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zyBooks now supports the ability for instructors to create multiple-choice tests for their class using a set of questions created by our authors, for certain zyBook subjects. The tests that you create can be exported as a set of MS Word documents. Note that zyBooks does not provide a testing platform and tests cannot be taken and graded online in the zyBooks platform. Students do not have a "Tests" tab. You are able to distribute tests to students using whatever written or online means you wish.
Creating a test
To get started, navigate to the "Tests" tab. Then click the orange "+ Test" button.
This will take you to our "Create a test" experience.
You will need to name your test which you can do on the right side of the screen.
Next, expand a chapter on the left to see which sections have test questions.
Expand a section to see which questions are available in that section.
Answers can be previewed in place. Answers will also be available in the documents you will export at the end.
Use the checkboxes on the left to select the questions you want to use in your test. You can select as many questions as you like from as many sections and chapters as you like.
Once you have selected all of your questions, you can switch to the "Organize test" view using the toggle at the top of the page. You can always go back to the "Select question" view to add or remove questions later.
Questions can be reordered by clicking and dragging the gripper handles on the left.
Exporting a test
After you have selected all of the questions you'd like to add and organized them into an order you are happy with, click "Review and export" to review the test and export it.
This will take you to the "Review and export" experience where you can give your test one last look before exporting it.
From the " Review and export" page, select the format you want to export.
Selecting Word .docx will produce the following three documents,
1. The test, with no answers
2. The test with answers inline
3. A concise answer key with only answers
The other two options will produce a QTI zip file. The following guides provide instructions for uploading a QTI zip file into an LMS
Known limitations
Browser-specific issues
Safari - file downloaded as a folder instead of a QTI zip file
Safari has a setting that, by default, opens files automatically when downloaded. This includes zip files. If your QTI zip file shows up as a folder instead of a zip, then you must disable this setting or use a different browser.
NOTE: zipping/compressing the folder that is downloaded will NOT work. macOS will compress the file in a way that is different than what the LMS expects, which will either cause an error when importing or produce a test with no content.
Here's how to disable this setting. Go to Safari > Preferences.
In the General tab, there is an option at the bottom about opening "safe" files. Make sure that it is unchecked.
Click the red 'x' to close the Preferences. Once you re-export the file from zyBooks, you should see that it downloads correctly as a QTI zip file.
LMS-specific issues
Please note, we have discovered a few limitations/issues related to importing tests into LMSs in the QTI format. We have informed the support teams at Brightspace, Blackboard, and Canvas of the issues.
Brightspace/D2L
- Question choices are not able to support importing images. Images work ok in the questions themselves just not in the choices.
- Occasionally MathML will not render correctly.
- Coding blocks may contain extra new lines.
Some of these issues can be resolved manually after importing, by editing the tests.
To begin, open the test and select "Add/edit questions"
Select the question that needs to be revised then open in full-screen mode.
On the top toolbar select the Σ symbol and then LaTeX Equation
Replace the existing incorrect text with LaTex.
Online tools such as https://latexeditor.lagrida.com/ can be used to generate LaTeX from a WYSIWG editor.
For questions that contain images in the answer options, you can add the images back in manually.
Go to the corresponding zyBook question and right-click to copy the image.
Then, in the question editor, you can paste in the image you copied.
For questions with coding blocks, you can also edit them in the question editor.
You can either edit the code directly, or you can opt to copy-paste the formatted code from the zyBook.
Blackboard
- Code is not styled in traditional code font.
- Occasionally MathML will not render correctly.
These issues can be resolved manually after importing, by editing the tests.
To clean up the MathML, open the incorrectly formatted question in "Edit" mode.
Select the <> symbol to edit as HTML
Parse the source to look for any values that should be formatted.
To make a superscript, surround the value in a sup tag. For example,
{0 , 1 }<sup>2</sup>
To make a subscript, surround the text in a <sub> tag.
log<sub>2</sub>(x)
To make an overline, surround the text in a span tag and set a style attribute with CSS rule, text-decoration: overline as such,
<span style="text-decoration: overline;">A ∪ D</span>
Canvas
For questions that are LaTeX heavy, some of the LaTeX may render incorrectly.
So far we have identified the following issues.
- Broken exponents
- Broken overlines
- Broken comparative operators
- Incorrectly escaped percentage symbols
- Extra newlines
- Other
Many of these issues can be cleaned up using Canvas's built-in equation editor.
Another option is to clean smaller items using HTML.
Start by entering "Edit mode" and then opening up the HTML editor.
Broken exponents
Surround values that should be exponents in the HTML tag, <sup>, which is short for superscript.
Broken overlines
Surround values that should have overlines with a span tag that contains a style attribute for text decoration.
<span style="text-decoration:overline">
Broken comparative operators
The symbols \gt and \lt can simply be directly replaced with > or < in the text editor. From the HTML editor, \ge and \le can be replaced with ≥ and ≤ respectively.
Incorrectly escaped percentage symbols
Additional backslash characters that appear before the percentage symbol can simply be removed.
Extra newlines
In some cases, extra white space characters might get added, which can make the question challenging to read. Remove the extra new lines by deleting them in the text editor view.
Other
As mentioned previously the equation builder can be a great way to replace more complicated LaTex. Another option is to take a screenshot of the correctly rendered LaTeX from the zyBook and use the image.