New Quizzes: Allow Rich Content editing for fill in the blank

This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas

Fill in the blank only allows word answer. If my students needs to enter (2sin(x)cos(x)) or something from calculus it gets confusing. If students as well as teachers are allowed to use Rich Content Editing in simple fill in the blank. I believe it will make it easier for all the chemistry and math teacher because it will enable latex typing.

 

For Example: This is hard to input:

124060_expression.gifexpression.gif

 

Inputting: (sin(3x))/((x-3)(x+3))-((3sin(x)cos^2(x)-sin^3(x))/(x^2-9)) can be very tricky and can be easily mistaken. Therefor if rich content editing(LaTex system) were to be allowed students can easily type

 

124060_expression.gifexpression.gif

instead of (sin(3x))/((x-3)(x+3))-((3sin(x)cos^2(x)-sin^3(x))/(x^2-9))

81 Comments
d_h_jones
Community Novice

In New Quizzes, enabling the Rich Content Editor (HTML) to work throughout all parts of Fill in the Blank questions (not just in the Question Stem part) would be a great help in setting questions using exponents and indices. I need to write statements like "The stationary phase of 3 x 109 cells per ml was reached after 284 minutes and no lag phase occurred" and I can only use superscript, subscript, bold etc. formatting in the Question Stem part at present. I want to be free to format as I wish in statements where I am creating blanks for answering. In this respect the Canvas New Quizzes environment is inferior to that of BlackBoard Tests.

ChandlWM
Community Contributor

Worse case scenario, you type it in another program, and paste the

screenshot in canvas. If you are using formula questions then in the

picture instead of numbers you would put letters. Then below the picture

you have type the formula question by saying the letter = this number.

On Tue, Jan 21, 2020 at 10:37 AM d.h.jones@swansea.ac.uk <

ChandlWM
Community Contributor

Workaround: You could have students use Cymath.com to enter their

equations and then just copy the format over into the canvas fill in the

blank. I imagine a problem arises when some students might include

parenthesis when they aren't needed. So then in the fill in the blank you

have to account for both. I imagine you could tell students to reduce how

much they type to the least amount of characters as long as it looks right.

Just imagine all of the mathematical issues that arise. There are so many

equivalent expressions in math. It would be cool if Canvas would partner

with someone like Myscript https://www.myscript.com/calculator or some math

company like mathcad which will evaluate the answer to see if it is

equivalent to the answer you set.

See https://www.cymath.com/answer?q=(2sin(x)cos(x))

ChandlWM
Community Contributor

The canvas equation rich content really all it does is make a picture when

it is done. It doesn't have a number value or expression equivalency check.

On Thu, Feb 6, 2020 at 8:58 AM Bill Chandler <William.Chandler@ccsdut.org>

kjthompson
Community Novice

Why did they even change this? I find it ridiculous that we cannot start a new line in the fill in the blank part to make multiple parts of a new quiz. I thought the idea New Canvas Quizzes was to make it more efficient and more advanced. If you are a math teacher, it is neither of those things. I am so irritated right now.

remerick
Community Member

Kyle, I absolutely agree. For me, this is yet another example of Canvas's history of almost getting things right.

cindyk
Community Participant

The problem I see with this is that a simplified expression has only one correct answer and many that are equivalent.  I need to be able to disable such a feature depending on the question.

That's why I frequently require simplified form.

What I'd really like is the ability to vary points by answer combined with Fill in the Blank so I can give partial credit for almost simplified or common mistakes and still use auto-grade.  It wouldn't be perfect but it would reduce my workload significantly.

bhill2
Community Member

Please make this change!  

This would help teachers of MANY subjects, including languages. At least consider adding the ability to do line breaks and simple text formatting (bold, italics) if a full RCE isn't feasible. 

cmeyer42
Community Explorer

AGREED! Please add this feature!

misterjei
Community Member

I can't believe it's been 5 years and there are still no line breaks.