Creating An Online Mid-term

Derek Nichols
Derek Nichols Blackbaud Employee
Ninth Anniversary Kudos 5 Name Dropper Participant
in Blackbaud K-12 Education Solutions™ Blog
End of term approaches and so to does mid-terms and final exams. Here's everything educators need to know including how to create an online mid-term using the Blackbaud Education management products.With Thanksgiving next week, I know we are all thinking about Turkey, football, and family but I want to make sure teachers are ready for the end of term. Teachers will be working on setting up their mid-term or final exams for their students in the next few weeks and they may need or want an exam students can take online. Online exams can be easily created using Assessments. Assessments can be added from the Assignment Center or Section assignments by selecting Add then Assessment:

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Once Assessment is selected, teachers will need to fill out the Details, Evaluation, and Publishing Options for the Assessment. There are some unique options that are available when adding an Assessment that are not available for other assignment types, including:
  • When adding Max points, teachers can select how the points are divided. They can select to divide the points equally among the questions or they can select to assign specific points for each question.
  • They can add a Time to complete the assessment and can select to Adjust individual student times if some students need additional time for IEPs or 504s.
  • They can allow multiple attempts on the Assessment.
  • They can randomize the questions.
  • They can allow students to save the assessment for later.
Once a teacher selects Save & add questions, they can start building the actual assessment. Teachers should be aware they can edit the settings for the assessment at any time by using Edit settings from the Assessment builder.

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There are three sections to the assessment.

Introduction
The introduction allows teachers to create a message for students at the beginning of the assessment. This could be used to provide instructions for students or briefly cover what will be included in the exam. There is a 2000-character limit on the introduction, but teachers can use the full WYSIWYG editor options. Students will also see the Time limit for the Assessment in the Introduction.

Questions
Teachers can add questions to their assessments under Questions. From the list on the left, teachers can drag a question type to their Assessment to add a question.

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Teachers should use Add Media to add audio files, links, embeds, and/or photos. There are four different question types that teachers can add to their assessments:

Essay:

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Teachers can use the Essay question type for open-ended questions. Teachers can add a character limit and allow students to use HTML in their answers.

Fill in the blank:

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Teachers can use Fill in the blank questions if they are looking for a specific answer. Teachers can provide a statement and add the correct answer in the available Answer text box. Students will need to provide the exact answer to receive credit. Teachers can add multiple acceptable answers by using a comma between potential responses.

Multiple choice:

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Teachers can add a question and provide multiple answer options. By default, teachers can add three answers, but teachers can add additional options using Add answer. Teachers need to select Correct for any answer that is considered true. There can be multiple correct answers.

True/False:

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Teachers can provide a statement and students can select either True or False in response. True and False can be changed to alternate values if needed. Teachers will need to select Correct for the correct answer.
Results
The last section to setup for an Assessment is Results. Under Results, you can decide what students should see once they submit their assessment. Teachers can select to Allow students to view results page and will then need to decide what information students can see. This can include:
  • Show questions on the results page along with the points earned and the correct answers.
  • Show the amount of time used to complete the assessment
  • Show take again button if multiple attempts are enabled
Once a teacher has finished creating their assessment, they can publish it to students when they are ready for students to take their exam. There are a couple of things teachers should keep in mind when they are building their assessment:
  • If you are copying and pasting text into the Assessment, make sure to select Paste as plain text. This will strip out any unwanted or troublesome HTML.
  • If you are creating an assessment with more than 40 questions, you might want to try splitting the exam up. There can be performance issues with bigger assessments so splitting them up will circumvent these issues.
  • Once students start taking the assessment, it can no longer be edited.
If teachers are looking for additional information around assessments, they should check out our Assessments guide documentation.


Please note that our team is hard at work redesigning the assessments experience for students and teachers. Stay tuned for more information on the upcoming Assessments EAP!

Comments

  • Br. Michael Fugger
    Br. Michael Fugger
    Sixth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Facilitator 1

    Assessment module shortcomings

    All of this is wonderful to remember. However without some secure way to give a high-stakes exam like this type, the assessment module in Blackbaud is useless to me and the other teachers at my school. There was a thread a couple years ago asking Blackbaud to add a secure browser option to the assessment module, but that suggestion had its status changed to Unlikely to Implement. We had high hopes we could cut back on purchasing scan test forms, but since we cannot lock down the browser during exams, we are still doing our semester exams with paper and pencil. If any teacher uses the assessment module for high stakes testing, be prepared to play a game of whack-a-mole with your students as they determine the best way to gain an unfair advantage while taking the exam unless the exam is open book/ open note. I also find the note about splitting up assessments to have no more than forty questions somewhat disconcerting. I don't remember seeing this caution note before. It seems that is just another possible failure point with using the assessment module. Any problem during the last days of a semester is the last issue any teacher wants with grade deadlines looming. The assessment module is a feature that we cannot use to its fullest extent because of the lack of a secure way to administer the test.

  • David Sartory
    David Sartory
    Ninth Anniversary Kudos 2 Name Dropper Facilitator 1

    Have any of the many, many problems with the assessment module been addressed? There are dozens of old posts, comments, support tickets, and discussions about how unreliable the module is and I watch the releases carefully. I haven't seen an assessment update of note. Assessments are essentially broken unless used perfectly in a vacuum… why is there no update on this but we're being encouraged to use them more?

  • Ben Leddy
    Ben Leddy
    Fourth Anniversary Kudos 3 Name Dropper Participant

    Ben from the LMS team here. Thank you for your feedback. I'm happy to share we are working on a redesign for the assessments experience, which you can learn more about it from the Q4 2021 Product Update Briefing at the 33:40 mark. If you are interested in participating in the Early Adopter Program (EAP) for the new experience when it is available, feel free to reach out at ben.leddy@blackbaud.com.

  • Demian Richardson
    Demian Richardson
    First Anniversary Facilitator 1

    Engaging with the Essay write service has offered me a unique platform to explore and express the intricate layers of human thought and experience, check more https//paperwriter.com/presentation-writer. As an essayist, I am driven by the desire to delve deep into various subjects, examining them through the lens of personal insight and intellectual rigor. My goal is to transform complex ideas into compelling narratives that resonate with readers on a profound level.

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