Mallard Tutorial

Mallard Tutorial for the College of Commerce Business Administration

This tutorial will guide you through the creation of several simple questions and ultimately a quiz.

The first question

We will start by writing a simple multiple choice question.

Start at the mallard home page, by clicking on the house icon in the left icon bar.
Scroll down to the "Developer Links"
Click on the "Question Manager" link.
Scroll down to "Create Online a New Question or Version:"
Every Mallard question must have an ID. It is analogous to a file name. In the blank, "Enter the Mallard id for the question:" type "interest_simple"
Click on the "Create Question or Version" button.
A large rectangular text area will appear. Type the following text in the the text area:

Interest paid or computed on the original principal only is:
<input type=Multiple_choice>
compound
derivative
simple
none of the above
</input>
<answer>
3
</answer>

Then click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the screen.
Click on "Try It" at the top of the screen.
Answer the question and then click on "Check Answer"
Use the borrower's "Back" button and select different answers.

The second question

Start at the mallard home page, by clicking on the house icon in the left icon bar.

Scroll down to the "Developer Links"
Click on the "Question Manager" link.
Scroll down to "Create Online a New Question or Version:"
Every Mallard question must have an ID. It is analogous to a file name. In the blank, "Enter the Mallard id for the question:" type "interest_compound"
Click on the "Create Question or Version" button.
A large rectangular text area will appear. Type the following text in the the text area:

Interest computed on the sum of an original principal
and accrued interest is:
<input type=multiple_choice>
compound
derivative
simple
none of the above
</input>
<answer>
1
</answer>

Then click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the screen.
Click on "Try It" at the top of the screen.
Answer the question and then click on "Check Answer"
Use the borrower's "Back" button and select different answers.

Adding Parameters to questions

Parameters determine how a question will appear and behave. We will now add a parameter to the second question to make the choices appear in random order.

Start at the mallard home page, by clicking on the house icon in the left icon bar.
Scroll down to the "Developer Links" and click on the "Browser" link. A list of available browses will appear.
Scroll down to "Question Browser"
Click on the "questions matching" radio button.
In the blank to the right of "questions matching" type "interest*" This will show you all the questions that begin with interest.
Locate the question "interest_compound" in the list and click on its "Edit It" button.
Insert the following text after the first <input> line

Click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the screen.
Click on "Try It" at the top of the screen. You will notice that the choices are now in a different order. Each time you click on "Try It" the order will change.
The choice "None of the above" is no longer appropriate. Click on "Edit it" and change the choice to "none of these"
Click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the screen.

Writing an Arithmetic question

One of Mallard's great features is its ability to handle arithmetic questions.

Start at the mallard home page, by clicking on the house icon in the left icon bar.
Scroll down to the "Developer Links"
Click on the "Question manager" link.
Scroll down to "Create Online a New Question or Version:"
Every Mallard question must have an ID. It is analogous to a file name. In the blank, "Enter the Mallard id for the question:" type "interest_wp"
Click on the "Create Question or Version" button.
A large rectangular text area will appear. Type the following text in the the text area:

Lanny Arvan opens up a savings account with $1,000.
The bank pays 5% interest each year compounded each month.
If the account is inactive for a year, what will his balance
be at the end of this period?
<input type=arith>
<param tolerance=1%>
</input>
<answer>
1000 * (1 + 0.05 / 12) ^ 12
</answer>

Then click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the screen.
Click on "Try It" at the top of the screen.
Answer the question using an equation and a fixed value (the easiest way to do this is to use the cheat button).
Experiment with the tolerance. Make it a fixed value, or change its size.

Multiple versions of a question

Mallard supports multiple versions of a single question. You should think of versions as testing the same knowledge. For instance, an appropriate version of the first question you wrote might be a fill in the blank question where the answer is simple interest.

Start at the mallard home page, by clicking on the house icon in the left icon bar.
Scroll down to the "Developer Links"
Click on the "Question Manager" link.
Scroll down to "Create Online a New Question or Version:"
In the blank, "Enter the Mallard id for the question:" type "interest_wp" You should see the following message.

1 version of question interest_wp already exists. Would you like to create version 2?

The radio button "Copy version 1 into the new version" is already selected.
Click on the "Create new version" button. You should see a text box with the code from the first word problem.
Change the problem so that the

principle = $12,000
rate = 2.5%
time = 2 years

Don't forget to edit the answer to reflect these changes.
Then click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the screen.

Creating a Quiz

Now that we have some questions, we will create a quiz using these questions.

Start at the mallard home page, by clicking on the house icon in the left icon bar.
Scroll down to the "Developer Links" and click on the "Quiz Manager" link.
Under the "Create New Quiz" heading set "Enter the Mallard quiz name:" = interest
Set "Number of Question Pools:" = 2
Click on "Create Quiz"
Set "Title" = An Interest Quiz
You can enter some text to appear at the top of the quiz. This is analogous to directions at the beginning of a quiz. Enter this text

Answer each question and then submit the quiz. The second question is worth twice as much as the first.

Leave "Grade Policy" set at "Default"
Under "Available Questions" click on "interest_simple" it will become hi-lighted.
Click on "Add to:" Group 1. The question will now be listed in group 1.
Under "Available Questions" click on "interest_compound" it will become hi-lighted.
Click on "Add to:" Group 1. The question will now be listed in group 1.
Under "Available Questions" Change Group to Group 2
Under "Available Questions" click on "interest_wp" it will become hi-lighted.
Click on "Add to:" Group 2. The question will now be listed in group 2.
Set the weight in Group 2 equal to 2.
Click on the "Change Quiz" button.
Scroll down to the "Try Quiz" button and try your new quiz.

Before Students can take your new quiz it must be finalized. Once this quiz is finalized you can not change what questions the quiz uses, the weights of the questions, or the number of questions. This ensures that all students will see the same quiz. You can still edit the questions that the quiz uses in case you find a problem.

Start at the mallard home page, by clicking on the house icon in the left icon bar.
Scroll down to the "Developer Links" and click on the "Quiz Manager" link.
Scroll down to "Edit or Try an Existing Quiz:"
Select "interest" from the list of available quizzes. Click the "Edit Quiz" button.
Scroll down to "Finalize the structure of this quiz?" Click on the "yes" radio button.
A warning will appear. Click on the OK button.
Click on the "Change Quiz" button.

Making the Quiz Available to Students

We now have a two question quiz. The first question will be on of our two multiple choice questions. The second one will be one of the two versions of our arithmetic problem. However, we must make the quiz available to students before they can take it.

Start at the mallard home page, by clicking on the house icon in the left icon bar.
Scroll down to the "Course Director Links" and click on the "Edit Lessons Page" link.
Find the lesson with the titled "Unused quizzes". You will see the quiz entry for interest

Leave title blank or delete it. Doing this will take the tile from the quiz file. If you want to override the title in the quiz file, enter some text between the quotes.
Change the due date to 12/12/97:midnight
Change status to "available" (available is the default. If you remove the status parameter all together, the quiz will be available.)
Highlight the line with your cursor. Hold down ctrl and press the x key to cut the line to the clipboard.
Position the cursor after the Intro to Mallard lesson and hold down the control key and press the v key to paste the line in.
Click on "Save Changes"
Click on the bookshelf icon in the left bar
Click on your quiz.