Tag: Uniqurate

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Maths with QTI – Modifying assessment.xml (for Assessments created in Uniqurate)

To date, I have only created assessments in Uniqurate, so the items in this post just refer to a couple of things I have needed to modify in the assessment.xml (which exists at the top level of the assessment zip file) file to get the assessments working properly.

itemSessionControl

Control whether feedback is shown when reviewing (showFeedback), and whether the user can view the solution (showSolution). The solution is defined by using setCorrectResponse in the templateProcessing. The itemSessionControl tag can be contained within testPart, assessmentSection or assessmentItemRef (individual assessment item) blocks.

<itemSessionControl showFeedback="true" allowReview="true" showSolution="true" />

Test Feedback

For assessments created in Uniqurate, the total (i.e max score) for an assessment seems to be calculated by summing the max scores for each of the individual questions in the assessment, even if it is set up so that questions are repeated. Therefore, as a very simple example, if an assessment has a single section containing a single question, but “Number of questions to choose from section” is set to 2 and “Repeat questions” is switched on, the total/max score for the assessment is set to 1, when it should in fact be 2. This can be fixed by editing the testFeedback section of the xml. Just change the value in the last set of span tags to adjust the maximum score:

<testFeedback identifier="TEST_FB" showHide="show" outcomeIdentifier="TEST_FEEDBACK" access="atEnd">
     <div>You have reached the end of the test. Your total score was <printedVariable format="%.1f" identifier="TEST_total"/> out of <span class="uqfeedbackvar total">2</span>. </div>
</testFeedback>

Note that this example is taken from the default Uniqurate output, you can of course define your own feedback, displaying any of the variables defined in the outcomeProcessing section of the assessment.xml file.

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Writing Tests in Uniqurate – Tips and Tricks

We are using the QTI specification to create maths questions that can be delivered online. In order to do this we have used Uniqurate, partly as a tool for writing questions (although the vast majority of questions have been ‘hand-coded’ in QTI XML, due to their complexity), but mainly as a tool for bringing questions together into  tests.

I thought I would share a few things that have made my life easier when using Uniqurate, in case they are useful to anyone else:

  • Use ‘Enter’ (carefully!) to confirm actions – Uniqurate often asks for confirmation, e.g. when deleting questions, using a pop up box. This can make deleting lots of questions an annoying process if you use the mouse to click the OK button in the confirm box. However, if you just click the delete button (rubbish bin) and then hit the enter key, this will confirm, so you can delete lots of questions quickly. Needless to say be very careful when doing this!
  • Go back to the main menu if it starts misbehaving – Uniqurate sometimes starts misbehaving, e.g. not adding questions properly. If this happens, just go back to the main menu, then click the “Edit current test” button to return to the edit screen.
  • Click on the Section name to edit it – it’s not immediately obvious, but you can edit section names by clicking on/selecting the current name of a section and then typing in the new name.
  • To move a question, click on white space, not the question name – You can drag and drop questions within a section (but unfortunately not from one section to another). To do this, you need to click on the white space to the right of the question name, not on the question name itself (doing so just selects the text).
  • “Add question to section” link only works when the mouse cursor is an arrow – Depending on your browser (I’m talking about IE10 on Windows), the pointer will be one of an arrow, a pointer (hand with pointed figure) or a text cursor when you hover over the “Add question to section” link, depending on which part of the link you are over. It only seems to actually work as a link when it is the arrow, so move around until you get an arrow before clicking!
  • Check the total score when you have repeated questions – see the post about modifying assessment.xml for more information

I will add any further things as and when they crop up.

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Maths with QTI – Issues

Please note that this is a work in progress, and we will add issues as we find them, or remove them as they are fixed (or we find out that they aren’t really issues).

As discussed in other posts, we’re using QTI (Question and Test Interoperability) to create and deliver maths questions. The majority of the questions are being written by modifying (directly in the XML) questions from Dr Sue Milne’s collection. Uniqurate is being used to put questions together into tests, and QTIWorks is being used to deliver the questions.

