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Keywords: assessment, quiz, question, automated feedback, automated  grading, automated  marking, interactive, formative, summative

What is it?

The Word Table format lets you create Moodle quiz questions, including comprehensive  feedback feedback and grades in Word tables, then upload them to Moodle. This can save you time.

All the main question types except Calculated questions are supported. That means you can import the following:

• Matching: Match  Match 4 or more words or phrases. No feedback is included.
• Multiple-Choice: Choose the 1 correct answer from 4 or more possible answers. Specific feedback can be added for each answer. 
• Multiple-Answer: Choose  Choose 1 or more correct answers from 4 or more possible answers. Specific feedback can be added for each answer.
• Short Answer: Free text answer. Specific feedback can be added for each possible  Free text answer.
• Description: Not  Not a question, just a facility to add some text, usually instructions for a set of following questions.
• Essay: An  An essay question allows the entry of free text, which is not graded.
• True/False: Choose  Choose whether a statement is true or false. Specific feedback can be added for each answer - NOTE:  these are usually best avoided as they are easy to guess.

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• Cloze: Fill Fill-in-the-blanks or Embedded answers question. Use bold to enter Multichoice Multi-choice items, italic to enter Short Answer items, and underline to enter Numerical items.

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Why use it?

Creating quiz questions using the Moodle interface can be time consuming. The Word Table format is a quicker way to create quiz questions, providing you don't want to use more advanced types such as calculated questions or drag and drop.

Who can use it?

• Staff can use this to upload questions more quickly into a Moodle course. 

Before I start...

You can either use this the Word template file * *and to copy and paste the corresponding tables for how ever many questions the question types you want to create or create or, install a plugin for Word (see below) to allow you to create new quizzes and add new questions into a Word table by clicking on buttons within the Word Add-Ins tab.

Create your quiz questions from the Word document template

Image Added  Download the Word template file  (.docx)

1. Open the downloaded template in Word. 
2. Enable editing.
3. Leave Type Category Name for now.
4. Choose the type of questions you want to create (MCQ, multi-answer, matching, short answer, essay, description, true/false, cloze, description). You can mix and match these.
5. For each question you want to create, copy the corresponding table, including the name.

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1. E.g. MCQ Question name (MC).
2. See How do I use it? below to understand how to complete the table for each question type.

OR

Install the Word Add-In and create questions that way

Follow the instructions below to download download and install the plugin for your platform. 

>> Instructions for installing the WordTable Plugin .

1. Once installed

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1. , open Word and you should see a Moodle (or Add-Ins) tab in Word.

Windows

1. Download the Word 2007/2010 installer Zip file (works with later Word versions as well) and unzip the files to a folder. There are two files included in the installer package: moodle2WordInstaller_v2_x.docm and moodleQuestion.dot
2. Start Microsoft Word, and use the command File>Options>Trust Center>Trust Center Settings... and set Macro Settings to “Disable all macros except digitally signed macros”.
3. Open the file moodle2WordInstaller_v2_0.docm, and you will see a Security Warning bar at the top of the file. Click on the “Options” button to open the Security Options dialog box. The publisher who digitally signed the files is "XML Workshop Ltd.", the company I work for.
4. Click the check box next to "Trust all documents from this publisher". See the Set Security Options GIF animation (new window).
5. Click Yes to Install the Moodle Word template in your startup folder. A message box should then be displayed, saying the templates have been installed/copied, and you must restart Word. Click Yes to exit Word, then start it again.
6. A new menu called "Moodle" should appear to the right of the menu bar, and clicking on this will display the Moodle question ribbon.
7. In the Moodle ribbon, click the "New Question File" button and start a new question file. You will be prompted to save it in Word 97-2003 format (.doc) immediately.

Mac

1. Download the Word 2003 installer Zip file, and unzip the files to a folder. There are two files included in the installer package: moodle2WordInstaller_v2_0.doc and moodleQuestion.dot.
2. Start Microsoft Word, and use the command Tools>Macro>Security to set macro security to "High".
3. Open the file moodle2WordInstaller_v2_0.doc, and you will be prompted to install the files. Click 'Yes'.
4. You may be warned about macros in the file, and asked if you trust the publisher who digitally signed the files. In this case the publisher is "XML Workshop Ltd.", the company I work for. You don't have much choice but to trust us if you want to use the templates.
5. Click the check box next to "Always trust templates from this publisher", and then click the "Enable Macros" button.
6. Click Yes to Install the Moodle Word template in your startup folder.
7. A message box should be displayed, saying the templates have been installed/copied, and you must restart Word. Click Yes to exit Word, then start it again.
8. A new menu "Moodle" should appear, and a toolbar too.
9. Click the button "New Question File" and a new question file should be opened

Follow these instructions to install the Add-In for other Word versions.

