03-exams.Rmd

# Exams {#exams}


```{r echo=FALSE, results=FALSE, messages=FALSE}
knitr::opts_chunk$set(eval = FALSE)
#library(exams)
```



## Concepts


**Goals**


* reduce the risk of cheating
* have a one-for-all exams generator

_References_:

* [First Steps (website of R_Exams)](https://www.r-exams.org/tutorials/first_steps/)
* Achim Zeileis, Nikolaus Umlauf, Friedrich Leisch (2014). "Flexible Generation of E-Learning Exams in R: Moodle Quizzes, OLAT Assessments, and Beyond." Journal of Statistical Software, 58(1), 1-36. <doi:10.18637/jss.v058.i01>
* [Moodle Tests: Not So Much of a Fuss When You Have R
M. Cristina Miranda, Anabela Rocha, ICSIT 2022](https://www.iiis.org/DOI2022/EB443PN/)



**Techniques**


Techniques to reduce the risk of cheating:

* Randomly selecting one (or more) out of a set of exercises for each participant.
* Randomly shuffling answer alternatives in single-choice and multiple-choice questions.
* Randomly selecting numbers, text blocks, graphics, etc. using the R programming language.


_Reference_ [First Steps](https://www.r-exams.org/tutorials/first_steps/)


**Output to several formats**

- html and pdf/LaTeX
- pandoc (for customizable outputs in various formats (Docx, ODF, PDF, ...).
- nops (fixed PDF format that can be automatically scanned and evaluated), 
- LMS: moodle, blackboard,
- QTI XML (various learning management systems: canvaslms, openOlat), arsnova (JSON format)


![](images/rexmas-exports.png)

_References_:

* [file demo-all.Rmd](https://www.r-exams.org/assets/posts/2017-09-10-first_steps//demo-all.R)


**An exercise, in a standalone file**

Each exercise (or rather “exercise template”):

* Data-generating process written in R.
* Question text.
* Solution text.
* Meta-information.

_Reference_ [First Steps](https://www.r-exams.org/tutorials/first_steps/)


**cloze type - a special question format**

"cloze" question type can handle *several questions types*, in the same file, for example inside an R `list` or explicitly described.


## In your machine


**Install**


Some steps:

* [Install R, then RStudio](https://posit.co/download/rstudio-desktop/)
* [RTools42](https://cran.r-project.org/bin/windows/Rtools/rtools42/rtools.html)

  * For some tasks (e.g., output for some learning management systems) it is necessary that the base R zip() function works. On Windows this requires to install the Rtools and to include them in the PATH environment variable. "Rtools is a toolchain bundle used for building R packages from source"

* Install `exams` package:

```r
install.packages("exams", dependencies = TRUE)
```

_Reference_ [Installing R/exams](https://www.r-exams.org/tutorials/installation/)



**Only once**



Create a folder for questions and then do:

```r
setwd("c:/<folder>/rexams-questions")
```

_Note_ in R one must use "c:/" instead of "c:\\".


```r
library("exams")
exams_skeleton(markup = "markdown",
  writer = c("exams2html", "exams2pdf", "exams2moodle"))
```



_Reference_ [First steps](https://www.r-exams.org/tutorials/first_steps/)



## The Slow Development Cycle


We use [already created contents](https://www.r-exams.org/templates/) - there creation coul be an addictive process!!



**Decision about exam contents (step 1/5)** -- a vector of filenames

```{r}
# setwd("~/<root of r-exams project>")
library("exams")
elearn_exam <- c(
  "swisscapital.Rmd",
  "deriv.Rmd",
  "ttest.Rmd",
  "boxplots.Rmd",
  "function.Rmd",
  "lm.Rmd",
  "fourfold2.Rmd")
```


**Appreciate, in html, the future exam (step 2/5)** -- `exams::exams2html()`

```{r}
set.seed(2023-05-16) # or 2002
exams2html(elearn_exam, n = 1, name = "R-exams")
```


* `exams2html` produce html output reading from "exercises" folder and writing to "output" folder
* `name = "R-exams"` specifies the Moodle Category. Below "R-exams" will reside all the exercises numbered "Exercise 1", "Exercise 2", ....
* `n` is the number of variations of a question

rules-of-thumb about *n*:

- maybe one can correct a moodle question in runtime (during exam)
- n=6 is a good number if questions are new (easy to correct)
- n much greater avoid completely participant copy of solutions but in case of error, a lot of work expects the evaluator/teacher



**Publish the exam (step 3/5)** -- `exams::exams2moodle()`

```{r}
set.seed(2023-05-16) 
exams2moodle(elearn_exam, n = 3, name = "R-exams", dir="output")
  ## This yields the file R-exams.xml that can be imported into Moodle.
  ##output folder should contain the xml file.
```

* `name = "R-exams"` the "R-exams" string will define a new category in Moodle structure.


**Moodle import (step 4/5)**

A step-by-step video guide to importing and customizing the quiz in Moodle is available on YouTube at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5K9hrE3YkPs>.


**Moodle direct observation (step 5/5)**

Direct observation, of questions, in moodle can clean last mistakes or errors.


_Reference_  [E-Learning Quizzes](https://www.r-exams.org/tutorials/elearning/)


## stackoverflow

More than 250 questions:

Exemple: "Change TRUE and FALSE to Verdadero and Falso in "mchoice" exercises of R-exams":
[answer here](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/75249954/change-true-and-false-to-verdadero-and-falso-in-mchoice-exercises-of-r-exams)

* More questions: <https://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/r-exams/>


_Reference_ [Resources](https://www.r-exams.org/resources/)