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Creating Multimedia/Interactive Tests for the Internet in 10 Minutes

by Sloan-C

ABSTRACT
This paper describes how any teacher anywhere can create multimedia/interactive tests, surveys, and assignments for the Internet using QuizPlease software. QuizPlease is a fast and easy way to create quality learning resources for the Internet. QuizPlease has been rated FOUR stars by Ziff-Davis, publisher of PC Magazine.

I. INTRODUCTION

The Internet has been delivering educational technology for years. One of the keys to the success of the Internet in education will be giving teachers the tools they need to tap into the enormous educational power of the Net. For too long the software and authoring tools available to teachers have been far too complex. Putting together quality learning resources or authoring courses has required vast resources and technical assistance in the past.

QuizPlease is a program I wrote to provide teachers with a fast and easy way to create quality learning resources for the Internet. The interface uses the familiar book metaphor (See Figure 1). Creating an HTML quiz is just a matter of filling in the blanks and turning a few pages. An instructor can generate a short quiz in a matter of minutes. Over 100 colleges/universities and businesses took part in the beta-testing program for QuizPlease.

Figure 1 - QuizPlease book-like interface

II. A LOOK AT QUIZPLEASE

A. Understanding QuizPlease
To best understand QuizPlease, look at some of these samples that QuizPlease produced. You may click on the items below:

Here are the sample quizzes that come with QuizPlease.
Netscape 3 is required.

• Tutorial Quiz - College
  A Tutorial Quiz gives instant feedback to the student. It is not marked or mailed.
• Tutorial Quiz - MISSION IMPOSSIBLE
  A Tutorial Quiz gives instant feedback to the student. It is not marked or mailed.
• Self- marking Quiz - Tunnel Quiz
  A Self Marking Quiz requires the student to make their selection, then press the Mark button. The test is scored, and they may explore the correct answers.
• Mark and Mail Quiz - Presidents Quiz
  A Mail and Mark Quiz is the same as a Mark Quiz, except the marks are emailed to the teacher.
• Answer Key - Presidents Quiz
  An Answer Key is a detailed report on the quiz, showing all answers, hints, URLs etc.
• Survey type - Multimedia '97
  A Survey type is a type of quiz that you may use for surveys. The results of the survey are emailed. This would be the ideal way to do a quick survey over the Net.
• Assignment type - How To Become A Computer Nerd
  QuizPlease allows you to create assignments for the Internet. An assignment is in the same format as a normal quiz, except there are now multiple choice answers to choose from. You may include multimedia and Web References with this type. You may want to combine the quizzes with assignments for a complete Internet course.

Now that you have experienced the quizzes created with QuizPlease, you may view the help file on-line for a detailed explanation of how to use the product. The help file was created in an HTML format. You may view it on the web at: http://robmccormack.com/qphelp/index.htm.

The QuizPlease help file that comes with the program is identical to the copy on the Internet, except it is a stand-alone program. All of the HTML and images were compressed into an executable program using InfoCourier. Think of InfoCourier as a mini-browser - it gives you a way to distribute HTML without being concerned if the user has a browser on their computer. It is a great way to distribute instructions, catalogs or other information. For more information visit: http://www.smartcode.com.

B. Activity is important
Many users look at QuizPlease solely as a testing mechanism, fortunately it is much more than that. It allows the student to jump to other Web sites to assist them in answering the question. Questions may have sounds, movies, and even a hint button. In a conventional classroom, the student assessment portion may account for only 5% of the total time. As the classroom moves to the Internet, activities become a vital part of the learning process. If a course delivered over the Net boils down to reading and taking an ordinary multiple-choice test, you have to wonder why is it on the Net. Net courses must have activities and engaging things for the student to do. All teachers realize that motivation of students is always a challenge. On the Net, you will find this an even greater challenge. The Assignment type of quiz is not a quiz at all. It may be used to create assignments for the students. These assignments may contain all of the features of QuizPlease, but they have no answers and are not marked.

C. Portability
HTML quizzes created with QuizPlease are portable and self-contained. They may be distributed on a floppy disk, a CD ROM, Networks, or on the Internet. These quizzes are really small "programs" which may be distributed royalty-free. They do not require the Internet to do anything other than provide a method of e-mailing the marks to the teacher (if that option is selected).

