OPTIMIZATION OF STUDENTS’ STUDY HABITS USING
ON-LINE TESTING
Eva Milková
Faculty of Informatics and Management, University of Hradec Králové
Rokitanského 62, Hradec Králové, Czech Republic
Keywords: On-line testing, virtual learning environment, multimedia study material.
Abstract: Multimedia applications give us an excellent chance how to support not only demonstrating and visualizing
the explained subject matter to be much clearer and comprehensible, but also enable us prepare various
kinds of test for students. The feedback provided through tests helps students to recognize what they already
knew and what they didn’t know and need to improve. In the article we introduce several on-line testing
applications that we use for our students and will discus their educational potential.
1 INTRODUCTION
Virtual learning environment and multimedia
applications give the teachers big chance to use them
to optimize students’ study habits, which means to
make their study more effective, time-efficient and
explained topics more comprehensible.
Last year, in the paper prepared for WEBIST
2007 (Milková and Slabý, 2005) we summarized the
biggest advantages of the virtual study environment
WebCT used as a compliment to the teaching of
subjects taught within the full-time study programs
at our faculty. Let us remind them now as well:
 Students have all electronic study materials
assigned to the appropriate subject available
altogether in one environment together with
needed information.
 The relevant study material is accessible
whenever and wherever. In this way also
students staying abroad within the framework
of the Socrates Erasmus students exchange for
several months are able to follow the subject.
 When lessons are taught by more than one
teacher, all teachers can be included as
teaching assistants to the e-subject. Each of
them inserts settings of exercises and the
evaluation of credit tests for his/her students to
the WebCT environment. Thus the lecturer
(guarantor of the course and author of the e-
subject) has a clear survey of both the history
of lessons and results of all students.
 Students interested in the area explained within
a subject can find additional material in the
WebCT environment, and sources and
information outside the immediate framework
of the subject. Discussions on “a level” with
their teacher can start. This is also one of the
ways in which the teacher can train his
potential thesis writers.
 In many subjects, the inevitable outcome of
creating common projects is teamwork.
Virtual study environments are inherently
well-suited to this. Students can communicate
with the teacher and each other, and
discussions are accessible to members of the
team only. Even as geographically isolated
members of a virtual team, they can send
requests for advice and parts of project to the
teacher for oversight.
 Students greatly appreciate accessibility to self-
tests with automatic checking and to
multimedia study materials visualizing the
explained matter.
 Students find also very useful the option called
Calendar, where they can see all the
information about important dates (written
credit tests, examination etc) in one
environment.
In this paper we devote attention to one of the-
above mentioned advantages, namely to the
accessibility to self-tests with automatic checking
prepared in WebCT and to the other multimedia
298
Milková E. (2008).
OPTIMIZATION OF STUDENTS’ STUDY HABITS USING ON-LINE TESTING.
In Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Web Information Systems and Technologies, pages 298-303
DOI: 10.5220/0001526302980303
Copyright
c
 SciTePress

applications supporting self-preparation of students
through on-line testing. “The feedback provided
through tests helped students to recognize what they
needed to know, appreciate what they already knew
and understand, what they needed to do in order to
learn, and what they didn’t know” (Black and
William, 1998).
2 ON-LINE TESTING IN
VIRTUAL LEARNING
ENVIRONMENT WEBCT
WebCT, like all the other similar virtual learning
environments, offers tools enabling preparing
various kinds of tests with several types of test-
questions.
2.1 Three kinds of Tests in the WebCT
Environment
There are three kinds of on-line tests in the WebCT
environment in the option called Assessments:
Quizes, Self tests and Surveys.
The following text is a copy of the text written in
http://oliva.uhk.cz/webct/help.dowebct.
 A quiz is an online test that students complete
and submit for marks. The marks are recorded
in Grade Book. You can use quizzes to assess
students’ performance in the course.
 A survey is an online questionnaire that
students complete and submit anonymously. A
survey is not worth marks but will be recorded
as Complete in Grade Book after it is
submitted. You can use surveys to allow
students to give feedback or opinions.
