Question Library

The Question Library is a central repository that stores and archives questions which you can reuse within a course. You can create multiple collections within the Question Library to organize your questions by type and topic, making it easier for you to find questions for your quizzes, surveys, and self assessments.

As a best practice for storage, organization, and easy access, DIID recommends that you create all your questions using the Question Library. You can also consolidate questions created within the Quizzes, Surveys, and Self Assessments tools by importing them back into the Question Library. The Algonquin Quiz Generator is a powerful tool that can be used to turn text-based questions into Brightspace quiz questions of various question types.

Question Types Available in Brightspace

• 1. True or False (T/F)

  2. Multiple Choice (M/C)

  3. Multi-Select (M-S)

  4. Written Response (WR)

  5. Short Answer (SA)

  6. Multi-Short Answer (MSA)

  7. Fill in the Blanks (FIB)

  8. Matching (MAT)

  9. Ordering (ORD)

  10. Arithmetic (2+2)

  11. Significant Figures (x10)

• Depending on the question type deployed, instructors can prepare feedback, craft Initial Text to help students start an essay, offer learners a Hint with optional suggestions or clarifications, write Description text and record Answer Keys for instructor records, and add an image to supplement the question (with alternative). 

• Instructors can check both boxes on Written Response questions to  enable the HTML Editor for learner responses and also allow learners to insert images and add attachments to maximize learner submission options.

Whether you present questions by pools, categories, or groups of questions, DIID recommends showing students as many quiz questions at once as your program, quiz, and proctoring arrangement will allow.

• Showing the maximum number of questions you can gives students an opportunity to easily skip over, move forward, and come back to a question that might take them more time.

• Showing the maximum number of questions you can means the student can set a realistic individual pace for quiz completion.

• It is many more clicks for students to take a quiz that stretches across many pages. There is a greater probability a student will get lost in the quiz if backtracking is allowed OR run out of time due to each individual quiz page loading times, etc.

• There is a greater potential for a specific quiz page/question to not load correctly or for connectivity issues to affect quiz performance if the quiz stretches across many pages.

• Brightspace now autosaves each question response no matter the pagination, where previously, student question responses had to be manually saved by learners to save results prior to quiz submission.

• Note: If you are using Honorlock, consider limiting the number of questions visible per page to discourage attempts to overcome the recording requirement (turning off wifi mid-quiz, etc.) If you have adopted Honorlock, regularly review the student recordings.

Integrity by Design

• To discourage cheating in quizzes, instructors can shuffle the order of all questions in quizzes or specific groups of questions (sections) in quizzes. When a quiz contains shuffled questions, each learner receives a quiz with a unique question order. For example, you could shuffle questions 1-10 in a quiz, or shuffle questions 3-10 (grouping those questions into a section) and retain the order of questions 1-2 at the start of the quiz. 

• If students are allowed multiple attempts on a quiz set to shuffle, the questions will shuffle for each attempt. This may make it more difficult for them to improve their scores. 

• If a quiz is built using a question pool, questions will be different on subsequent allowed attempts. DIID recommends setting the quiz so that only incorrect questions are presented to students on subsequent attempts to prevent them from getting new questions.

• DIID recommends setting a due date for each quiz, at a minimum. Start and end dates can also be used to control quiz access. Students must begin their quiz before the end time. Note that students can go past the end time if their time limit allows it. However if they are booted from the quiz for any reason (lose power, browser freezes) they will not be able to re-enter because the time period will have expired. 

• You can require a Password for students to use in order to take the quiz. Professors most often will display this password in the classroom when the quiz is administered, to ensure that students are present.

• Be sure to check your Quiz Submission View settings to ensure early Quiz completers are unable to share correct answers with other users.

Quiz Restrictions

Honorlock

• Honorlock is the on-demand proctoring service used at NICC and is integrated into the Quizzes tool in Brightspace. As an NICC instructor, you may choose to use this service for some, none, or all of the quizzes in your class. 

• Use of a webcam, microphone, and Google Chrome is required with Honorlock. Students will also need to install an Honorlock Chrome Extension. 

• If students are unable to meet the technical requirements required by Honorlock, instructors can choose to make alternate testing arrangements with students, or allow students to bypass the proctoring requirement.

Quiz Timing

• A Recommended Time Limit will not force a student to finish the quiz at the end of the duration, and you have the option to hide the clock. 

• An Enforced Time Limit will force a student to finish the quiz at the end of the duration. You can also allow a grace period, which allows students extra time to submit the quiz. This is helpful to students who may have lost track of time, or have a poor connection that slowed their quiz submission process. 

• You can allow users Special Access if they require a longer time limit, different dates, or multiple attempts 

• Brightspace now allows for a 'No Time Limit' setting where no recommended time to complete is communicated to the learner.

• DIID recommends instructors include a syllabus quiz at the beginning of the course to verify students’ understanding of important course information and offer students a low-stakes opportunity to test out the Quiz tool.

• Instructors have the option to give learners multiple quiz attempts on quizzes, including the option to limit learners to only retake incorrectly answered questions from previous quiz attempts.

• When considering time limits and attempts, DIID recommends only limiting quiz attempts and forcing time limits on summative assessments.

• When Automatically Publish Evaluation is turned on quizzes will be marked as graded as soon as an attempt is submitted. This will then display the default Submission View for the quiz (score only by default). The score displayed is only what the system can auto-grade; any long response or short answer questions must be manually graded. DIID recommends communicating this in advance to learners, as the student score will inaccurately reflect quiz performance until the manually graded quiz elements are scored.

• Instructors can use Additional Submission View, set to come into effect after the Due Date, to reveal correct answers to student work.

In addition to Brightspace, there are many external quiz activities that instructors can utilize, some of which integrate with the Brightspace grade book.

• H5P: NICC has an institutional license to H5P which allows instructors to create interactive quizzes and other activities that can integrate directly with the Brightspace grade book. Visit the H5P page to learn more and see some sample activities.

• Google Forms: a free tool with your Google account, Google Forms can be used to create quizzes, surveys, and other forms for your learners to complete. Choosing the "quiz" option when creating a Google Form will allow your quiz to be auto-graded. While the grades will not automatically import to Brightspace, this can be a great option for formative practice or ungraded group work. You can also uses Google forms to collect student information, create quick knowledge checks, and collect feedback from your learners.

• Kahoot: This free quiz tool allows instructors to build interactive quizzes and games. Visit the Gamification page to learn more.