.
GREAT STUFF !!!
I only hope some of my comments make sense.
Cheers and THANKS !
Przemek
The default behavior for a duplicated course is that questions are also duplicated (i.e., independent from the original course-level bank). Only quiz questions from a different course’s course-level bank are linked (i.e., auto-updated when changes are made). I plan to mention this a little more strongly in my next version of this video.
The teacher, Kathy, is happy because she has her new course, which looks like her old one. She does not need to start from scratch.
Do you think she should not be happy? If so, why?
>> Great idea of the "honesty question" ;)
This illustrates the power of a course-level bank. It is done similarly in Moodle 4. I demonstrate that it can still be achieved in Moodle 5 through a course-level bank.
(10:48)
Yes, maybe adding “(copy)” would be helpful.
Yes, a course can have more than one course-level bank. I prefer using only one course-level bank and then categories to organize questions, but some might want to use more question banks.
In this post, Tim asks "Do we add a yes/no option here, to say "This question bank can only be used in this course?" I said yes. Otherwise, the teacher might see many course-level banks from "old" courses. Instead of adding "copy" to every new course, I think it might be better to tell teachers to hide any course-level banks that they no longer desire to see.
(11:48)
Perhaps, but then you would want this feature for all activities and resources, not just quizzes. This might require some effort. I hide activities and resources until they're ready. You might want to create a Tracker item for your idea that empty quizzes should provide a note to the teacher that they are empty.
(12:40)
I am still trying to understand a scenario where moving a question from a course-level bank to a quiz-level bank is beneficial. Could you provide a couple of examples?
(14:03)
Yes. This has always been the case for imported questions. Perhaps the “Import” dialog box should include a textbox for “author” that defaults to the name of the person performing the import, but can be easily changed to any name.
For example, when I import questions from the publisher, I want to see “McGraw-Hill" listed as the creator, not my name. It's fine for my name to appear after I edit a publisher question.
(Tagging Questions - Your last comments)
Some might believe that tagging a question doesn’t generate a new version. Perhaps I can mention in the video that any modification to a question will produce a new version. I believe that sharing question banks will significantly enhance the value of question versioning.
(6:25) > Relative to #2 > "When copying a course, questions in either quiz-level or course-level banks are duplicated and independent."
I must say I never noticed such duplications for quiz level QB's... I keep promising myself to investigate this further..
But then: does "copying a course" mean strictly following this path from the course source page:
More... > Course reuse > Copy course ?
or possibly also
More... > Course reuse > Backup , and then Restore
- as a new course ?
- or into an existing course > "Delete the contents of this course and then restore" ?
Let alone choosing to "Merge the backup course into this course"
There's of course also More ... > Course reuse > Import etc. from the target course.... (not a full course-copy but pretty close).
As far as I remember, there are inconsistencies here in how the various backups + restores work..
(7:50)
What I meant was the action of renaming the questions in the duplicated quiz/zes... Too much work & hassle, I agree, so I strongly welcome this move: https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=466692#p1874001 . THANKS !
(8:18)
I'll follow your next version and try to give this some more thought and testing attention
Kathy is DESERVEDLY happy there. No word puns or irony intended on my part
(10:48)
I concede I need to closely re-read that post from Tim (Oct 2023) and then compare it against the current M5 implementation.
(11:48)
That was just an aside, maybe an idea for the future, maybe not.
(12:40)
One possible scenario: Quiz-level QBs used like a recycle bin - I'd move there questions I no longer need, but really don't want to delete, or bother about their (potentially) shared status. They have been sitting in my course QB for a time, but proved of little practical value. I want to retire them, but I'm a keeper too , so ...;) . Also - importing from such a course I can easily exclude "recycle-bin quizzes"...
(14:03)
We're both agreed there. Similar questions are asked regarding H5P activity files and their ownership and licensing.
Tagging and versioning
I think we're aligned in our opinions there
THANKS !
Przemek