We have found all the parts of the system – Uniqurate, QTIWorks and the QTI specification in general – very useful, usable and flexible. However, as is inevitable with such a complex and extensive specification and combination of creation and delivery systems, we have come across some issues. None of these are major problems that we cannot work with or around, but I thought I would continue my recent theme of writing “work in progress” blogs, and write one containing all of the issues that we have with each part of the system/process.

QTI (inc. Maxima, MathAssess engine)

  • Rounding floats doesn’t seem to work properly. After rounding, there seems to often be an arbitrary (small) value added to or subtracted from the rounded value, giving a value to >10 decimal places. For example, rounding 41.28947 to 2 decimal places, which should give 41.29, might give 41.29000014723.
  • There can be issues with recognising 2 equally valid correct answers as such. For example, if 1/x^3 is the correct answer to a question, x^-3 might be considered not fully simplified, even though it is at least as simple and arguably simpler. Another example would be requiring -(3x^2)/y, when (-3x^2)/y or -3x^2/y, or even -3x^2y^-1 would be equally correct. It might be possible to fix this within the XML, but would ideally be built into the Maths comparison engine.

Uniqurate

  • Questions are sometimes added to the wrong section of a test, or are not added at all (the latter seems to happen after a question has just been deleted from the test section). Generally returning to the Main Menu and then editing the test again gets rid of the issue temporarily.
  • It would be great to be able to add multiple questions to a test section in one go, rather than having to add them one at a time.
  • It is possible (and not that difficult) to create invalid combinations of of the “Number of questions to choose from section” and “Show questions only once/Repeat Questions” settings. If you tell it to show more questions that you have added, but leave it set to use each question only once, the test is invalid. It would be good if Uniqurate stopped you from doing this. To me, it seems as though there is significant overlap between these settings, at least when you tell it to show more question instances that there are questions in the section.
  • Can only specify the total number of questions in a section, not the number of each question.
  • The “Add question to section” link only works when the mouse cursor is an arrow. Depending on the browser (I’m talking about IE10 on Windows), the pointer will be one of an arrow, a pointer (hand with pointed figure) or a text cursor when you hover over the “Add question to section” link, depending on which part of the link you are over. It only seems to actually work as a link when it is the arrow.
  • Related to the above point, if you choose to show more questions than there are in the section, and hence set it to repeat questions, you are not guaranteed one of each question. E.g. if you have 2 question, and choose to show 3 questions, you could get 3 of one question and none of the other.
  • IDs given to sections are random strings, which makes them hard to identify when looking at results in QTIWorks. It would be good to be able to specify the ID for a section.
  • If questions are repeated in a section, the total score for the test is calculated as if each question was to be shown only once.

QTIWorks

  • The maths input help box could do with some improvements – see my post about a Help Guide for Maths Entry Questions.
  • Would like to be able to display multiple questions on a single page, rather than one question per page. This would be possible to set up by creating multiple questions in a single XML file, but it would be much nicer to be able to do it through the delivery settings.
  • Right clicking on a MathML block, then going to Settings > Math Renderer > MathML sometimes shows a simplified version of what is displayed, which for some questions (e.g. division of fractions) might actually be the answer. While it is unlikely someone would realise and do this, and it is only for certain questions where it would give the answer, it is something that could be looked at.
  • When a single part question is answered, it shows as “Answered” (in blue). However, when a multi-part question is answered, it is shown as “Finished” (in grey).
  • Similarly, if you answer a question (so it is marked as “Answered” and in blue), but then look at the solution, it is then marked as finished. This makes sense if the answer given was incorrect, but if the answer was correct and then the student looked at the solution, it would be good if the status remained as “Answered”.

Fixed/Non Issues

  • Would like scores, feedback and/or solutions to be shown when reviewing a test – Feedback and model solutions can be shown when reviewing by adding the following to the testPart section in the assessment.xml file for a test: 
    <itemSessionControl showFeedback="true" showSolution="true" allowReview="true" />

    showFeedback means that the last feedback that the user was shown when attempting the question is shown when they review it. showSolution provides a “Show Solution” button, which puts the correct response (as defined in the response declaration, or by using setCorrectResponse in templateProcessing) in the answer box. However, it seems that if a maths variable is set as the correct response to a question, this will not  be displayed properly as the solution when reviewing.