Running a Blackboard test under examination conditions

Guidance for delivering Blackboard tests under examination conditions.

Creating the test

• Read the Good practice guide for Blackboard question types to ensure effective and fair use of the different question types available in Blackboard.
• Read the Designing for Effective Online Assessment guide to help you effectively design your online assessments including some practical and general guidance for writing objective test questions.
• Provide instructions separately in advance of the exam to aid student preparation. 
• Repeat key instructions at the start of the test. These can be added as a block of text at the top of the test page, or as a block of text on a separate page within the test itself.
• In Blackboard Ultra, answer options to Multiple Choice type questions are automatically presented to students in a random order. Avoid using answer choices such as ‘all of the above’ or ‘none of the above’, as these may not appear in the order you expect them and it will confuse students. If there are more than two correct answer options to the question, either combine into a single answer option or consider using a Multiple Answer question instead.
• Check that answers to any Fill in the Blank questions allow for alternative spellings, abbreviations, common misspellings, synonyms, punctuation, and the inclusion or omission of units of measurement to numerical answers.

Student guidance

• Advise students where it is a requirement that answers to Fill in the Blank must be spelled correctly or are case sensitive, and where answers to Calculated Numeric or Formula must be presented to a set number of decimal places or include units of measurement.
• Advise students of any corrective (negative or partial credit) scoring applied to any questions, detailing the penalty applied for selecting incorrect responses.
• Offer a practice test in advance of the exam that includes all relevant features of the actual exam, all question types to be used, and a sample of questions similar in content, style and difficulty.

Deploying the test

Signposting students

• Create the exam in the Assessment area of your Blackboard module site. Make sure that it is the first item in the Assessment area and appropriately titled so that students know it is the exam for the module.
• Create an announcement with a link to the exam that is released to students at the same time as the exam to help students quickly locate the exam.
• Ensure that any other items in your site that a student might confuse with the exam are hidden before the exam becomes available, and hide any content or information from your site that you do not wish students to access during the exam.
• Make sure that any information about previous exams posted in your site are removed, hidden, or updated to the latest guidance.

 Exam duration, scheduling, and availability

• The duration of the exam will be based on the validated duration of the exam. In line with guidance set by the Exams Team, the original duration will have 15 minutes per hour extra working time added as default for all students as an inclusive and proactive measure, plus 15 minutes submission time added, during which students must complete the submission of their exams and allows for any submission or IT issues.
• For the very small minority of students who require more complex adjustments, a single learning contract adjustment will be applied. For students with complex adjustments, their working time ends as per their learning contract recommendation.
• Submissions up to and including 15 minutes and 59 seconds after their working time will be marked.
• Use Release Conditions available in Blackboard to control the release and availability of the exam. All exams must be set to be released at the scheduled start time of the exam. Do not set exams to be released earlier.
• You must set the due date and time on the exam in Blackboard based on the working time (not the end of the submission time or the availability of the exam), so students know when they must start submitting their exam if they have not done so already. 
• The exam must remain available sufficiently to accommodate students with a range of complex learning contract adjustments.

Test settings

• If you choose to display one question at a time, do not Prohibit Backtracking. Students should be allowed to read through the test and answer questions in any order, and return to review questions that they have previously answered prior to submission.
• Consider the order in which students will see the questions. Although randomisation can improve security by making it difficult for students to copy from each other, if all questions are presented in the same order it can help referencing a particular question if students have a query about it or you need to provide additional information or clarity once the exam is in progress.
• If questions will be drawn randomly from Question Banks, avoid further randomisation within the test if you want questions on the same topic, for example, to be presented together.
• Optionally randomise answer options. Answer options to Multiple Choice and Multiple Answer questions are randomised by default.
• Do not apply anonymous marking.
• Turn off post assessment marks automatically.
• Turn off all assessment results settings. You can optionally make this information available to students manually once all students have taken the test and all attempts have been graded. On submission, students will see that the attempt has been completed.
• Add an access code. A six-digit access code is automatically generated. You can share this with the students at the start of the exam to prevent unauthorised access to the exam outside of the exam venue.
• Do not apply a time limit. Time should be controlled by the invigilator to discount any unforeseen delays and individual student requirements.
• Optionally, add a description, but do not use the description to provide detailed instructions as there is a limited number of characters and there is no formatting to highlight key points.
• Remember, if you try out your exam in Student Preview mode it will lock all settings and prevent changes to questions as the exam has been started by a user. If you need to change any settings or questions as a result of previewing it, you must discard changes when exiting Student Preview.

During the exam:

• At the start of the exam, make sure the exam is visible to students.
• Ensure that you clearly articulate to students the end of the working time of the exam and the time by which students must ensure that the submission of the exam is complete, along with the consequence of submitting late.
• Students should be reminded that the only software running during the exam should be a web browser logged into Blackboard, and the only thing visible on the screen is the Blackboard module site for the exam and the test page. Students should also be reminded that they must not attempt to use any communication or collaboration functionality available in Blackboard to communicate with other students in or outside the exam venue.
• Share the access code, reminding students that it is a breach of conduct to attempt to share it outside of the venue.
• Students should be reminded that they only need to click the ‘Start Attempt’ begin to begin button once, even if it takes a few moments for the first question to appear.
• Students should be reminded that at the end of the exam they need to click the ‘Submit’ button at the end of the last question or test page to submit their answers. Students should only click the ‘Submit’ button once even if it takes a few moments for the confirmation screen to appear. Students must not click the ‘Save and Close’ button as their attempt will not be submitted and cannot be graded.
• If questions are displayed one at a time, students should be reminded that they can navigate through the test using the forward and backward arrows at the bottom of the screen. When answering questions, the continue button at the end of each question should be used to move to the next question.

 After the exam:

• Check that student responses have been recorded in the Gradebook for all of the students present in the venue during the exam.
• Make the test unavailable to students.
• Submissions up to and including 15 minutes and 59 seconds after their working time will be marked
• You will need to manually grade any Essay questions. You should also check all responses to any Fill-in-the-Blank, Calculated Formula, and Calculated Numeric type questions for any unforeseen correct responses.
• Make scores and feedback available to students as appropriate.

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