As instructors prepare their assessments to be delivered online using Canvas Quizzes, LMS administrators are frequently asked for input to prevent academic dishonesty. There is no way to guarantee integrity for an online quiz, but there are various quiz settings you can use to your quizzes more secure. Make sure you fully understand settings and the impact of the settings you choose on overall test security before publishing the quiz.
Use a pool of questions. Build pools, or banks, of quiz questions that have more questions than you will actually include, and Canvas will randomly pull a smaller number of questions from that pool for each quiz. The larger the number of questions in the pool compared to the number of questions included in a quiz, the more secure the quiz can be since different students will see mostly different questions.
Randomize questions and responses. Even if you ask students the same set of questions, when questions are presented randomly, each student can receive a different version of the quiz. The same applies to answers, but if you want to shuffle answers, make sure multiple-choice questions do not have “all of the above” or “none of the above” as possible answers.
Employ different question types. Use a variety of question types such as matching, ordering, fill-in-the blank and categorization question types. For questions requiring a calculation, consider using the formula question type. All of these question types can be auto-graded, but can be more complicated for students to quickly search for a response because of the question or answer format. Use additional distractors when available. You may also consider adding some short answer questions that require students to explain how they derived their response.
Show one question at a time. By default, students taking a quiz in Canvas will see their questions as a list that they scroll through and answer. As an alternative, you can select for each question to be shown one at a time. Rather than scrolling, students click a “next” button to advance through each quiz question as it is individually displayed on screen. One of the biggest advantages to students only seeing one question at a time is that it makes it more difficult for them to take screen shots of their quiz to share with others.
If you select “Show one question at a time,” another option is to lock each question after a student answers. This keeps students from being able to move forward without answering and prevents them from going back to change an answer. Please keep in mind that this feature can also be problematic for students who need to rethink their answers during the quiz.
Require an access code. To help ensure only students who are physically present can take the exam, add a quiz access code. Distribute the code to students in the classroom, and then change the access code after quiz launch to reduce sharing the code with students not present in the classroom.
Hide results and scores until all students have taken the quiz. Restrict submission viewing until all students have taken the quiz. Edit the quiz settings to allow students to view their submissions or correct answers only after all students have submitted and availability has ended. Canvas quiz setting can be confusing – for example, setting a date to display correct answers allows students to view the quiz immediately after submission even if they cannot see the correct answers until a date in the future. Manually editing the settings provides you more control over when students see their submissions. For maximum security, you may opt to never let students see their submissions except while meeting individually when you share your view.
Set a manual posting policy for the quiz in the gradebook so that students cannot see their scores. With New Quizzes, you cannot rely on the posting policy to restrict submission viewing as you can with Classic Quizzes, so make sure your quiz settings are configured correctly.
Restrict course content. Unpublish files or folders or disable tools in your Canvas course to discourage or prevent access to content while students are taking the quiz.
Include an academic integrity statement. Add a zero-point true/false question at the beginning or end of your quiz to remind students about integrity. For example, “I swear on my honor that I have neither given nor received aid on this exam.” Or add a non-question type statement describing your expectations at the beginning of your quiz as a reminder.
Both quiz tools, Classic and New Quizzes, have these configuration and settings options, but implementation may be different. Below are some instructor guides to get started, but is always a good idea to review your quiz and settings with a LMS administrator before you deliver your online exam.
- What options can I set in a Classic Quizzes quiz?
- How do I manage settings for a quiz in New Quizzes?How do I create a question bank in a course (Classic Quizzes)?
- How do I create an item bank in New Quizzes?
- How do I select a grade posting policy for an assignment in the Gradebook?
Visit the IT-ATS Welcome bar or send an e-mail to canvas-info@udel.edu if you need assistance configuring your Canvas quizzes.