Combining a CD-ROM and the Internet is becoming very common. For example: Microsoft Encarta™ now contains over 4000 links to the Internet. QuizPlease quizzes can be placed on a CD-ROM, with links to the Internet. Why would you want to do this? If you wanted to include some exciting movies and sounds as part of a quiz, they could be played from the CD-ROM. Clicking on any Web References would take the student to the Internet. The student could take a test on the CD-ROM; and if they were hooked up to the Internet, the results could be e-mailed to the instructor. For most users, the Internet still doesn't have enough bandwidth to allow any substantial use of multimedia. This limitation is only temporary.

D. Theory behind creating tests
The QuizPlease help file contains articles about the theory of writing tests. Although these articles focus on paper-based tests, the theory is the same when applied to tests on the Internet. Many educators have received very little training on how to write multiple choice tests. Even if they have, the help file would be a good refresher course.

E. Technically Speaking
Now for the technical part. Quizzes created with QuizPlease are simple HTML documents full of JavaScripting. JavaScripting produces an interactive quiz and marks the tests. JavaScripting is not Java. Java is a full-blown highly scaleable programming language. JavaScripting is for all purposes a distant cousin to Java. When you create a quiz in QuizPlease you will not see any HTML codes or JavaScripting since all of this is done behind the scenes and completely transparent to the user. Advanced users may use HTML tags in the questions allowing them to use special formatting or to expand the capabilities of QuizPlease.

The heart of QuizPlease is a standard Microsoft Access™ version 2 database file. All questions and information about the quizzes are stored in this file. If you have existing quizzes in other formats, you may use Access to import them into QuizPlease. However, you will need to be familiar with Access to accomplish this. QuizPlease does not contain any import facility for test banks in other formats. The images and multimedia files are kept in their own folder and are not maintained inside the database.

QuizPlease is being used by a Fortune 500 company. They are using it to test the skills of 3,200 employees, and a pilot project conducted in June involving 800 employees was a success. The largest problem for the pilot was the setup of hardware and software and the fact that some branch offices did not have Netscape 3.

QuizPlease requires Windows 95, 16 megs RAM, 6 meg hard disk space. In the current version you will need Netscape 3 or better to take any quizzes. Internet Explorer may be used only with limited success. QuizPlease will fully support Internet Explorer in the near future.

F. Features
QuizPlease is full of easy-to-use features especially designed for educators, because it takes the "keep it simple approach". The ability to randomize questions, select questions in any order and to sort questions by any field is only a mouse click away.

Assigning a "learning objective" to each question is one of the most useful features of QuizPlease. Every question has a learning objective field. If you make use of this field, it is easy to create an HTML quiz with questions pertaining to the specific learning objective you selected. All questions may have a "User Defined" field. This may be used for classifying questions into categories not built into QuizPlease. A good example of the User Defined field is to make use of it for the difficulty of the question, say 1-10 with 10 being the most difficult. The instructor may create an HTML test that contains questions with varying difficulty. It is easy to generate a quiz with questions from the easiest to the most difficult if that is important to the instructor.

In the sample quizzes, you may have noticed that each question can have the following features, all of which are optional:

Another feature of QuizPlease is its ability to create an "Answer Key". An "Answer Key" is a HTML document which looks and behaves just like the HTML quiz except all of the information is visible for the instructor to view or print. For example, without an Answer Key, you would have to click on each answer to view the feedback; there would be no way to see or print all of the feedback for all of the questions.

G. Disadvantages
One disadvantage in using QuizPlease is that students can find the answers to their quizzes in the HTML code. Since the HTML quizzes are portable, the student may view the source code (the HTML and JavaScript). In Netscape, you may select from the menu bar Edit | Source. The answers to each question are buried somewhere in what looks like mumbo jumbo, but they are there. Most users will be tricked by the fact that the HTML is forced down a page, so it looks as if you can't read it.

A new product available this summer called "QuizPlease SERVER" will do away with this limitation. QuizPlease SERVER will require the Internet Server to do all of the marking, and thus the student will not be able to view the answers. It also will write a Microsoft Excel™ compatible spreadsheet on the server for the teacher to view or download. For more information see: http://robmccormack.com/qphelp/qpserver.htm.

III. FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS

A. Coming Soon
This summer, QuizPlease 97.2 will be released as well as QuizPlease Server 97.2. QuizPlease Java should be released by December.

QuizPlease 97.2 Features

1. Fill-in-the-blank questions,
2. Essay questions (must be marked by a human being),
3. Improved customization,
4. More compatibility with Internet Explorer.

