Design and Implementation of the Network Examination System

Link: http://www.etc.edu.cn/articledigest16/wang-xian.htm
The Design and Implementation

A web-based testing system

Yang Juan * Cheng Jiangang * Han xibin * Cao Yan * Wang Xueyou **

* Tsinghua University Education Software Research Center E-mail: yangj00@mails.tsinghua.edu.cn

** Tsinghua University Institute of Modern Education Technology Tel: 010-62782405

Topic Selection

This article introduces the design and implementation of the evaluation subsystem of the network teaching platform-network examination system. This article briefly introduces the design of the online examination system's question bank system, which includes three sub-databases: Question Bank, examination database, and subject knowledge structure database. Then we introduced the development of six modules of the examination system: exam creation module, release module, test control module, marking module, statistical analysis module, and release module. This article focuses on the design and implementation of the exam creation module, especially the manual exam creation module.

Keywords:Network teaching platform Network Examination System exam paper

1 Introduction

Looking at the research and application history of computer-based testing, as shown in figure 1, we can see that with the development of computer technology, the application of computer in testing has been simply scored from the beginning, after the emergence of the IRT model, adaptive tests, and now the network-based situational and simulated tests have played an increasing role. The form of questions also changes in this process, from fixed questions in a single exam to questions that can be freely combined, and then to the current multimedia questions library. With the establishment of the question library, it is easy to create a paper and the test form is also changing, A large-scale collective test by all students taking the same test paper has developed to a group test using different tests with equivalent test effects. With the increase of the question bank and the development of computer technology, individualized test papers have become a new target for researchers and teachers.

Figure 1 Application of Computer in testing

1950

1960

1970

1980

1990

2000

Group test

Group test

Individualized Testing

Electronic scoring/marking

IRT model

Question Bank Item Banking

Fixed-Order Tests Fixed sequence test

Multimedia questions Multimedia items

Adaptive Test

Network-based testing Situational questions Simulation Testing

Application history of computers in tests

This timeline not only reflects the increase in the role of computers, but also reflects the use of computers to gradually implement many ideas of teachers and educational measurement experts. Therefore, the advancement of technology cannot be the key to judging the quality of a teaching platform. Only the most suitable teaching needs are the best. As a network teaching platform, it is to help teachers achieve their teaching philosophy. As one of the most important components of the network teaching platform, the evaluation system must also adhere to this purpose: it helps instructors achieve educational measurement.

In the network teaching process, periodic evaluation is required. The examination is a mainstream measurement method. Therefore, the network testing system is an important part of the learning support subsystem of the network teaching platform. The online examination system's question bank system has been improved to support multiple media forms of questions. At the same time, with the help of the convenient exam creation module, you can obtain multiple equal papers, the release module can also be used to implement some "individualized testing" functions in different forms of the same volume. In fact, the online examination system is still in the group-based testing stage. Strict individualized tests require a continuous evaluation system, that is, to track the learning process of students and observe the changes in the Learning volume, skills, learning path and performance of students, dynamically complete the evaluation of the original proficiency level of students' knowledge, and then conduct targeted individualized tests. This article focuses on the overall structure and functional design of the online examination system and the introduction of the three types of question libraries, the Design and Implementation of six main functional modules, including exam creation, release, test process control, marking, score issuance and return, and statistical analysis, during the test process.

2 Network Examination System Design and question bank overview 2.1 system overall structure design

The examination system consists of teachers and students. The workflow is divided into three stages: Question Bank and exam creation, examination and grading, and statistical analysis. The supported system databases are divided: standardized Question Bank, exam database, answer library, statistical information library, and subject knowledge structure library. The functional modules of the system are: exam preparation, exam management, exam generation, Identity confirmation, exam and submission, exam grading, statistical analysis, score archiving, and score Publishing.

The general process of the examination system is as follows:

Figure 2 system flowchart

The entire examination system includes four parts: user management, permission authentication, construction and maintenance of questions and exam resources, test process control, statistical analysis, and information feedback, which are supported by their respective databases, this includes the instructor information library and student information library used for user management and permission authentication, the test database and examination database that support the construction and maintenance of test questions and exam resources, and the answer library involved in the test process control, the statistical information database involved in the statistical analysis information feedback and the discipline knowledge structure database that assists in the test paper and statistical analysis (3 ).

Figure 3 System Structure

Network Examination System

User Management permission Authentication

Questions and exam resource construction and maintenance

Tested program-controlled

Statistical analysis information feedback

Student Information Library

Instructor Information Library

Test Database

Exam Database

Answer Library

Statistical information library

Subject knowledge structure Library

2.2 question bank system Introduction

The question library system includes the question library, examination library, and subject knowledge structure library.

Library System Model: Classic quiz theory and question response theory. The classical test theory is suitable for traditional tests, and the question response theory is more suitable for adaptive tests. In the current network teaching, the individualized test and the collective test of the instructor exam are both in existence. Therefore, two testing theories are used at the same time. The question library established on the basis of the two theories is nothing more than a different description. Therefore, the description library and question library are used separately to establish a unified question library, then, a descriptive library is created based on the classic quiz theory and question response theory. In this way, you can share a question bank and only call the description library during the exam creation.

