Quizzes in courses

A quiz in Idun Blue is a lesson inside a course. It tests whether the participant understood, with points and a pass mark, and it is part of the course tool. There is no standalone quiz for collecting email addresses; to collect sign-ups, use a form. See Signup page and follow-up.

Put a quiz in a lesson

1. Open the course under Courses and go to Build.
2. Create a lesson and choose the Quiz type.
3. Add questions.

A quiz always belongs to a lesson. If you want a test in the middle of the course, make a lesson for it.

The question types

There are two:

• Multiple choice — several answer options; you mark which are correct.
• True/False — one statement, two options.

For each question you fill in:

• Question text — the question itself.
• Points — how much the question weighs.
• Answer options — with Mark as correct on the right one or ones.
• Explanation — shown to the participant, and the most valuable field here. Use it to teach, not just to say “correct”. Write why.

The settings

The Quiz settings card has five controls:

• Max attempts — leave empty for unlimited.
• Time limit — in seconds. Leave empty for no limit.
• Passing score (%) — the default is 70.
• Shuffle questions — questions come in a different order each time.
• Shuffle answers — the options within each question swap places.

Click Save quiz settings when you’re done.

There’s no setting to reveal correct answers afterwards, and none that locks the next lesson until the quiz is done. To control the order, use the lesson’s own Require previous lesson completion to unlock switch.

Quizzes and certificates

If the course issues certificates, the participant has to have passed every quiz in the course before the certificate is issued. That happens automatically — you don’t set anything. The pass mark is the one you set per quiz.

Which also means a quiz with an unreasonable pass mark can block the certificate for everyone. Test it yourself.

See the results

Once at least one participant has taken the quiz, a Results button appears on it. It shows three numbers:

• Attempts — how many times the quiz has been taken.
• Average score
• Pass rate

If nearly everyone misses the same question, the question usually isn’t the hard part — the lesson before it didn’t explain the thing.

Tips

• Three to five questions per quiz. More feels like an exam.
• Ask for understanding, not recall. “What do you do if the breath goes shallow?” beats “What is the technique called?”.
• Set a pass mark that’s reachable. 70 percent is a reasonable place to start.
• Take the quiz yourself as a participant before you publish. A wrongly marked answer is invisible to you and baffling to her.