I just found out that once a student takes a quiz that I as the administrator am unable to modify the quiz. In other words, I can't fix a problem that the student discovered.
This seems over restrictive. Is there way to work around this, or have I misunderstood Moodle?
Bill
(Moodle 1.8.2)
Bill - What type of modification are you trying to make. You cannot remove questions as that would impact all the other users who have tried the quiz. If you could provide a little more detail about your situation perhaps someone can give a suggestion about how to accomplish what you are hoping for. I have found Moodle to be quite flexible and adaptable. Peace - Anthony
I am thinking of a situation where the first student takes a quiz and then contacts me that there is a misspelling or one of the questions is not clear. As things stand, I can't fix the problem for other students.
In a classroom setting I would stop the quiz and clarify the unclear question. I need that kind of flexibility in Moodle as well. It is then my responsibility to fix it with that first student.
Thanks.
Bill
In a classroom setting I would stop the quiz and clarify the unclear question. I need that kind of flexibility in Moodle as well. It is then my responsibility to fix it with that first student.
Thanks.
Bill
Bill,
An editing teacher, or any user with equivalent or greater editing rights, can edit a question even after the quiz has been attempted by students.
As Anthony says, it is not possible to delete a question once a quiz has been attempted. It's also not possible to add new questions to a quiz once a quiz has been attempted. However, it is always possible to edit questions. It is even possible to change which possible answer is teated as correct. However, when doing this, you will have to click on the 'regrade' link in the Results screen.
The only reason why people might not be able to edit a question is that it belongs to another 'teacher'. Although this restriction does not apply to admins.
There are a number of ways to edit questions. One way is to open a preview of a quiz and then click on the editing a 'hand' to the left of the question. Another way is to click on the link to a quiz, then click on the 'Edit' tab. You'll then see a list of all the questions in the quiz. Click on the editing a 'hand' to the right of the question name to edit it.
Hope this helps.
An editing teacher, or any user with equivalent or greater editing rights, can edit a question even after the quiz has been attempted by students.
As Anthony says, it is not possible to delete a question once a quiz has been attempted. It's also not possible to add new questions to a quiz once a quiz has been attempted. However, it is always possible to edit questions. It is even possible to change which possible answer is teated as correct. However, when doing this, you will have to click on the 'regrade' link in the Results screen.
The only reason why people might not be able to edit a question is that it belongs to another 'teacher'. Although this restriction does not apply to admins.
There are a number of ways to edit questions. One way is to open a preview of a quiz and then click on the editing a 'hand' to the left of the question. Another way is to click on the link to a quiz, then click on the 'Edit' tab. You'll then see a list of all the questions in the quiz. Click on the editing a 'hand' to the right of the question name to edit it.
Hope this helps.
In reply to Peter Ruthven-Stuart
Re: How modify quiz after a student has taken it
by Stephen Francis -
There is a genuine problem here that hopefully will be ironed out in future Moodle upgrades. I'll clarify
1) If the question is edited, no problem, say a spelling mistake, or a re-word. This is fine, edit away. HOWEVER, if you click on the quiz/test that the student did, it will display the edited version of the question not the real one he or she attempted. This is a silly problem but none the less, not accurate. The Moodle test is not "stored" as such, the previous attempts just point to the question id, albeit now the question is different from before.
2) If you want to move, delete or add a question, then you will have to delete ALL the attempts that have been made. However, there is a hack for this problem so that you don't have to delete the attempts, but it has problems. The previous attempts will not be solid. I'll give you an example. A guy sits a 10 question test. Now you add one through the hack method. If you review his test it will say the test was 11 questions, but it wasn't when he sat it.
The problem is inherent in the way Moodle stores data, or doesn't in this case. We would certainly want to see test/quiz data pulled and stored so that things can be changed without corrupting past attempts and past data. Hope Tim can clarify whether these solved or not in the future.
1) If the question is edited, no problem, say a spelling mistake, or a re-word. This is fine, edit away. HOWEVER, if you click on the quiz/test that the student did, it will display the edited version of the question not the real one he or she attempted. This is a silly problem but none the less, not accurate. The Moodle test is not "stored" as such, the previous attempts just point to the question id, albeit now the question is different from before.
2) If you want to move, delete or add a question, then you will have to delete ALL the attempts that have been made. However, there is a hack for this problem so that you don't have to delete the attempts, but it has problems. The previous attempts will not be solid. I'll give you an example. A guy sits a 10 question test. Now you add one through the hack method. If you review his test it will say the test was 11 questions, but it wasn't when he sat it.