All the papers and their information are saved in the exam database. The function of the exam database is as follows: 1. Back up data and check data; 2. Provide a basis for future exam creation: teachers can call up or use the exam in the exam database, or use it for reference, or, you can make a new exam with a slight modification. 3. You can select an open exam from the exam database for students to perform self-testing and check students' knowledge about the knowledge points.

The subject knowledge structure library includes the knowledge point Library and the course knowledge structure library. Knowledge points are the basic units that constitute the course structure. The knowledge point library stores a large amount of knowledge point information. The chapter structure library is created by the instructor according to the course structure and teaching outline before preparing lessons or establishing a question bank. In the process of setting the chapter structure, the instructor must add knowledge points for each section, so that the knowledge points of the entire course can be organically combined to facilitate exam creation.

Each question indicates the knowledge point and knowledge point weight involved in the question when it is stored in the database (the component of the question in the knowledge point is converted from recognition ), this establishes a connection between the questions and the subject knowledge structure.

3. Design and Implementation of functional modules of the examination process

Design and implement the test paper, release, invigilation, marking, sending and returning, and statistical analysis modules based on the classic test theory.

3.1 exam Creation

You can create a test paper manually or automatically.

Manual exam creation features a convenient query and analysis function for instructors. When a general instructor creates a test paper, he hopes to have a clear knowledge structure and clearly understand the knowledge distribution of the test questions. The system creates a test paper according to the hierarchical relationship of chapter-section-knowledge point-question. The instructor establishes a chapter structure in advance to associate the chapter with the knowledge point: the instructor adds the chapter according to the subject structure, and adds the knowledge point after each section. The questions in the question Library correspond to knowledge points, so that the question library and chapter can be combined to enable the question library to be used by multiple teachers. Of course, the questions that the teacher can find can only belong to the public question bank and the individual question bank of the teacher.

During exam creation, you can select chapter, section, and knowledge point. The exam creation program lists the questions corresponding to the selected knowledge point for the teacher. The instructor determines the selection method based on the number of questions in the question library. If the question volume is small, you can list all the questions at a time. If the question volume is large, select a knowledge point to list the questions that evaluate the knowledge point. If a question contains different knowledge points, the question is listed only when the most Weighted Knowledge points are selected. Of course, if the instructor asks for a larger range of questions, then list all questions related to this knowledge point. For example, a question contains three knowledge points: A, B, and C. The weights are a (0.5) B (0.3) and C (0.2 ). If the instructor selects knowledge point A during exam creation, this question will be automatically listed for selection. If knowledge point B or C is selected, this question will not be listed. If the instructor needs more questions on the B or C knowledge point, he can ask for a larger range of questions so that the questions will be listed. The advantages of this solution are as follows: (1) highlight the main points of test. Although the test involves multiple knowledge points, the knowledge will be focused, there is no need to place the questions focusing on knowledge point A in the questions to be selected for knowledge point B or C; (2) avoid repeated questions, although during the selection of questions, there are corresponding programs for "deduplication" Processing (when a certain question is repeatedly selected, a warning is raised), but because a considerable number of questions will involve multiple knowledge points, if you do not consider the weight, listing the knowledge points separately will lead to redundancy of the questions to be selected. For teachers, a large number of repeated questions will increase their workload. Therefore, the above strategy is adopted in the exam creation program to "remove duplicates" in advance. Figure 4 shows the question selection page.

Figure 4 exam selection page

During the course of selecting a question, add the questions selected by the instructor to the "selected question list" at any time, and display the distribution of knowledge points in the exam, which provides a reference for the instructor to adjust the selection plan at any time. Knowledge Point Distribution 5:

Figure 5 knowledge point distribution chart

Ratio difficulty Chapter 1 Section 1 Medium knowledge point A 11% Knowledge Point B 5% hard ..... Section 2 Knowledge Point D 3% is easier ... ... ......

In Figure 5, the proportion of a knowledge point is the sum of the score obtained by multiplying the score of the selected question that involves the knowledge point by the weight, the difficulty is subject to the most difficult questions of all selected questions that involve this knowledge point.

After the exam is created, you need to set the total score, test time, and other attributes: whether the exam order is random, check whether the option sequence of multiple choice questions is random (the last two attributes will play a role when the exam is published ).

After the exam is created, the exam is saved to the exam database, and information is returned to the test database to refresh the exposure time of the selected questions.

The automatic exam creation module pre-defines a set of indicators to measure the advantages and disadvantages of the exam. When organizing the exam, the user puts forward certain requirements for these indicators according to their own exam creation requirements, the exam creation module selects questions from the question library according to certain algorithms to form the exam, so that the actual value of each indicator is as close as possible to the target value proposed by the teacher, to meet the user's needs to the maximum extent. Intelligent exam creation includes four elements: exam creation requirements, exam indicators, generation methods, selection methods, and exam evaluation. The exam indicators are calculated based on the exam indicators of each exam, therefore, we need to add two elements, question indicators and question indicators, to the calculation method of exam indicators, intelligent exam creation consists of six elements: exam creation requirements, exam indicators, exam indicators, Exam Evaluation, and selection methods.

