For those of you who give timed exams, I thought I'd share some use case scenarios to get a general idea as to how it works:
Student A |
Accesses timed test and clicks on save and exit. (Doesn't click Submit for
Grading)
Forgets to return before time runs out. It gets auto-submitted when the time runs out. |
Student B |
Accesses timed test.
|
Student C |
Accesses timed test.
Is in the process of taking it when the phone rings. Leaves the computer intact and goes to the phone. Returns over an hour later and a window is showing saying, you have 5 minutes left. Clicks on OK. A couple of more confirmation windows later, he is out of the now auto-submitted exam (which has the answers he completed before he left for the phone call). |
If you have set your exam to show feedback at a specific date and it was within the submission window, students can see immediately how they did. If your exam is not an objective exam and/or it includes essay questions, it's a good idea to set the feedback date to some time in the future when you know you will have graded the essays AND set the Grading Options to "None" so that partial points from the objective part does not go to the gradebook and make them panic thinking they failed. When you are done grading the essay questions, you can go to the settings link of the inactive test, and change the grading options to: send to gradebook.
The software allows you to set the number of submissions. You can limit it to 1.
The software does not support one entry only. Within the time limit, students can leave the test and return later and continue, if there is any time left, that is. The clocks continues, as shown in the above use cases. Choosing to not show feedback or send grades to the gradebook, in combination with reasonably small windows for timed tests, can also reduce cheating.
For faculty who worry about cheating, keep your exam windows narrower or schedule them in a proctored environment/lab. See option under settings > security where you can enter a lab/testing center IP address, and possibly give a username/password to a lab proctor.
I urge you to test things out and make sure you understand what the settings mean before you publish your tests. It is too easy to make assumptions about how things should work (based on other tools you have used) as opposed to how the tools here actually do work.
2/21/06