The problem is inherent in the way Moodle stores data, or doesn't in this case. We would certainly want to see test/quiz data pulled and stored so that things can be changed without corrupting past attempts and past data. Hope Tim can clarify whether these solved or not in the future.
Stephen - I think that the Moodle quiz module is designed for stability. It would be easy to get things out of sync otherwise. What you mention as problems can actually be considered features.
In case 1 where you had a question that was not worded as well as you would like and may have been misleading you have the option of counting it as having 0 weight for the quiz - essentially removing that question from the quiz. You could then create a better question. I see it as the debate between how do you fairly handle a quiz you have made photocopies of for class and then find a mistake. You can tell the second class about it but then how do you handle the first class. In any case, however you would handle that situation is how you should handle it with Moodle. I personally like only having one version of a question - it would get too complicated trying to figure out which version of a question I was looking at. The idea is to assess the students ability to recognize a particular piece of knowledge. I believe that the simplicity of a single version is important.
In case 2, to delete a question, I simply count that question as being worth 0 marks. I'm not overly concerned with moving a question especially considering that I typically gave a lot of random questions on mine. I don't use the hack, if I want some additional assessment I create another quiz.
I think that simplicity for the end users trumps being able to go back and look at various versions. In order for assessments to provide meaningful information and be used to compare one student's achievement with another the assessment tool itself cannot be changing.
There are ways around these situations with the Moodle quiz module but it sounds like a little planning could go a long way in preventing the problem. Of course I was frequently writing my quizzes just moments before I told students that they would be available.
I encourage you to continue to think of ways in which the quiz module can be more useful for teachers and students. Keep the fresh ideas coming as that is what helps to drive Moodle forward. Peace - Anthony
In case 1 where you had a question that was not worded as well as you would like and may have been misleading you have the option of counting it as having 0 weight for the quiz - essentially removing that question from the quiz. You could then create a better question. I see it as the debate between how do you fairly handle a quiz you have made photocopies of for class and then find a mistake. You can tell the second class about it but then how do you handle the first class. In any case, however you would handle that situation is how you should handle it with Moodle. I personally like only having one version of a question - it would get too complicated trying to figure out which version of a question I was looking at. The idea is to assess the students ability to recognize a particular piece of knowledge. I believe that the simplicity of a single version is important.
In case 2, to delete a question, I simply count that question as being worth 0 marks. I'm not overly concerned with moving a question especially considering that I typically gave a lot of random questions on mine. I don't use the hack, if I want some additional assessment I create another quiz.
I think that simplicity for the end users trumps being able to go back and look at various versions. In order for assessments to provide meaningful information and be used to compare one student's achievement with another the assessment tool itself cannot be changing.
There are ways around these situations with the Moodle quiz module but it sounds like a little planning could go a long way in preventing the problem. Of course I was frequently writing my quizzes just moments before I told students that they would be available.
I encourage you to continue to think of ways in which the quiz module can be more useful for teachers and students. Keep the fresh ideas coming as that is what helps to drive Moodle forward. Peace - Anthony
You are absolutely right about how moodle should work. However, you have to appreciate that it is very difficult to do.
What you are asking for is normally called 'versioning'. That is, Moodle tracks every version of each question and quiz (similar to the way that CVS tracks the Moodle code) and records the exact version of each question that each student sees, so review pages can reproduce exactly what the student saw. (Or give the teacher the option to change things, for example using an enhanced regrade interface.) Oh, and for the sake of the database you probably don't want to store every single version, for instance if the teacher makes two edits in quick succession, and no student attempts the quiz between the two.
But as I say, this is very difficult. There was an attempt to introduce this around the Moodle 1.5/1.6 time-frame before I started workinng on the quiz, but they got half-way and then ran out of time, so the only effect was to leave irrelevant junk in the code.
Currently there are many other things about the quiz that I think would give much more benefit for the amount of developer time expended, so having another go at implementing versioning is not a priority for me.
What you are asking for is normally called 'versioning'. That is, Moodle tracks every version of each question and quiz (similar to the way that CVS tracks the Moodle code) and records the exact version of each question that each student sees, so review pages can reproduce exactly what the student saw. (Or give the teacher the option to change things, for example using an enhanced regrade interface.) Oh, and for the sake of the database you probably don't want to store every single version, for instance if the teacher makes two edits in quick succession, and no student attempts the quiz between the two.