 A self test is an online test that students
complete and submit for marks so they can
assess their understanding of course material.
The marks are not recorded in Grade Book.
Remark: Grade Book is the WebCT tool that
serves to the teacher to view, enter, and manage
grades for students.
2.2 WebCT Test-questions
In the classical (non electronic) tests prepared to test
knowledge in natural science subjects there have
been used two main types of questions for years
(centuries); the type Calculated and the type
Multiple Choice. However, in the textbooks directed
to the foreign languages education there have been
used several other types of questions. These types
are available in the WebCT environment as well. Let
us introduce their list and short description.
 Calculated: Students are presented with a
mathematical formula and must enter the
answer.
 Combination Multiple Choice: Students are first
presented with a list of answers. They are then
presented with various combinations of those
answers and must select one of the
combinations as correct.
 Fill in the Blank: Students are presented with a
question containing blanks and must provide
the missing text.
 Jumbled Sentence: Students are presented with
a question containing blanks for which they
must provide the missing text by selected a
word or phrase from drop-down lists.
 Matching: Students are presented with two lists
and must match terms in one list with terms or
definitions in the other list.
 Multiple Choice: Students are presented with a
list of answers and must select one or more
answers as correct.
 Paragraph: Students must answer the question
by entering multiple sentences.
 Short Answer: Students must answer the
question by entering a brief response.
 True False: Student must select whether the
statement is true or false.
All types of questions, except the type
Paragraph, can be checked automatically. Thus
students can see correct answers immediately after
sending solutions of all questions (except the type
Paragraph).
2.3 A Case Study: On-line Testing in
the WebCT Environment Prepared
for the Subject Graph Theory
As we have already mentioned in natural science
subjects above all the types Calculated and Multiple
Choice have been used. However, the other types of
question seemed to give a chance to solve tasks in an
enjoyable way. Therefore we tried to prepare for the
subject Graph Theory test-questions used the other
types as well. We were successful in it and some
examples are shown in the following figures 1 - 5.
It is very important that the WebCT environment
enables to include figures and tables within the
questions. Without this possibility it would be
unthought to create questions for the subject Graph
Theory based on images of graphs.
OPTIMIZATION OF STUDENTS’ STUDY HABITS USING ON-LINE TESTING
299

There is also the possibility to change the HTML
code of questions in the WebCT environment. We
have used this opportunity when completed some
questions with the area for writing some notes.
Students often need to record some information
when solving the task. Therefore we have increased
the appropriate questions by “area for notes”
prepared in very easy way using HTML tag
<TEXTAREA> </TEXTAREA>.
Figure 1: A question of the type Calculated; “How many
edges there are in the complete graph K
11
?”.
Figure 2: A question of the type Combination Multiple
Choice; “Which set of properties written in A. to G.
belongs to the given graph?” (The properties written in
English: A. undirected, B. weighted, C. directed, D.
planar, E. complete, F. eulerian, G. connected. Thus the
only 3
rd
combination A,D,E,G is correct).
Figure 3: A question of the type Matching; “Determine the
truth of each of the following statements using the either
answer YES or NO.” (There are several short statements
and about each statement students should decide if it is
true of false statement. As e.g. the first statement: “Each
end-vertex of a bridge with the degree bigger than one is a
cut vertex.” This statement is true thus students should
select the answer YES).
Figure 4: A question of the type Short Answer;
“Determine the graph that you gain by removing one
vertex from the graph K
5
?”.
We are pleased to say that students like these
types of questions that can be solved in an enjoyable
way. We do not use on-line testing as a part of
examinations. The prepared tests serve for students
to recognize themselves what knowledge they need
still to improve. Students can, but don’t have to
solve them during the term. However, similar tasks
occur in the exam test. It is up to the students
whether they deal with these questions and if they do
not understand them well they can discuss them with
their teacher during the lessons.
