Exams: Prepare to deliver your exams
D2L Brightspace offers several methods of delivering final exams, both with built-in tools or integrated applications. Exam tools can include an online (digital) and/or paper-based approach, and you can select the option(s) that best suit your assessment.
In this resource, you will find a collection of resources for creating up your exams using these digital tools.
Getting help during an online exam
During Fall and Winter terms, if technical issues arise during a final exam delivered in D2L Brightspace, students, instructors, and TAs can access the "D2L Brightspace Exam Help Form" for technical support via help.torontomu.ca/ithelp under the "General IT Help" section.
Not sure where to start?
If you are unsure about which assessment tool to use for your exam, please contact TMU's Brightspace Instructor Support Team at courses@torontomu.ca.
Depending on the type of exam that you are planning to run and how you are delivering it, your tool options will vary. Important considerations when selecting the tool that best suits your exam are listed in the Exam Tool Options table (below).
Some types of exams can be delivered using more than one of the tools offered at TMU; this guide recommends the most commonly used tool for each style of exam, with an additional comparison between similar options when available.
Exam Options | Akindi Bubble Sheets | Crowdmark Handwritten | Brightspace Quizzes | Brightspace Assignments |
---|---|---|---|---|
Primary Function | Paper multiple-choice (bubble sheet) assessments | Digital grading of paper assessments | Online quiz-based exams, with varied question types | Student file submissions |
Exam Delivery | On Paper | On Paper | Digitally | Digitally |
In-person or Remote | In Person | In Person |
|
|
Question Types |
|
|
|
File upload |
Auto-Grading | Yes | Only multiple choice | Yes, based on question type | No |
Multiple Version | Yes; Up to 6 separate versions | No | Yes; Automatic shuffling and random selections from pools of questions | No |
Open or Closed Book | Determined by in-person invigilation | Determined by in-person invigilation | Determined by quiz settings or in person invigilation | Open book Turnitin Originality Check compatible |
Resources to share with students before an Akindi Bubble Sheet exam
There are no digital components to the student’s exam attempt.
Please ask them to come to the exam prepared with their TMU OneCard, and a dark writing utensil (pencil recommended, but not required).
Time-Based Accommodations
As this assessment is completed on paper, the timing is not managed by the tool, but through the facilitation of the exam.
Make-up Test or Rewrites in the Test Centre
- the number of questions (50 - 150)
- the number of possible answers (A-E or A-J)
This will allow the Test Centre to provide students with a blank bubble sheet that best matches the exam.
Once the exam is completed,
- Collect an envelope of the filled response sheets from the Test Centre.
- Scan them as a PDF (via scanner, or by taking photos on a mobile device and converting them to PDF).
- A course instructor must upload the completed exam sheets into the Akindi Dashboard (see Option 2 in the Scanning Completed Tests resource below).
After the exam has been completed, scan the filled bubble-response sheets – either by scanning them yourself, or returning them to the Duplicating and Printing Services (DPS) location at 105 Bond Street. If scanned by DPS, you will receive an email when the results are ready to be viewed online.
Note: If a student recorded their responses on a generic sheet provided by The Test Centre, it cannot be scanned by DPS. Please scan and upload these sheets yourself, as described in TMU’s Akindi Scanning Resource.
Once scanned, the bubble-response sheets will be auto-graded and allocated to individual students in the online system. Review the grading, making adjustments as needed, then sync the scores to your Brightspace Grades tool.
As Akindi Bubble sheets provide the most commonly desired features at TMU, they are the primary recommendation for standalone bubble sheet assessments.
Please note that other tools are available to you, which also offer automatically graded on-paper bubble sheets as part of the assessment. If you are not sure which tool would best suit your exam, please consider your options using the comparison guide below.
|
Crowdmark Paper Assessment | Scantron | |
---|---|---|---|
Recommended Use |
On-paper and hybrid bubble sheet assessments |
Multiple question type assessments, including multiple choice questions | No longer available; previously used for bubble sheet assessments |
Printing Sheets |
Regular A4 letter size sheets |
Regular A4 letter size sheets | Proprietary Scantron sheets |
Printing and Scanning |
Any consumer printer/scanner; can be done by Bond Street Printshop or independently |
Any consumer printer/scanner; can be done by RICOH or independently |
|
Pre-filled student information on sheets |
✓ |
No | ✓ |
Question types |
Multiple Choice and Multi-Answer, T/F Max. of 50 or 150 questions Answer options: A-E or A-J |
Multiple Choice, Handwritten Response Max. of 100 or 200 MC questions Answer options: A-E |
Multiple Choice, T/F; no multi-answer Max. of 215 questions Answer options: A-E |
Results |
Available online in the Akindi Dashboard, including the scanned bubblesheets |
Available online in Crowdmark, including the scanned response sheets | .CSV file emailed to you |
Advanced marking |
Partial marks Varied point values Exact selection only Multiple answer selection Either/or (multiple correct choices) |
Auto-marking for bubble sheet responses, including: Select one correct answer Select all correct answers |
No |
Answer Key Creation |
Uploaded from .docx file Manual selection (online) Upload completed bubble sheet Copy/paste |
Manual selection (online) | Use a bubblesheet and fill in the answer key. Put this at the top of the other bubblesheets for scanning. |
Can edit answer key after completion |
Yes; automatically re-grades all students |
Yes; automatically re-grades all responses | No |
Auto-export scores to Brightspace Grades |
✓ |
✓ | No (manual CSV file upload to D2L Grades) |
Automated response analysis |
✓ |
✓ | Excel files emailed to instructor |
Multiple versions of assessment |
✓ |
No | No |
Resources to share with students before an Crowdmark Handwritten exam
There are no digital components to the student’s exam attempt.
