FTT - Mix It Up With Different Question Types In Schoology Assessments

Mix It Up With Different Question Types In Schoology Assessments

@LisaBerghoff/@MrKimDHS

 It is getting to be that time of year when we focus on end of the year assessments. The whole notion of "show us what you know" often is in direct opposition to teachers' needing a quick way to grade because we want to get that grade book signed sealed and delivered in time for us to go on summer break. Would I ideally like to sit with every single student and have them go through their growth and progress on all of our learning targets? Absolutely. Unfortunately our schedule does not allow for that and so we are forced into other means of assessing student learning. According to Rick Stiggins, high quality assessment must satisfy five specific quality standards: 1. Clear Targets, 2. Focused Purpose, 3. Proper Method, 4. Sound Sampling, and 5. Accurate Assessment Free Of Bias and Distortion. 

As you are crafting your summative assessments, I thought it would be helpful to bring back into focus some of the assessment features that can be found baked into Schoology, our learning management system.  These features help customize your assessments to go beyond the typical multiple choice and true/false test. There are also lots of options within the setup that can help personalize the experience so you can get the best out of your students. As we know from the TPACK framework, many parts need to come together in order to best integrate technology in our classrooms. With your knowledge of the content and pedagogy combined with how well you know your students, you can utilize technology to effectively assess your students in a way that hits all five of Rick Stiggins' benchmarks for high quality assessments. 

Let's Get Into It:

The Setup-

When you click to add an assessment to your class, you will see the instructions box on the setup page. This box is often overlooked and I would encourage you to use it. Here, you have a rich text editor menu that allows you to add images or other media, links, and tables. You can also bold, highlight, and change the color of your fonts in order to draw attention to specific text. You can choose how you want to set the tone for your assessment. This is a spot where you can remind students of often missed details, and offer words of encouragement.

In the assessment toolbar you can allow students to flag questions so they can go back and review them before they submit. You can also allow them to eliminate answer choices if you do have multiple choice questions on your test.

Question Types-

There are 18 different types of assessment questions you can choose from. I am going to highlight the 5 that I think are most interactive and get kids to demonstrate their learning in different ways. 

1. Label Image

Upload an image and have your students label it by dragging and dropping from a list of potential answers. This can be a wonderful option for timelines, labeling models, cycles, or systems, describing parts of a work of art, or parts of an equation. Here are detailed instructions for using Label Image questions in Schoology, including how to align learning objectives. 

2. Highlight Hotspot

Upload an image and have your students identify an area or region that is determined by you. Use this option with maps, geometric shapes, data charts, scientific diagrams,vocabulary questions, and more. Here is an example using basic Spanish vocabulary. Here are instructions for using Highlight Hotspot. 

3. Chart

This question type enables students to review, create, or manipulate different kinds of charts in response to a question.  I actually recently saw a teacher use this as a self reflection tool which really appealed to me. I created one for an instrumental performance. I uploaded an image of the rubric so the students can refer to it. Then, I set the parameters so students can interact with the chart. They can assess themselves using the chart and then write or record a reflection explaining why they chose what they did. You can see lots of ways this would apply to your class. Here are detailed instructions for using the Chart question type. 

4. Highlight Image

This question type offers so much more than the name implies. Upload an image and your students are given multiple color options to highlight the image. But they don't need to only highlight. You can use this as a drawing tool as well. Since many of our students have touch screen chromebooks, this can be a fantastic option for marking text, circling or drawing arrows for vocabulary. My example below shows how to use the Highlight Image question for graphing in math or science. The image that I uploaded is just a basic graph. Once you create one question of this type, you can easily duplicate it and just change the equations.

5. Audio/Video 

I often have students who don't do well on a test or a quiz just come in and tell me what they know. It's remarkable to see the difference when they can just talk to me. While I can't do that with every student in person, I can have them respond to an audio or video question. You can upload an image or other media to add to your question prompt. The students then click to record their audio or video, depending on the question type. It's very easy to listen or watch once they submit.

Are you ready to start exploring the various options within Schoology assessments? Want some help getting started? Send an email and I'm happy to partner with you!