October 7, 2010
Dear Everyone:
When I met with the two guys who are "representing"
the support group for the electronic
document management system that I
am producing the Computer Based Training (CBT) for, they "suggested"
that a form be developed that would collect the information needed to
set up a new Userid once a student has completed the CBT.
I said that I would look into it.
Captivate, the software we're using to create these
CBTs, does have a feature that allows you to create a "quiz".
This is a special slide that asks a question, then responds
depending on the answer.
We've used it plenty of times for a "self-check" in a module.
If the student answers the question correctly, they continue with
the module. If not, that's a
clue that the student needs to go back through the module for better
understanding.
You can also use a "quiz" slide to "survey" an
audience. The answers are
fill-in-the-blank and the quiz collects the answers.
I thought I could use this to create the "form" that the system
support people wanted.
(A bit of history about all this:
Back when I first got involved with this system, about seven
years ago--centuries in software-years--the people in charge made a very
wise decision: No one would
be allowed a Userid unless they had gone through at least some
rudimentary training. It cut
down considerably on unnecessarily-simple questions like, "how do I log
in to the system?"
(As one of the Instructors, I quickly learned that
many people had no idea what their "default target group" would be.
But having gone through the training, they could at least work
with me to help identify this information before the class was over.
We Instructors would then send the information to the system
support people. They liked
that. No work required on
their part. They would like
this to happen again.
(As our maternal grandfather used to say, "They
want ice water in hell, too."
So what we're attempting to do here is recreate the
Instructor-led ferreting out of information.)
I kicked around a few simple survey questions, but
ran into a few roadblocks. I
mentioned it to another co-worker who also uses the CBT software.
Since all the work he's done has been around the
newer-sexier-shinier-SharePoint system, he automatically translated the
question into something to do with SharePoint and "suggested" the
obvious: Instead of creating
a "survey" in the CBT software, why not just create a link to a
SharePoint survey?
This is when I smote myself in the forehead:
Of course! That would
be much easier! In fact, the
system support people could even pull a listing out of the system of all
the available target groups (for instance) and require the User to
select from a list, instead of letting them just
make something up out
of whole cloth. And it would also
be easier to update the survey in a SharePoint, or just plain web, site
instead of having to revise the CBT every time something changes, which
it does too often now, thank you very much.
This is why I'm doing the CBT in the first place.
Another thing I'm doing with quiz slides is the
"final assessment", the test at the end of the CBT to see if the User
understands enough to be let loose in the system.
Again, when I was an Instructor, we had a pretty good idea that
some people were not exactly following the rules with the CBT.
At first, we had to send out a Word document with
the questions and wait for them to send it back with the answers.
Suddenly, I would be receiving a dozen or more emails from
“students” in India (a company had been contracted to do some work for
one of the Operating Companies) all with the exact same Word document
with the exact same correct and incorrect answers.
And all within about 10 minutes.
(Think they were cheating?)
Later, when the current CBT was introduced, we
would be contacted by people (again in India), requesting a Userid.
We would “explain” about taking the CBT.
An hour later, they would claim to have “completed” the CBT, with
the assessment all filled out.
Think they actually went through the three to four hour course
before taking the assessment?
When I went through the actual CBT myself, complete
with the assessment, I discovered something:
At the end of the assessment, the system
automatically generates a
list of all the questions complete with the correct answers.
Bingo!
Someone printed out the questions and answers and provided them to
anyone who “needed” them.
We’ll soon put an end to that.
The newer software allows for a “Quiz Pool” containing a number
of questions with answers.
Then you can specify a “random question” that the system uses to
randomly generate the questions.
I also “turned off” the “feature” that automatically provides the
student with a list of questions and answers at the end of the
assessment.
It will be interesting to see what happens once the
“new and improved” CBT goes into place.
But that’s still a bit of a ways off.
Love, as always,
Pete
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