Please ask them to come to the exam prepared with their TMU OneCard, and a dark writing utensil (pencil recommended, but not required).
As this assessment is completed on paper, the timing is not managed by the tool, but through the facilitation of the exam.
If students are completing a separate makeup exam (with different questions), you will be required to create a separate Crowdmark Assignment and print a new question sheet for these students.
After the exam has been completed, scan the filled response sheets – either by scanning them yourself, or returning them to RICOH.
Within the Crowdmark system, then “match” the scanned sheets to the students, as described in TMU’s Crowdmark Exam Matching resource.
Once Matched, you and your team of graders can divide the work, provide numeric and written feedback, then sync the scores to your Brightspace Grades tool. Optionally, you can also distribute the feedback directly to students through Crowdmark.
Synchronous vs Asynchronous Quiz Start
By default, Brightspace Quizzes are asynchronous: students can start at any time in the window of availability, and will be able to answer questions until their personal timer ends. Learn more about asynchronous quiz settings at the Controlling access to Asynchronous Quizzes resource.
In Brightspace, Synchronous Quizzes are now a feature. When set to Synchronous, the quiz timer begins for all students at once, and ends for them at the same time (unless they have a time-based accommodation). Learn more about enabling synchronous quiz settings at the Create a Synchronous Quiz resource.
Encourage Academic Integrity through question delivery
Brightspace Quizzes include several features that you can implement to encourage academic integrity, including ways to organise and randomise questions and answers.
Randomizing and pooling questions has proven to be effective, as each student will see an individualised set of questions in a unique order. You can also randomise the answers to questions, for example, by shuffling the order of multiple choice answer options, or by allowing D2L to generate a random set of variables for math questions.
Respondus Lockdown Browser (available by request)
In Person Exams: Respondus LockDown Browser can be used in supervised exam environments to “lock” students into the Brightspace quiz on their exam device.
Remote Exams: Respondus LockDown Browser + Monitor is the only approved tool for virtual proctoring at TMU.
Please avoid using the synchronous quiz feature when Respondus Lockdown Browser + Monitor is enabled on a quiz, as it can impact the amount of time each student has to complete their exam.
Note: Respondus LockDown Browser (without use of webcam monitoring) is not recommended outside of a proctored lab environment, and Zoom is not recommended for virtual proctoring.
After the student's work has been submitted, you can view, grade, and provide feedback using the Brightspace Quizzes tool.
Depending on the types of questions in your quiz, some may be auto-graded, while others require manual scoring.
To learn more, visit the Brightspace Quiz Grading resource.
As Brightspace Quizzes are most commonly used at TMU, they are the primary focus of this resource.
Other online quiz tools are available to you, which also offer options to run online exams that can be administered in-person or remotely. Each has different features, which may benefit your exam. If you are not sure which tool would best suit your exam, please consider your options using the comparison guide below.
Online Quiz Tool Comparison Guide:
Akindi Online Assessment | Crowdmark Online Assessments | ||
---|---|---|---|
Recommended Use |
Quizzes with pooled or varied question types |
Multiple choice quizzes with a fixed end time; hybrid quizzes | Remote open book assessments, with multiple question types |
Question types |
Variety, including Multiple Choice, Written Response. Learn more about Brightspace Quiz Questions. |
Multiple Choice, Multi-Answer | Variety, including Multiple Choice, File Upload, Written Response. |
Hard deadline for submissions |
✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Accommodations can be individually set |
✓ |
✓ | ✓ |
Easily import questions from .docx or PDF file |
No |
✓ | No, but documents can be distributed as questions |
One-step fix of incorrect questions |
No |
✓ | ✓ |
Automated response analysis |
No |
✓ | ✓ |
Automated Virtual Proctoring Available |
✓ |
No | No |
Randomly selected questions from pools |
✓ |
No | ✓ |
Shuffle questions |
Within sections or across entire quiz |
Across entire quiz | Within randomized pools |
Prevent backtracking |
Can be set for one question or any page break |
One question at a time | No |
Multiple versions of quiz |
Assigned based on group or section enrollment |
Randomly assigned | Manually assigned |
If desired, enable Turnitin Similarity Checking
At TMU, Turnitin Originality can be used through the Assignments tool.
After submission, the reports and at-a-glance similarity score can then be accessed directly from the D2L Brightspace Assignment submission list.
Brightspace Assignment Makeup Exams
As the Brightspace Assignment is primarily used as a method of file upload, you can allow students to re-submit or submit at a different date to the same assignment. This is beneficial as it will simplify your gradebook and final grade calculations.
To facilitate this:
- In the Availability Dates & Conditions panel, use the Special Access settings to adjust the window of availability for specific students
- In the Submission and Completion Settings panel, ensure that “All submissions are kept”
After student work has been submitted, you can view, grade, and provide feedback directly in the Brightspace Assignments tool.