Question Bank at Category Level Moved to “Shared teaching resources” Course After Upgrade to Moodle 5.0

Question Bank at Category Level Moved to “Shared teaching resources” Course After Upgrade to Moodle 5.0

Rakhshanda Ariz -
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Hello,

I’ve recently upgraded my staging site to Moodle 5.0 and transferred data from my live site, which was running Moodle 4.5. On the Moodle 4.5 site, I had created Question Banks at the course category level for shared use across multiple courses.

However, after the upgrade, I noticed that those category-level question banks have been moved into a new course named “Shared teaching resources,” which has automatically appeared under the main course category.

Could you please clarify:

  • Why did this automatic migration happen?

  • Is this an intentional change in Moodle 5.0?

  • Did I miss any recommended steps during the upgrade process that would have preserved the category-level structure?

Any guidance on restoring the original organization or understanding the logic behind this shift would be appreciated.

Thank you.

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回复Rakhshanda Ariz

Question Bank at Category Level Moved to “Shared teaching resources” Course After Upgrade to Moodle 5.0

Rick Jerz -
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  1. The automatic migration happened because that was the best method for the new question-bank structure of Moodle 5.
  2. Yes, intentional.
  3. No, you didn't miss any steps.  In Moodle 5, there is no "category" level (nor any system level, either.)

The following links can contain some guidance.

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回复Rick Jerz

Question Bank at Category Level Moved to “Shared teaching resources” Course After Upgrade to Moodle 5.0

Rakhshanda Ariz -

Thank you very much for your helpful response!

I would appreciate your further guidance on a couple of points to ensure we make the best decisions for the long-term sustainability of our Moodle site:

  1. We are currently on Moodle 4.5, where the Question Bank resides at the course category level. After testing the upgrade on a staging site, we noticed that post-migration to Moodle 5, the Question Bank shifts either to "Shared teaching resources for Category: (Course name)" or to the "System shared question bank." Would you recommend proceeding with this migration path, or could this lead to complications in future Moodle updates?

  2. Is there a way to prepare or restructure the Question Bank on our Moodle 4.5 site before migration, so it aligns better with Moodle 5’s new infrastructure? Ideally, we would want the questions to reside at the course or quiz level post-migration to maintain clarity and ease of use.

We’re looking for a sustainable approach that would serve our organisation well in the long run and align with Moodle’s expected evolution.

Thanks again for your time and support!

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回复Rakhshanda Ariz

Question Bank at Category Level Moved to “Shared teaching resources” Course After Upgrade to Moodle 5.0

Rick Jerz -
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You ask good questions. I can give you my thoughts, and maybe others can give theirs.

I have not upgraded my Moodle 4.5. I have a brand new Moodle 5, and I am redoing my courses and question bank. Here is what I have observed:

If I backup/restore a Moodle 4.5 course that had questions in the System, Category, Course, and levels, these come into a Moodle 5 course-level question bank named "System shared question bank." The question categories are quite nicely organized, just like they were in Moodle 4.5. This "System shared question bank" is "owned" by the teachers in this course. Any teacher in this course can use questions from the "System shared question bank" in any other course that they teach. So you haven't given up anything, and perhaps your teachers now have an easier way to share questions.

However, the problem is that for every course that was using Moodle 4.5 "Category" and "System" banks, all questions are also repeated in every course. So you probably end up with a lot of repeated questions, and you somewhat might lose the concept of a "common" question that when edited, everyone will see. This is where some extra effort will have to be invested, from how I see it.
 
(You mention two shared banks showing.  Perhaps this is what happens when Moodle 4.5 is upgraded to Moodle 5.  I don't know.)

So, you can designate one course as the "Master." However, other courses will then need to edit their quizzes and link back to the Master Course questions, if you desire to retain "common" questions. Yep, some effort, but then some better sharing. And in the long run, this might be best. In the short run, it might create some confusion.

So, a lot of one's strategy will depend on where you want to end up, and how much effort you want to invest.

Here is what I am doing (since you kinda asked.)

I began with a brand new Moodle 5, and configured it according to my notes about how I customized Moodle 4. Then, I imported questions from Moodle 4.5 into Moodle 5, a "Master Course" and made sure to carefully organize them into sub-categories. I backed up my Moodle 4.5 courses, without users, and without questions, then restored these in Moodle 5. These restored courses do not contain quizzes when restored, so I am adding the quizzes back into them, and re-adding questions into each quiz by using questions from the Master Course. Even though I am my Moodle's administrator, what I am doing is what a typical teacher might do. This process might take me around 8 hours per course (I am not finished, yet). I have around four courses to worry about (i.e., to teach). But, I am in it for the long run, so I can accept this "time" investment.  And it allows me to rethink and clean up my question bank. However, I suspect that many teachers would complain.


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回复Rick Jerz

Question Bank at Category Level Moved to “Shared teaching resources” Course After Upgrade to Moodle 5.0

Emma Richardson -
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8 hours per course?  Teachers are going to do more than complain!!  This question bank change has me very wary of upgrading...

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回复Emma Richardson

Question Bank at Category Level Moved to “Shared teaching resources” Course After Upgrade to Moodle 5.0

Rick Jerz -
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Yep, that's my estimate. In my one course, I have around 40 quizzes. Three were a bit complex, too. But, once I am done, things will be easy for the next 3 years.

In two of my smaller courses that had 1 to 8 simple quizzes, it took me around 3 hours.

All this being said, if you choose to import a course "with" questions, like Rakhshanda, then you do not need to redo the quizzes, maybe live with a little disorganized course-level bank, and perhaps have some duplicate questions.

You somewhat need to experience this to understand what is going on. Experiment!
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回复Rick Jerz

Question Bank at Category Level Moved to “Shared teaching resources” Course After Upgrade to Moodle 5.0

Rakhshanda Ariz -

Here we have two scenarios, along with an experiment that seems to work well for my needs — and I’d really appreciate your feedback on it.

Scenario 1: Using Master Courses to Represent Category-Level Question Banks

Create a “Master” course per category to act as a central repository for questions.
For example, if a teacher is added to a Master course for a specific subject, she gain access to all question banks within that course — including those not relevant to her.

  • I currently have 82 courses across 20 categories, which results in 20 Master courses showing on the site homepage.
  • While I can hide these from students, they remain visible to admins, which could lead to a cluttered interface.

Scenario 2: Exporting Courses from Moodle 4.5 to 5 and System-Level Question Banks

When exporting courses from Moodle 4.5 with question banks stored at the category level, Moodle 5 creates a system-level question bank on the new site, and the question banks are transferred there.
However, when I create a new course directly in Moodle 5, a system-level question bank is not created — or may be i don’t know how to do that.

Therefore, for all newly created categories and courses on the Moodle 5 site, I’ll need to rely on the new structure — using question banks either at the quiz level or course level.

Experiment That Seems Most Suitable (Feedback Requested)

To better align with Moodle 5’s new infrastructure, I tested the following approach:

  1. In Moodle 4.5, I moved all question banks to the quiz level using drag-and-drop feature in 4.5.
  2. I then migrated the site to a new domain running Moodle 5.
  3. After the transfer:
  • All quiz activities and their associated question banks remained intact.
  • Now i can move questions from quiz level to course level within Moodle 5 as needed.

This method seems clean, preserves structure, and offers flexibility after migration.

Has anyone else tried a similar approach?
Would love to hear your feedback — especially regarding any possible limitations or better alternatives I might have missed.

Thanks in advance!

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