The Fill in the blanks question has a form of a sentence or paragraph having a blank space in place of a word or phrase. A learner must drag and drop a set of words or short phrases (text items) into response targets in a sentence or paragraph. The Fill in the blanks question requires an advanced level of knowledge because it is harder to recall than it is to recognize (as a learner does with other question types, like multiple choice, for example).
The Fill-in-the-blanks stimulate a cued recall effect because the cue helps learners access information in their long-term memory.
How to create a fill-in-the-blanks question:
- Click
add question and select the fill-in-the-blanks question from the left-hand panel.
- Select the question appearance.
- Click on
button to select the number of attempts allowed.
- Type in the question and the text.
- For a blank, mark a word or phrase and click 'Create Blank', meaning the learner must drag and drop the answer into the blank spot.
- Add distractors to add to the question difficulty level (Optional).
- Click on
button to create feedback for correct and incorrect answers (Optional).
- Click on
button to add content tags (Optional).
Best Practices
- The question instruction should be meaningful and state a specific problem that focuses on the learning objective.
- Only use fill-in-the-blank questions for testing significant points, not specific details.
- Do not start the question with a blank, because this may confuse learners.
- Limit the number of blanks per sentence or paragraph. The more blanks you put into the question, the more confusing it gets.
- Avoid clues to the correct response to the question.