Using Inspera for formative or mock digital exams

Inspera exam points should be created directly in Canvas as a Canvas assignment using Inspera as an external tool. This is essential as this is how students are enrolled onto tests.

1. Add a Canvas assignment (link to Canvas guide) from the assignments area adding a relevant title and any instructions. Please ensure you include the name of your module in the name of your assignment, e.g. MOD1234 Inspera Digital Exam [Date].

2. Ensure that the points available for the test are entered and 'display grade as' is set to Points. This should match the marks available for the test in Inspera or, to display the marks in Canvas as a proportion of 100 set this to 100.

3. Under submission type select external tool and then click on 'find' to locate and select 'Inspera Assessment'. Ensure 'load this tool in a new tab' is ticked.

4. The assignment can be assigned to specific students if necessary and availability dates can be set. Please note that the dates set here do not pull into Inspera and are controlling the availability of the link in Canvas only. The Digital Exams Team do not set due dates for summative exams so please leave this blank.

5. The assignment will need to be published to become available to students - you can do this now or nearer the time. Scroll down and click save.

6. A new page will load and you will need to click on 'load Inspera test in a new window'. This generates the exam point in Inspera and takes you to the Inspera settings in what is known as the 'Deliver' area.

The test name will be the same as the assignment name in Canvas but all other settings will now need applied in Inspera. 

1. Under 'template' you should select: 'Inspera in person exam template non lockdown'.
2. Under 'question set', search for the name of the question set you wish to use.
3. You should set the start time as the exact time you wish the exam to start. The Canvas start time should be 30 minutes prior to this to enable students to get logged in ready to start at the exact start time.
4. The end time should include a buffer time. The Digital Exams Team use a 3 hour buffer for summative centrally supported digital exams as this captures any extra time needs or if any issues occur during the exam that require you to give a student(s) additional time.
   • You can use a smaller buffer time for a formative exam if you wish but ensure that you consider the maximum potential extra time needed by a student.
   • For example, if a student may need 30 minutes extra time on an exam, you may wish to add a 1 hour buffer to be on the safe side for that particular exam as this captures the extra time need plus any potential extra time requirements on the day.
5. We advise that you do not use the 'duration' field, as the duration of the exam should be managed in the exam venue and students should be told to submit when the duration of the exam is over.
6. You can choose to add graders via the contributor drop down. You can view the Adding and removing markers Inspera webpage for further details. Alternatively, graders can be added once the exam has taken place by clicking the assignment point in Canvas.
7. Candidates will sync from Canvas when you create the assignment link in Canvas and open it. The number of candidates will display. Students cannot access the test until it has been released.
8. Scroll down to the 'Options' area ready for the next set of instructions.

Open up the 'General Settings' drop-down:

1. Please ensure 'Marking 2.0' is ticked to have access to the latest marking tools. 
2. No further settings are required under the 'General settings' tab.
3. Scroll down to the 'Security' drop-down.

Please note: if delegated marking is required for manually marked questions this will be set up using Grading Committees. You will do this after the exam has taken place.

Open up the 'Security' drop-down:

1. The locked down browser settings are not required for formative or mock tests, therefore you do not need to tick anything under 'require locked browser'.
2. You will need to ensure that 'Require Day Password' is selected, and then select the 'Set custom password' option. Here you can write a password between 4 to 10 characters. Your students will need to enter this password to start their test in Inspera.
3. No further settings are required under the 'Security' tab.
4. Scroll down to the 'Exam Day' drop-down.

Open up the 'Exam Day' drop-down:

• Provided you have selected the 'Inspera in person exam template non lockdown' template, you should see that the 'Enable Spell Checker' is ticked. This option would apply to any manually marked questions in your exam. You can choose to un-tick this if you wish.
• No further settings are required under the 'Exam Day' tab.
• Scroll down to the 'After test' drop-down.

• The settings for 'After test' and 'Grading workflow' will depend on your processes and the type of test.
• If you wish to explore feedback release options for a formative Inspera exam, please see the Inspera Feedback Release webpage.
• 'Explanation of grades' is something that we are not currently using at Newcastle, so no settings are required here.
• You have now selected all the required settings in the 'Set up' area of the test.
• Click 'next' to move to the Design area.

The Design area is where display options specific to the test are set. The design settings are identical to the ones the Author module has available when creating question sets, as described in this article: Design settings in question sets.

The design area of your question set enables you to view a preview of your question set and enable a series of settings. Any settings made here over-ride those previously set in the design tab of the question set.

1. Click on 'fetch form question set' to apply design settings set at the question set level.

The Digital Exams Team recommend that the following settings are enabled in any Inspera exams:

• Question Numbering Style – Test sequential is the recommended option.
• Hide navigation bar ❌
• Disable navigate back button ❌
• Table of contents ❌ - unless you are using Candidate Selected Questions
• Hide question title ✅
• Enable Flagging ✅
• Enable notes and highlights ✅
• Question maximum marks ✅
• Show interaction accessibility guide ✅
• Show progress indicator ❌

2. Click next at the bottom of the screen to move to assessment settings.

1. The Inspera Digital Exams Team recommend that 'Do not use grade scale' is ticked.
2. Click on next at the bottom of the screen to move to the final review page.

• This is the final screen from where the test is activated.
  • Please note that it is then possible to 'deactivate' a test and amend settings up until the time it is released to students. 
• Click on activate test. The test will become accessible to students at the date and time set. Remember that as students need to access the test through Canvas, the Canvas assignment must also be published and have the correct availability dates set.
• It is good practice to have a colleague check over your exam set up.

Please see the next section of this webpage 'What do I need to know about hosting my own formative Inspera exams?' for further guidance.

Multiple Attempts helps candidates to learn and understand the topics better by allowing them to practice until they get it right. Multiple Attempts exams using Inspera can be hosted in a non-locked down environment so that students can readily access them on campus or their own devices. Module teams can allow their students to take practice auto-marked Inspera exams repeatedly, either by unlimiting the access so a student can submit as many times as they wish, or by setting a defined number of retakes. You can find out more about Multiple Attempts on our dedicated webpage.

To help support you with grading and providing feedback to students on formative or mock exams, you can utilise some of the alternative grading options available in Inspera. 

For quick and consistent marking across your student cohort, you can add rubrics to your manually marked questions (such as essays), which not only can be visible to your students in their exam if you wish, but can also be released as part of feedback.  

There is also something called criteria grading which can also be a quick and efficient way to assign your marks to your students based on a set of criteria and associated marks. You can also build a reusable criteria bank for a specific test and use this to apply quick feedback comments for each student. Find out more about criteria and reusable criteria on the Rubric webpage.

When setting up formative/mock exams for your students, you can release grades and feedback to students at any point after the exam. For exams with manually marked questions, you would need to assign any marks and feedback before you are able to release this to your students. For any exams that have automatically marked questions only, it is possible to set your exam grades and feedback to instant release. Head over to the Inspera Feedback Release webpage and see the drop down called 'Formative Exams with Auto-Marked Questions'.