11 Designing Practice Exams
Make sure to trial run your exam!
The key recommendation for all scheduled exams is to have a trial run of your exam, ideally with some sort of low/no-stakes real example test for students in the course to try. You can provide students with an ungraded test of the process before the exam period, perhaps with a couple of questions presented using the intended format. This will help them understand the format and help everyone discover technical issues prior to the actual exam. If the exam will be timed, include a time limit on the trial test to see how the system will handle students uploading responses on the expected schedule. This will help them understand the process for the exam and will help you to discover any shortcomings or things to fix for the actual exam.
In addition to this process test with students, review/test your actual test questions in the system with a form of “student view” to ensure images are visible, etc., before the full test day.
In general, for large courses (several hundred students or more), consult with Science LT support to determine any concerns/adjustments that can help keep the process smooth and avoid overloading the servers (for example, staggering the start time or providing students with extra time to account for technical difficulties).