Exam Question Management
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Exam questions can be built through the user interface or can be imported. Elentra currently supports a variety of question types:
multiple choice (with optional multiple responses)
short answer
essay
matching
text
fill in the blank
Users can add individual questions through the user interface, import questions in bulk through a text box, or migrate questions, images, and responses from another exam management tool (this option is only available to medtech:admin users). This section addresses how to create individual questions in the user interface; see for additional information on importing questions from another exam tool.
Currently only staff:admin can create questions by default. To grant a user the ability to view, edit or create questions, assign that user to a label or course.
The Question Management feature handles permissions via two methods: course association and label association.
Course Associations Any course contact will be able to access questions that are associated with that course.
Note that Course Contact access to questions is controlled through the access control list (a database table in Elentra) so that it can be configured for an institution's need. For example, you could adjust things so that Associated Faculty have the ability to save drafts of questions/groups, but not publish them.
Label Associations Labels are built in Elentra and you can associate individuals with one or more labels. For each association you make, you can control whether the user can read or write questions, groups and exams (in this case groups refers to question groups).
When you build a question through the user interface, you will walk through several tabs to add the required information.
Assessment Type (Formative or Summative): These categories will be applied in future when exams you create must be flagged as Summative or Formative. You'll only be able to apply Formative questions to Formative Exams, and Summative questions to Summative Exams.
Question Code: This optional code field can be completed according to the guidelines set by your institution.
Associated Courses: If a question is assigned to a course, by default, course contacts for that course (e.g. Course Director, Curriculum Coordinator, Program Coordinator, Associated Faculty) will have access to all questions associated with the course.
Associated Labels: If question is assigned to a label, any permissions set up in that label will be applied to the question.
More than one label can be applied to a question. That means that if you want to associate a question with more than one specialty, more than one body system, or more than one topic, labels lets you do that.
Note that this replaces Exam Folders in previous versions of Elentra.
Question Version: Note, for new questions this will be blank.
For organizations that used Exams before software upgrades in ME 1.23, all existing questions will be set to summative.
Correct Text: Serves as a guide for graders and will be displayed to them when they are grading the exam.
Maximum number of characters for essay format is set to 65,535.
Currently essay questions and short answer questions are treated slightly differently in the Learner Feedback Report (available after an exam is completed). Essay questions will show the complete response, while short answer questions will be cut off.
Create a blank in the Question Text by typing "_?_"
An answer field will be created for each blank that is detected. Add as many answers as are possible, separating answers with a comma.
Click Add after you have entered the answer(s).
Note that a question cannot start with a blank.
Fill in the blank answers are case sensitive. You may wish to include two answers (e.g. cardiac arrest and Cardiac Arrest) to ensure learners are properly credited for their answers.
Graders can manually grade fill in the blank questions if needed.
Add one list of terms as items.
Add the corresponding list of terms as answers.
For each item, pick the correct answer from the dropdown selector.
When the learner completes the question, they'll see a list of items and choose an answer from an dropdown selector.
Multiple choice questions presented in horizontal view will not have the strikethrough feature available when learners take an exam.
Optionally set the toggle to indicate whether a learner is expected to provide multiple responses to a prompt.
If multiple responses is enabled, complete the additional fields:
Grading Scheme
Partial: This will give partial credit for every correct reaction (e.g. selecting a correct answer AND not selecting an incorrect answer). By default, Elentra divides the total point value across the number of response options and awards credit for each response option which is correctly responded to (selected if correct, not selected if not correct).
All or Nothing: A learner must ace the question to score points. If they miss an answer (whether they select an incorrect answer or miss selecting a correct answer), the learner will get 0 points.
Partial with additional penalty: This will give partial credit for every correct reaction and will penalize a learner for an incorrect answer. Elentra divides the total point value across the number of response options and awards credit for each response option which is correctly responded to (selected if correct, not selected if not correct) and deducts credit for an incorrect answer. You can optionally change the value of each answer using the answer weight options.
Maximum number of responses
Define how many responses a learner will be permitted to enter.
Answer Weight
This optional feature allows you to support weighting different response options in partial or partial with additional penalty grading schemes.
Answers will be equally weighted by default. If you adjust their weights you can tailor the points awarded to a learner when partial and partial with additional penalty grading schemes are used.
Sample Use Cases
Assume a MC question has 2 correct responses and 2 incorrect responses where the correct responses are worth 40% each and the incorrect responses are worth 10% each. If a learner picks 1 correct response and 1 incorrect response, their score will be the following under each grading scheme:
Partial Grading Scheme: Learner scores 0.5 (+0.4 for identifying 1 correct answer, +0 for not selecting a correct response, +0 for selecting an incorrect response, +0.1 for not selecting an incorrect response)
All of Nothing Grading Scheme: Learner scores 0
Partial with additional penalty Grading Scheme: Learner scores 0 (+0.4 for identifying 1 correct answer, +0.1 for not selecting an incorrect answer, -0.4 for missing 1 correct answer, -0.1 for selecting an incorrect answer)
Correct Text: Serves as a guide for graders and will be displayed to them when they are grading the exam.
Currently essay questions and short answer questions are treated slightly differently in the Learner Feedback Report (available after an exam is completed). Essay questions will show the complete response, while short answer questions will be cut off.
Text questions are designed to allow an exam creator to insert information in an exam.
From the Setup or Details tab of an existing question you can optionally create a copy of that question.
When viewing the Question Text on the Details tab, the Question Text will be prefaced with "Copy of." The newly created copy will automatically be given draft status and will maintain the existing details and tags.
When viewing the question index you can make changes to multiple questions at once to enhance productivity when using the Question Index. These actions include:
Group questions
Set status
Set course
Set curriculum tags
This process will open the curriculum tag selector and show you the tags already assigned, which question is assign with which tag.
Tags added will be applied to every question selected via checkbox
You are able to un-assign tags via this method as well
Reactivate retired questions
Any time you make a change to a published question, a new version will be created. A new version will be created for any change—correcting a typo, linking the question to additional curriculum tags, altering a response option, etc.
When creating exams, you can add a question with multiple versions and choose to select an older version if desired. Do this by clicking on the forward/back arrow icon. If a question has changed since you created an exam, you will be given a notification for that and can update your exam to reflect the newest version of that question; however, you can still elect to use the old version of the question if you prefer. If the forward back arrow icon is blue, you’re not using the most recent version of a question on an exam.
Versions listed in the modal will let you preview the previous version to be better able to compare what changed. Reverting to a previous version will create a new version based on that previous version, thereby preserving the complete history of a question.
Creating a new version of a question is as easy as making a change on a question and publishing or saving that version as a draft.
Retiring a question is a new type of system status for questions. It allows you to prevent a question from being attached to new exams or being used in new exam posts when attached to existing exams. These are the features of a retired question:
Not eligible to any new exam
Excluded from new posts of existing exams
Has a comment field when retiring as to why something is being retired
Filtered out from the question index unless you opt to filter to view retired questions
Can reactivate retired questions and then will become available for use on exams again
Filter question bank to show retired questions
Check off the questions you want to reactivate
Click Reactivate (at bottom right)
Only a question not attached to any existing exams can be deleted, otherwise we recommend Retiring that question. Deleting a question will remove it from a Question Group.
To allow learners to create questions, you must also mark them as "Student Admin" in their .
You can view the versions on a question by selecting "Versions" from the "More" button menu.
