A new create and edit experience for Quizzes occurred in the June release of Brightspace (20.22.6). Here is a summary of this update so that you can review, prepare, and raise any questions you may have.
Why did we do this?
Our goal is to simplify common tasks for first-time or infrequent users, while giving easy access to the advanced features that our experienced power-users love. Bringing consistency to how activities in Brightspace are created helps us achieve this goal. We recently re-imagined the creation experience for Assignments, and today we are happy to unveil a similar experience in Quizzes.
Here is a tour of the changes:
Consistent layout
The redesigned create and edit screen in Quizzes has the same layout as Assignments, making it familiar and easy to learn.
Figure: The New Quiz creation screen.
The primary panel on the left contains common, frequently used fields that are always displayed. These fields are most relevant to learners and are core to quiz creation.
Figure: Primary panel of New Quiz creation.
The right-hand panel organizes additional, more advanced options such as start and end dates, release conditions, and special access. These options follow the same logical groupings as found in Assignments.
Figure: Availability Dates & Conditions accordion.
While the right-hand groupings are collapsed, summary text provides details about which settings are active so you can see which settings are applied at a glance which is perfect for when you are looking to reuse and copy existing quizzes.
Figure: Right panel of New Quiz creation.
Build your quiz in one place
The add/edit question workflow has been brought into the primary panel giving users the ability to easily modify quiz questions without navigating to a separate interface. Users will still be able to perform the same bulk management of quiz questions from this screen such as Move To and More Actions workflows. The quiz preview functionality is also more prominent so you can be confident in what learners will see.
Figure: Question Builder in the primary panel.
Auto-publish and sync to grade book
Newly-created quizzes by default auto-publish attempt results to learners and the grade book (If the quiz is connected to the grade book). We’ve updated the terminology around these two settings to better describe what is happening, and set them to on by default, creating a more streamlined connection with the grade book.
Figure: Before and after of Auto-publish and Synchronize workflows.
Simpler submission views
Users can confidently prepare what the learner sees once a quiz is submitted with a redesigned Submission Views workflow now called Quiz Results Display. Simply choose from a list of common configurations or customize the display to meet your exact needs. As part of the redesign, the name field has been removed when authoring secondary views. Secondary view names will automatically be generated in the new experience based on the date the view goes into effect. The rationale behind this change is that secondary view names never display to learners and keeping the authoring of secondary views focused on their trigger properties ensures instructors are aware of which view is being displayed and why. Previously, secondary views were often misconfigured and set up incorrectly. If the name of a secondary view must be edited, it can be accessed via the Manage Dates tool where a streamlined workflow exists to change a view's date and name.
Figure: Quiz results display options.
Figure: Customizing Quiz Results Display page.
Updated page break workflow
Users can easily and intuitively apply question paging rules to their quiz. Common paging configurations like displaying all questions together or one question per page are quick and easy to set. Further paging configurations are available by choosing to add page breaks after each section of your quiz creating a more customized experience. Quizzes created using the classic experience will see an additional option to use legacy paging which retains any previous page break settings.
Figure: Question Paging options.
Display in calendar
The ability to add availability dates (start/end dates) to the calendar is available in the new quiz creation experience as part of the 20.23.2 release. Once a start or end date is selected in the Availability Dates & Conditions accordion, the Display in Calendar checkbox appears.
Figure: Display In Calendar toggle.
Learning outcomes
The ability to view and align quiz questions using the Learning Outcomes tool is available in the new quiz creation experience as part of the 20.22.9 update. Quiz question alignments created using the classic experience are compatible with the new experience and users can expect to see the alignments carry forward when trying out the new experience.
Figure: Learning Outcome tags and More Actions > Align to Standards for quiz questions.
Sunsetting of workflows
There are a few things leaving the new quiz creation screen that will make the page altogether less confusing and less redundant. Let's review:
Visibility option for description, header, and footer
The On/Off visibility toggles for the Description, Header, and Footer fields have been removed. Previously, this toggle had to be explicitly set for learners to see these fields. This setting was often overlooked, leaving valuable information unseen by learners. Going forward, if there are values entered in the field, it will be visible automatically. Existing quizzes that contain information in these fields with the visibility toggled OFF will see a notice when editing their quiz in the new experience to review the impacted fields.
Figure: Visibility toggle for Description field.
Edit values button
The Edit Values button that appears above the question list is removed as the question builder workflow has been uplifted. Setting Bonus, Mandatory, and Point values in bulk on questions can be accomplished via the uplifted More Actions workflow. Setting Difficulty on quiz questions continues to be phased out of newer quiz and quiz question creation workflows and will not carry forward in the new creation experience.
Figure: Edit Values button.
Student view preview
The Grades tool still features control over how a student’s grade is displayed, but this small preview during quiz creation will not carry forward.
Figure: Student View Preview.
ePortfolio artifacts
New quizzes automatically inherit the value set at the org by the configuration variable: d2l.Tools.ePortfolio.AllowExportForQuizDefault. This means that the toggle for ePortfolio artifacts cannot be changed for individual quizzes.
Figure: ePortfolio Artifacts toggle.
Share quiz from top level org unit
The ability to share a quiz from the top level org unit will be sunsetting with the new creation experience.
Figure: Make quiz available to other org units toggle.