But as I say, this is very difficult. There was an attempt to introduce this around the Moodle 1.5/1.6 time-frame before I started workinng on the quiz, but they got half-way and then ran out of time, so the only effect was to leave irrelevant junk in the code.
Currently there are many other things about the quiz that I think would give much more benefit for the amount of developer time expended, so having another go at implementing versioning is not a priority for me.
Anthony and Tim,
I have to say I agree with the the point that having versions is making things complicated. What I was hoping for is that the student record of the attempt is stored, almost like a hard copy, or saved. This means you always get to have the "hard copy" of the test he/she sat whatever happens to the question bank, the question or the test. If this was possible it means you don't need "versioning" to solve my problem. It means you can do what you like with regards editing questions, changing the tests etc because the tests that were previously sat are "saved" in the report. This doesn't seem such a difficult thing to do, but then I'm very green on this.
Steve
I have to say I agree with the the point that having versions is making things complicated. What I was hoping for is that the student record of the attempt is stored, almost like a hard copy, or saved. This means you always get to have the "hard copy" of the test he/she sat whatever happens to the question bank, the question or the test. If this was possible it means you don't need "versioning" to solve my problem. It means you can do what you like with regards editing questions, changing the tests etc because the tests that were previously sat are "saved" in the report. This doesn't seem such a difficult thing to do, but then I'm very green on this.
Steve
Steve - It still sounds like versioning - just not as extensive. You would need to keep the version the student took which means saving those questions somewhere which of course is extra disk space. While I like the idea in theory I wonder how practical it is and how much need there really is. I can see that every once in a while it can be helpful but I have also been OK without it. Peace - Anthony
Hi Anthony,
Just for your own sake I'll give you an example. I have 50 questions on Weather. The test gives all 50 questions to the students. However, a new question now comes out about weather. I have to add it to the weather question bank/category and the weather test itself. But i can't. Adding to the bank is not a problem, adding to the test is because of previous attempts. It is not practical creating a new test every time and calling it Weather Test 1, 2, 3 etc. After a year I'll have hundreds because this is just one topic, we have about 200 topics in total each with new questions coming in every few months. I just cannot keep wiping students records to add in new questions to the tests. We have potential 300 students are year on working on these tests to prepare for their exams.
Hope you can see now.
Just for your own sake I'll give you an example. I have 50 questions on Weather. The test gives all 50 questions to the students. However, a new question now comes out about weather. I have to add it to the weather question bank/category and the weather test itself. But i can't. Adding to the bank is not a problem, adding to the test is because of previous attempts. It is not practical creating a new test every time and calling it Weather Test 1, 2, 3 etc. After a year I'll have hundreds because this is just one topic, we have about 200 topics in total each with new questions coming in every few months. I just cannot keep wiping students records to add in new questions to the tests. We have potential 300 students are year on working on these tests to prepare for their exams.
Hope you can see now.
Stephen - Thanks for explaining your situation. The way I handle a similar situation is with random questions and allowing multiple attempts. My students get a comprehensive final. In your weather example, I would create a quiz with 25-30 random questions on it from the category. That way it does not matter when I add a question to the category. If the student takes another attempt then he/she will have an opportunity to see the question. The more students take the test the better prepared they will be. Will the exam have all 51 questions? Or will it be a random selection from the 51 questions? My students took multiple attempts of a sample final exam before the actual exam. Might this or a similar approach work for you and your students? Peace - Anthony
We're certainly getting there. Your suggestion might just be the best way. Set a test for 30 random questions and if they repeat the attempt enough times, then they will have seen all of them. However, I have banks with 150 questions, the students will have to do that a fair lot to eventually see all of them and it would be just the student's luck to have a question in the real exam that the random generation system never threw up for him. Perhaps they and myself will have to live with that compromise. I need to think more on this. Greatly appreciate your ideas Anthony.
Stephen - I would need a mathematician to help me recall how to calculate this. But if you were to give 100 random questions out of 150 - you should be able to calculate the number of attempts necessary to theoretically ensure that you have covered a certain percentage of the questions. I know that for my final exam students averaged about 20-30 attempts of the sample final which was one third the length of the actual final. Keep it small allowed for them to try multiple time. In addition, I used the quiz block and posted the class with the highest average so it created a little competition. The comprehensive final which counted as 20% of the final grade typically raised the class average by a point which means most students scored 5 points higher on the exam than their grade was prior to the exam. The repetition seems to help and I like the idea of simulating the actual exam which they not surprisingly took on Moodle (supervised in a computer lab). Peace - Anthony
Perhaps one thing to consider adding would be the ability to 'retire' a random question, so that all prior attempts on it would still be considered, but it would never be chosen for future test attempts. This would allow you to have the ability to keep the questions current, retain attempts, and have a history for quiz analysis.