Importing the Word document to Moodle

Once you have created your Word Table document with your questions and are ready to upload them to Moodle...

1. Navigate to your Moodle course
2. In the Settings menu, click Question Bank.
3. In the Settings menu, click Import.
4. Select Microsoft Word Click the Moodle tab > New question file and save the file to your computer.
5. Delete the True/False question, unless you want to add this type of question.
6. On the Moodle tab, in the Add Questions menu, click the type of question you would like to insert and the complete the table following the instructions below.

How do I use it?

Once you have your Word document template, or Word Add-In installed (see Before I start...) you can populate your Word document with your questions, ready for uploading into your Moodle course.

1. Replace Type Category Name with the name of the Moodle quiz category you want to create for these questions to sit within.
2. For each question replace the following:
   1. Replace 'MCQ Question name' - with the name of the question (only editors will see this). Leave the two letter code that is in brackets as this tells Moodle what type of question it is.
   2. Type the question in the top box. 
      • For Cloze questions, bold any text you want to add as a drop-down list and italicise any text you want to appear as a blank space for students to enter the correct word.
      • Include any LaTeX in double question marks ($$).
      • Add any images you wish to add.
        • Make sure you refer to them in the question, so if they don't load properly the student knows they are missing information.
        • Remember to add alt text for visually impaired people using screen-readers (providing this doesn't give the answer away). 
          • Right click the image > Format picture... Click the Layout & Properties menu (3rd button) > Enter a succinct, descriptive title (required) and a longer description (optional).
        • If images have been cropped or resized, click on the image, go to the Format tab and choose Compress Pictures > All pictures in document > OK.
   3. Fill in the relevant questions, answers and feedback for the question type:
      1. MCQ: Enter the Answers, feedback and make sure the correct answer has a grade of 100.
      2. Multi-answer: Enter the Answers, feedback and give each correct answer a grade, so they all add up to 100.
      3. Matching: Type the question under Item and the matching answer under Match.
      4. Short-answer: Enter all the possible correct short answers under right answer and add feedback alongside each.
      5. Essay: Enter the response to the student under Response template. 'Information for graders' will only be seen by tutors.
      6. Cloze: Enter any distractors to populate the drop-down lists in the question text (which you indicate with bold text in the question).
      7. Description: Doesn't require any feedback or grades, as this is just for adding instructions.
      8. All-or-nothing multiple choice: 
      9. Missing word: 
   4. Provide simple feedback for overall correct and incorrect answers.
   5. Provide detailed general feedback. All students will see this regardless of whether they got the answer correct or not.

   6. Please make sure that for the grade, the correct answers sum to exactly 100 %.

Importing the Word document to Moodle

1. Navigate to your Moodle course.
2. Go to the top menu and click More>Question Bank.
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3. Once in the Question Bank, choose Import in the drop-down menu at the top.
4. Select Microsoft Word 2010 table format (wordtable)
5. Choose the category you would like to import questions in to. You can leave this as the default if you like.
6. If you keep 'the Get category from file'  checkbox selected, Moodle will create categories based on those in the Word file you upload.
7. Drag your Word document to the import file area, or click Choose a file... >  >  Upload a file and  and  Choose File , then select it from your computer and click click Open and  and  Upload this file .
8. Click Import .

Caution

Each time you import questions these will be added to any that already exist in your Moodle course question bank. If you want to edit and replace the existing questions you will need to delete these from the question bank before importing the updated questions, otherwise you will end up with duplicates.

Examples and case studies

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Questions & Answers

Question:

I receive an error message when I try to Import.  What can I do?

Answer

1) If you receive the error: ' The type of the file you selected (application/msword) does not match the type expected by this import format (application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document).'   Please ensure the Microsoft Word file you are trying to import is of type .docx (and not .doc)  If you are using a .doc file select Save As, and select file type Microsoft Word (*.docx) from the Save As drop down list.  Once you have saved the file as type .docx please try again to import the file to your Moodle quiz.

2) If you receive the below error regarding the Moodle language...

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Please carry out the following to add the Moodle Language.

1. Within the Word document select the File menu.
2. Select Info.
3. Select Properties.
4. Select Advanced Properties.
5. Look under the Custom tab.
6. Type the moodleLanguage within the Name field (This is case sensitive - a lowercase m for moodle and an upper case L for Language is required)
7. Type en within the Type field (This is case sensitive, please ensure en is in lower case) and click Add.
8. Try again to import your Word Table format document (*.docx file) to your Moodle quiz.