The six question types

Six types, and the useful distinction between them is not the interaction — it is whether the software can mark it.

Marked automatically

Multiple choice

Several options, exactly one correct. Write the options and mark which is right.

Best for: a fact with one answer, or a judgement between clearly different positions.

Fill in the blank

A sentence with a gap, and the word that fills it. You can give more than one acceptable answer, and you should — the matching forgives capitals, surrounding spaces and a trailing full stop, and nothing else.

Best for: terminology and names. Not for: anything a learner might phrase three ways, unless you list all three.

Choose all that apply

Several options, more than one correct. Marked all or nothing: every correct option ticked and no incorrect ones.

Best for: “which of these are true” where partial knowledge genuinely is not the answer. Be aware you are setting a harder question than it looks — six options with three correct has twenty wrong answers and one right one.

Put these in order

A list the learner arranges. Every item must be in its place.

Best for: sequence — chronology, process steps, a logical argument. The learner can drag, or use a dropdown beside each item, so it works on a phone and with a keyboard.

Matching pairs

Two columns to pair up. Every pair must be right.

Best for: term and definition, person and place, cause and effect. The side being matched to can shuffle.

Marked by a person

A written answer

A box the learner types into. Nothing marks it until you read it.

Best for: anything where the reasoning is the point. It is the only type that can ask “why”.

It is also the only type that creates work for you. A course of thirty written answers and two hundred learners is six thousand things to read — which is what assistants are for, and worth thinking about before you write the course rather than after.

Choosing between them

Two rules of thumb that save most of the trouble:

If you would accept several phrasings, do not use fill-in-the-blank unless you list them. It is the type that generates the most “this was marked wrong and it is right” messages, and every one of them is your time.

All-or-nothing types are harsher than they feel. Five pairs out of six scores zero. That is fine if you intend it; if you do not, either use fewer items or expect to award partial credit yourself — see Overriding a mark.