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Figure 5: A question of the type True False where the
“area for notes” is used; “Determine if the given graph is
bipartite or not. (Use an appropriate algorithm.)” (Students
record list of vertices and edges in order given by the used
algorithm Breadth-First-Search and looking for the circle
of odd length. If there is no such a circle their answer
should be YES. In the opposite case their answer should
be NO).
3 INTERESTING WAYS OF
ON-LINE TESTING
In the previous chapter we have described tool
enabling to prepare tests in WebCT environment.
Nevertheless, the types of questions prepared by
WebCT tool need not be easy to fulfil for each
subject as e.g. for the subject where students learn
how to create algorithms.
In the following text we illustrate a nice
application called ALGDS (Hotový, 2007)
containing interesting types of test-questions making
testing of algorithms amusing at first and then we
emphasize the possibilities of the program
ALGORITHMS (Voborník, 2006), the fundamental
tool giving feedback to students studying the subject
Algorithms and Data Structures.
However, to appreciate advantages of the above-
mentioned tools it is necessary, at least briefly,
explain the syllabus of the subject Algorithms and
Data Structures.
3.1 The subject Algorithms and Data
Structures
The ability to create the basic algorithms contributes
to a development of logic consideration and
imagination and is an inseparable part of students’
skills studying Application Informatics and
Information Management at our faculty. And
because the entrance examination at the faculty
doesn’t include questions concerning the above-
mentioned area there are a lot of students without
any algorithmic knowledge at the beginning of their
studies. Therefore we devote the whole first term for
increasing the algorithmic thinking of our students in
the subject called Algorithms and Data Structures
(ALGDS). This subject is placed before the other
subjects dealing with algorithmic and programming
skills.
The education in ALGDS lacks all the structures
and constructions connected with structured
paradigm. Consequently students do not get any
habits which might make the entrance into object
oriented world more complicated. (Remark: The
entire conception of programming education at our
university can be found in (Kozel, 2006)). Creation
of algorithms is based on the imagination of a brick-
box, a nice and useful game for children. There are
only several base elements available from which
children are able to create incredible buildings. Why
do not use this idea also when creating algorithms?
Thus when we lead our students’ first steps by
creation of algorithms we explain to them that it is
like building interesting objects out of just a few
basic elements. In the subject AGDS it means that
we start our teaching with basic algorithmic
structures (basic elements from the brick-box) and
typical algorithmic structures (a few parts made out
of these elements) and then we let students get into
the secrets of making whole algorithms (building
whole constructions). Algorithmic structures and
algorithms are written in Czech meta-language
(Czech translation of basic commands used in the
program-language Pascal) on a paper!
At our lectures and lessons we devote time not
only to the explanation of algorithmic structures and
their illustration on several examples but we also let
students complete prepared algorithms similarly as
you can see in the following two examples. This is
very welcomed by students and makes lectures much
more interesting and enjoyable.
 Complete the algorithms solving the following
task. “In the sequence of n integers saved in
the array
a (in items a[1] , ..., a[n])
determine the first minimum value and then
sum of all integers behind the found minimum
value.”
OPTIMIZATION OF STUDENTS’ STUDY HABITS USING ON-LINE TESTING
301

begin
minimum := a[1];
sum := ..........;
for i := 2 to n repeat
begin
sum := sum + ..........;
if a[i] ... min then
begin
minimum := ..........;
sum := ..........;
end;
end;
end.
 There are n integers saved in the array
a (see
the table). Determine the values in the array
a
after finishing the following algorithm. Write
them to the table.
begin
n:=6;
x:=a[1];
i := 2;
while i ≤ n - 1 do
begin
if a[i] > x then
begin
a[1]:= a[i];
a[i]:= x;
end;
i := i + 1;
end;
end.
a[1] a[2] a[3] a[4] a[5] a[6]
11 8 19 7 16 17
Similar tasks occur in examination tests. To be
able to solve such examples we have created the
application ALGDS where students practise their
knowledge in the above-mentioned way. Let us
briefly describe it.
3.2 Web Application ALGDS
Web application ALGDS is created within PHP
language and it is intended for testing knowledge
gained in the subject Algorithms and Data Structure.