Of course, I'm a big advocate for random questions from large pools, so this sort of an answer makes sense to me.
Thanks,
Matt
Of course, I'm a big advocate for random questions from large pools, so this sort of an answer makes sense to me.
Thanks,
Matt
Matt - I have not tested the idea, but is this not the behavior you would get if you deleted a question that had previously been used on a quiz? Perhaps Tim might have a clearer idea but this is the behavior that I would expect. Peace - Anthony
Tim,
Versioning is a good idea but difficult to build.
However having a quiz that you cannot access to the original question gave you a more difficult problem.
Just consider the usual case of "legally" having the students records so you can justify the grading done.
In my own university we must keep the students exams at least 6 months.
There is also all the bugs that can be generated (i.e. MDL-13575).
What can be done easily is to prohibit any changes in a question if it has been used in a quiz by just allowing saving the question as a new question.
This is a kind of semi-manual versioning with little code changes but no more grading or breaking questions...
Pierre
P.S. Changing a question in a used quiz will be consider illegal if the quiz is printed on paper.
Versioning is a good idea but difficult to build.
However having a quiz that you cannot access to the original question gave you a more difficult problem.
Just consider the usual case of "legally" having the students records so you can justify the grading done.
In my own university we must keep the students exams at least 6 months.
There is also all the bugs that can be generated (i.e. MDL-13575).
What can be done easily is to prohibit any changes in a question if it has been used in a quiz by just allowing saving the question as a new question.
This is a kind of semi-manual versioning with little code changes but no more grading or breaking questions...
Pierre
P.S. Changing a question in a used quiz will be consider illegal if the quiz is printed on paper.
Think we're talking about 3 different things.
first: a place where questions are stored. And can be modified, added, changed etc.
second: a place where the questions are grouped together to be used for teaching. Some things are no problem if they are changed after a test is taken and other items should not be permitted to change.
Third: a place where the final results are stored and nothing is allowed to be changed.
Three different places with different ways of using a question. They shouldn't be mixed up and/or hacked?.
Hans.
Hans,
However, in Moodle the questions are stored in one place i.e. in the database.
So what we want to specify, are the questions control code to create these three virtual places.
"Some things are no problem if they are changed after a test is taken and other items should not be permitted to change."
As we want an common question handling and because there is no simple way to define which "item" can be or not changed , the proposal is to not allow any changes.
If you have a problem with a given question in a quiz, the ways to handle it are
Pierre
P.S.in MDL-10376 the cloze question was changed because MULTICHOICE was misspelled. Correcting this create a new question set and the older one was destroyed (partly or completely ). This is why the question was "broken".
However, in Moodle the questions are stored in one place i.e. in the database.
So what we want to specify, are the questions control code to create these three virtual places.
"Some things are no problem if they are changed after a test is taken and other items should not be permitted to change."
As we want an common question handling and because there is no simple way to define which "item" can be or not changed , the proposal is to not allow any changes.
If you have a problem with a given question in a quiz, the ways to handle it are
- create a new question and rebuild a new quiz either a complete one or just with the new question.
- manually grade the existing question without changing the quiz.
- ...
Pierre
P.S.in MDL-10376 the cloze question was changed because MULTICHOICE was misspelled. Correcting this create a new question set and the older one was destroyed (partly or completely ). This is why the question was "broken".
Hallo,
I agree with Bill...
In a class room, you conceive, for example, a listening activity for French learners, and you want to use the quiz module which is very practical for this kind of activity.
Even if you are very experienced, you will always have to adjust your questions because it is the students' results which are YOUR feedback:
- maybe your formulation is misunderstood (then you can change the question, ok) but
- maybe there are 2 or 3 questions missing (as an example, students might need some more global understanding questions or maybe they don't understand the logical relationship between two facts so you will have to add one or too questions to guide them better), and that is not possible.
I think tests and quizzes etc should always be adjustable, (by editing teachers): you have to verify and adjust your teaching and course.
Ulrike