ExonlineX: Online Evaluation on the MOOC.TECNICO platform

The project

This project developed an online assessment platform for Técnico (https://exams.elearning.tecnico.ulisboa.pt/) based on the Open edX platform from TECNICO MOOCs (https://courses.elearning.tecnico.ulisboa.pt /).

This platform allows the development of evaluations with different levels of complexity, suitable for exams in science and technology, using different types of questions: multiple choice questions, open answer questions, numerical assessment questions, mathematical expression assessment questions; questions to identify points in figures and diagrams. The platform also allows the use of libraries of questions and the generation of random parameters per student, which results in the generation of unique exams for each student. Finally, the platform also allows the automatic correction of exams or the submission of files with answers. What was done

The ExonlineX platform was used during the 2nd semester of 2019-2020 to carry out tests and exams in 25 UCs of the 1st and 2nd cycles of studies for a total of 4150 students, which covered Técnico transversal courses such as Management and Calculus II with 1280 and 672 students respectively, 1st cycle large courses such as Applied Mechanics II and Control Systems from MEMeC with 370 and 240 students respectively, and courses of various bachelor and master’s degrees, with groups of students ranging from 5 to 150 students. A programming manual and videos were developed to support the development of exams for professors, as well as a user manual for students.

Other relevant information

The platform can be used for the evaluation of any Técnico curricular unit, by any student registered through the authentication method Técnico ID. According to the professors who used the platform (20): 75% revealed to be Satisfied or Very Satisfied with the platform; 65% also indicated that even in the context of face-to-face assessments, they consider that they will use the platform for future assessments; 50% found its use easy or very easy; 65% used the possibility to generate different exams for students; 50% of teachers preferred to include open-ended question answers in order to manually correct the exam.

According to the students who used the platform: 57% took less than 1 minute to enter the platform and 73% had access to the exam in less than 5 minutes; 51% of students found reading the exam easy; 70% thought the difficulty of the assessment was comparable to the written assessment.

Carlos Santos Silva (carlos.santos.silva@tecnico.ulisboa.pt) Alexandra Moutinho (alexandra.moutinho@tecnico. ulisboa.pt) Department of Mechanical Engineering Ana Moura Santos (ana.moura.santos@tecnico.ulisboa.pt) Department of Mathematics Pedro Rosado Dias (pedro.rosado.dias@tecnico.ulisboa.pt) MOOC Técnico