The link to the application is placed in the WebCT
environment within the subject Algorithms and Data
Structures. The design of the application is
illustrated on the figure 6.
Figure 6: The first page of the application ALGDS.
Web application ALGDS enables three types of
questions.
• Complete the given algorithm.
• Order the given algorithm.
• Solve the given algorithm.
The test Complete the given algorithm demands
to complete omitted parts in the algorithm solving
the given task similar as it was shown in the first
example illustrated in the previous section 3.1.
The test Order the given algorithm demands to
order all commands written in wrong order to get
algorithm, which correctly solves the given task (see
figure 7).
The test Solve the given algorithm demands to
determine values of some variables used in the
algorithm using the given enter data similar as it was
shown in the second example illustrated in the
previous section 3.1.
end.
while (i <= n) and (found = 0) do
begin
i := i + 1;
end;
if (a[i] mod 7) = 0 then
begin
write(a[i]);
found := 1;
end;
begin
found := 0;
i := 1;
Figure 7: A question of the type Order the given algorithm
used in the application ALGDS; Arrange mixed up parts
of the given algorithm in correct order to get algorithm
finding the first value divided by 7 among values saved in
the array a.
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The Web application ALGDS enables students to
improve their knowledge in an enjoyable way. Each
students answer is analyzed and the correct answer
appears if student was wrong. There is no
explanation of why the student’s answer was false
however they can follow step by step the whole
algorithm using the program ALGORITHMS.
3.3 Program ALGORITHMS
We have already mentioned that students write their
algorithms on paper. There was an important
question. How can students get feedback for their
solution written on papers in the Czech meta-
language when studying at home and preparing for
lessons? They have two books (Milková, 2001),
(Milková, 2004) containing many solved examples,
prepared for the subject Algorithms and Data
Structures, available. Nevertheless, there are a lot of
other tasks that we give our students to solve and
therefore the program ALGORITHMS was
developed. This program is created in Borland
Delphi environment within the thesis of our student
on the script given by author of this paper. The
program is user friendly and provides entire
graphical comfort for users.
Using the program ALGORITHMS students can
place their solutions of the given tasks in the
program and the program shows them step by step
how their algorithms work, if they are correct or not.
The program also shows actual values of used
variables in each step of the algorithm’s process. In
this way students can test their knowledge gained in
the subject Algorithms and Data Structures.
4 CONCLUSIONS
In the paper we illustrated some of on-line testing
possibilities, various kinds of feedback that helps
students to recognize what they already knew and
what they didn’t know and need to improve.
Let us emphasize once more that we do not use
on-line testing as a part of examinations. The
prepared tests serve for self-preparation of students
to be able to recognize what knowledge they need
still to improve. Students can, but don’t have to
solve the prepared test. However, similar tasks occur
in the exam test. After more than tree years
experience with this approach to the increasing the
students’ preparation to a subject through on-line
testing that offer immediate response we can say that
most students deal with tests and if they do not
understand the questions well they discuss them with
their teacher during the lessons which serve to the
teacher as an important feedback as well.
REFERENCES
Milkova, E., Slabý, A., 2007. Virtual learning
environment: Challenge to Increase Teaching and
Learning. In: Third International Conference on WEB
Information Systems and Technologies (WEBIST
2007). INSTICC. Barcelona.
Black, P., William, D., 1998. Inside the black box. Phi
Delta Kappan, Vol 20, No.2, pp 139-148.
Hotový, V. 2007. Vizuální podpora rozvoje algoritmic-
kého myšlení s využitím webdesignu, Thesis. Hradec
Králové.
Voborník, P., 2006. Programovací jazyk pro podporu
výuky algoritmů, Thesis. Hradec Králové.
Kozel, T., 2006. Java ve výuce programování. In:
Proceedings of Informatika XVIII/2006. Konvoj. Brno.
Milková, E., 2001. Algoritmy – typové konstrukce a
příklady, Gaudeamus. Hradec Králové.
Milková, E., 2004. Algoritmy v příkladech, Hradec
Králové. Gaudeamus.
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