Throughout TechSmart courses, students will encounter different types of assessments and assessment questions. These will differ slightly courser to course, but the following is an overview of the different assessment types and question styles that appear through TechSmart's course offerings.
Assessment Types
There are 3 different assessment types: Lesson Checks, Quizzes and Tests. When a student completes an assessment, there will be an opportunity to review their answers, and see a correct explanation of any question they may have answered incorrectly.
Lesson Check
A Lesson Check will occur once at the end of each lesson. There are a total of 5 questions, and is designed for teachers to monitor if students are comprehending the material within the lesson.
Quiz
A Quiz occurs once per unit at the midway mark through the unit's content. There are a total of 12 questions, and is designed to make sure students are comprehending the early concepts before moving onto more advanced content in the rest of the unit.
Test
A Test occurs once per unit at the end of the unit's content. There are a total of 25 questions, as well as a Practice Test that also has 25 questions. Each test is designed to evaluate if students have comprehension of all of the unit's learning objectives.
Assessment Question Types
There are a total of 4 different assessment question types: Multiple Choice, Code Rewrite, Code Highlight and Short Answer. Students may not encounter every question type on each assessment, but may encounter each of them throughout a course.
Multiple Choice
Multiple choice questions give students a list of possible answers to a given question, and students may pick only one correct option.
This may require students to analyze a piece of code and select a correct output of the given code, decide which statement best answers a question about a series of statements, or decide if a given statement is true or false.
Common Multiple Choice Pitfalls
- Not reading the question carefully
- Not double checking they selected the answer they intended before turning in the assessment
- Assuming there are patterns of the answers (e.g., "C" is always correct)
(Not reading the question carefully)
Code Rewrite
Code Rewrite questions give students a code block, and ask that students somehow alter the pre-written code.
These questions can have a few variations in what they will ask students to do. Students may be asked to write new code in an existing code snippet to achieve a certain output or behavior. They may also be given a code snippet and be asked to refactor, or rewrite, the existing code to be more efficient. Or, students may be given a piece of broken code and will be asked to change some parts of the code to make it work correctly.
It is important to note that while TechSmart does its best to allow as many variations of the expected answer as possible to be counted as correct, it is possible to have a student submit working code that is not accounted for, which in turn will be marked as incorrect. Please reach out to Live Support if you encounter an unaccounted for correct solution.
Common Code Rewrite Pitfalls
- Using syntax that is not part of best practices
- Changing or deleting code that was not meant to be altered
- Writing code that is outside of the scope of context for the lesson or unit
(Using incorrect syntax - return with a capital “R” is not a valid keyword)
Code Highlight
Code highlight questions will ask students to use their mouse or trackpad to highlight specific parts of code within a larger code block, such as certain keywords, syntax, or data types.
Some questions may ask them to highlight multiple items, which can be done by holding the control/ctrl key on PC, or the command/cmnd key on Mac. Code highlight questions do not have any variation in what is considered a correct answer, so it is very important to carefully read the question and follow its instructions exactly.
Common Code Highlight Pitfalls
- Highlighting more than the question is asking for, such as quotes or syntax characters that are not part of the item that is meant to be highlighted
- Not highlighting enough
- Highlighting 1 item in a question that is meant to have multiple items highlighted
(Not highlighting enough of what the questions is asking for)
Short Answer
Short answer questions will ask some question and allow students to write their answer in a text box.
These questions will often ask students to either evaluate a piece of code and answer what the outcome or output will be, or give a short statement that has a missing blank to be filled in.
It is important to note that TechSmart does its best to allow as many variations of the expected answer as possible to be counted as correct, such as different spelling, letter casing, extra spacing, etc. But it is possible to have a student give a correct answer that is not accounted for, which in turn will be marked as incorrect. Please reach out to Live Support if you encounter an unaccounted for correct solution.
Common Short Answer Pitfalls
- Incorrect spelling
- Erroneous spacing
(Incorrect spelling)