The exam creation requirements include a large coverage, outstanding emphasis, balanced score distribution of each chapter, appropriate score distribution of each question type, difficulty in line with the purpose, total score, total time in line with the requirements, and examine the requirements of multiple levels such as non-repetition of knowledge points. These abstract exam creation requirements must be clarified: ① set exam indicators based on the Common "requirements" of teachers to quantitatively measure a exam; ② set weights for various indicators, or divide it into different importance levels to reflect the importance that teachers place on each indicator in a specific test. ③ ask the teachers to raise hopes for these pre-defined indicators during the test, then, the system generates the exam based on the selected questions.

Exam indicators are divided into four categories: ① the most basic indicators: total score, total time, and number of questions; ② basic indicators: Examination scope and key content; ③ common indicators: difficulty and discrimination of the exam; ④ balanced and coordinated indicators involving the exam: the proportion of exam questions and knowledge points. Based on the internal relationship between exam indicators and exam indicators, exam indicators are generated by exam indicators. This method becomes a selection condition during the selection process.

The essence of exam creation is to select a subset within the scope of the test database. The implementation methods can be divided into two categories: one is to determine the value, and the other is to blur the value. A definite value is used to select a subset so that its indicators are accurate to the predefined values. This is similar to solving a equations. The independent variable is the index value of each question and can be regarded as a matrix of m × n. The corresponding variable is the index of each exam and can be regarded as a matrix of L × 1, the equation is in the form of exam indicators = f (various exam indicators), the number of equations is the total number of exam indicators, and the scope of the independent variable is a set of questions in the entire question bank. There are currently no effective solutions to the problem of solving the equations with more than a dozen independent variables and more than a dozen equations. Even if there is a solution, there is often no solution, therefore, this method of solving the equation is not used.

Correspondingly, a fuzzy value refers to selecting a subset so that the difference between its indicator values and the predefined values is as small as possible. First, we have more than a dozen target functions and the predefined values of these functions. Then we can calculate the actual values of these 10 target functions for each exam, and then compare the target value with the actual value, calculate the difference value, or calculate a comprehensive difference using the weighted average method based on the difference value, or directly use these 10 differences for optimization, so that these differences are extremely small, to obtain the exam that best meets the instructor's requirements. The detailed introduction is described in another article.

3.2 release

After the instructor completes the exam, the exam has not been published, and the student side has not yet seen the exam. Before the exam is published, the instructor can modify the exam at any time. Once published, the exam cannot be changed. The publishing process is to create a test paper for each student on the student end, including all the information about the questions, including the question stem, options (actually the ID of the questions and options), the order of the questions, option order is written into the exam table of each student. The release process can be completed through a trigger. If the instructor sets attributes: the order of the questions is random, and the options are random, the order of the questions and the order of options are arranged randomly when each exam is generated, and multiple papers of different forms can be generated.

3.3 test Process Control

Once the student starts the examination, the timer starts timing. When the page jumps, the timer is paused. After the new page is loaded, the timer continues. at the specified time, the exam is automatically handed over. During the examination, you can use a page to display a question. At the same time, you can use a status box to list the answer questions that have been answered and are being answered, so that students can easily grasp their own answers. Students can modify the answer questions. The student finally handed in the exam, or automatically handed in the exam at that time. Exam page 6.

Figure 6 student examination page

3.4 Marking

The computer automatically reviews subjective questions, multiple-choice questions, and other objective questions. subjective questions are submitted to instructors for grading. When grading, the instructor not only displays the answers of the students, but also the reference answers and scoring standards, so that the instructor can easily score the answers. After the instructor completes the grading, the subjective score is also written into the database, and the objective score is summarized to form the final score of the exam.

3.5 score returns

After the examination is completed, even the computer-based examination papers must be inspected by the instructors before they can be handed back. Because teachers may need to adjust students' scores.

Once the instructor confirms the score, all the score is returned to the corresponding students.

3.6 statistical analysis

Statistics and analysis can be divided into two modules: Statistical on the overall score of students, and graphical display of the number of students in each score segment, so as to understand the overall mastery of students; analyze the scores of each student's knowledge point to understand the knowledge point and analyze the answers of the students on each knowledge point.

4 Conclusion

The development and design of the web-based network examination system has important theoretical and application values for distance education. This project systematically designs the network examination system, A database, such as the question library, Knowledge Point Library, and exam database, has been created to design and implement a series of functional modules from manual exam creation to statistical analysis, and introduces the design scheme of the intelligent exam creation system.

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This paper discusses the design and implementation of an online testing system, which is the subsystem of Tsinghua education online e-learning platform. item Bank, paper bank and knowledge bank are introduced briefly. six modules of testing system including testing authoring module, test publishing module, testing administration module, scoring module, data analysis, and feedback module are introduced. this paper focuses on the testing authoring module and described its design in detail.

Key words:Web Based Testing test Generate Test authoring