QuizPlease Server 97.2 Features

1. Students may be limited to taking a quiz only once.
2. Marks may be marked by an Internet Server, and stored on the server in a Microsoft Excel™ compatible file.
3. After taking the test, students may be directed to another URL. This can be set up so that they are sent to one URL if they passed and another if they failed.
4. Full source code of the CGI (common gateway interface) provided for customization.
5. Several HTML quizzes may share a common results file (where the marks are stored).
6. Details on the students' individual responses are stored in the results file.
7. Instructors may download the result file and directly import it into Excel, or the QuizPlease Server will create an HTML file for them.
8. Compatible with Internet Explorer and Netscape.

QuizPlease Java Features

1. A Java Applet will have all functionality of the QuizPlease Server and QuizPlease. Java will allow even better activity and more types of tests.

B. Say goodbye to multiple choice tests
Multiple-choice tests have gained in popularity because they are easy to manually mark and a computer can also mark them. QuizPlease 97.2 will allow fill-in-the-blank questions that are marked by the computer. Many find it faster to create this type of quiz. Unlike multiple-choice questions, fill-in-the-blank tests never give a direct hint of the correct answer. If the student answers with wild guesses, they will score zero unless they are having a particularly lucky day. If a multiple-choice test has four choices, then a student should average 25% without any knowledge of the subject matter. If the same student is smart enough to determine the quiz contains some obviously incorrect answers; they may score 50% or more. Fill-in-the-blank quizzes have many advantages. Here is how QuizPlease 97.2 will allow instructors to easily build fill-in-the-blank quizzes.
Consider this example:

Who was the youngest US President?
That is easy -the answer is John Kennedy- or is it? Would you mark students incorrect if they answered President Kennedy? How about JFK or John F. Kennedy? Computers have a hard time with this. It may make perfect sense, but to a computer, JFK just doesn't look like President Kennedy no matter how smart that computer thinks it is.

It would by easy for the computer to look for the word Kennedy anywhere in the student's response but that would just not do. If the student answered "Robert Kennedy" - the computer would mark it as correct, but any teacher would know this is obviously wrong. Also the correct answer JFK does not contain the word Kennedy.

So, we need to rely on the teacher to tell the computer what are acceptable answers. For fill-in-the-blank questions, QuizPlease will use a nearly identical interface, except the answers a), b), c), d) and e) will be used to type in answers the teacher feels are acceptable. If the student's response does not match one of these, their answer will be marked incorrect. The quiz will be smart enough to consider KENNEDY to be the same as Kennedy.

Here is what the student will see if they answered correctly:

Who was the youngest US President?
Correct, you answered: Kennedy
Acceptable answers were: Kennedy, JFK, John Kennedy, John F. Kennedy, President Kennedy

If they answered the question incorrectly, they would see:

Who was the youngest US President?
Wrong, you answered: Robert Kennedy
Acceptable answers were: Kennedy, JFK, John Kennedy, John F. Kennedy, President Kennedy

You may try out a beta version of a fill-in-the-blank question at: http://www.robmccormack.com/qp972/presfill.htm.

Five choices may not seem like a lot, but if you are careful about the wording of the question it should work well for nearly any question you can imagine. For example, a more carefully worded question might be:

What was the last name of the youngest US President?
Now, you would only have to enter one acceptable answer - Kennedy. You may be surprised how many questions will require more than one acceptable answer. A good example is working with currency. If the correct answer is $1000, you may have to allow $1,000, 1000, 1000.00 and $1,000.00.

IV. TRYING OUT QUIZPLEASE

QuizPlease is Webware. This means you may download an unregistered copy from the Internet. It is not distributed any other way. If you want to register the program ($149US) you may pay for it by credit card on the Web or by fax. Once registered, you will be given a Registration Code that will immediately register QuizPlease. Nothing else will be sent to you. The help file provides complete documentation and may be printed.

To download a copy, visit: http://www.robmccormack.com/qp/index.htm

The QuizPlease installation is 4.1 megabytes. This unregistered version is fully functional and comes complete with a spell checker. The limitation on the unregistered version is that you will be able to produce an HTML quiz of only 3 questions, but you may create as many quizzes as you like.

V. CONCLUSION

President Clinton said on July 1,1997 that the Internet may just revolutionize education. In Bill Gates revised book The Road Ahead, he writes that the biggest benefactor of this new technology is education, inside and outside of the classroom. Chapter 9 is called "Education: The Best Investment" which is worth looking at. He also wrote, "the return on investment will be enormous". Considering the amount of time and money spent on educational technology in the past 10 years, it is about time.

QuizPlease is just one of the many tools on the net that will help educators develop high quality resources for the Net without the high price or long development time.