Creating Homework and Test Assignments
Homework and Test assignments are very similar in the way they are created, as they both use similar content, share assignment options (with a difference in default settings), and provide you the most control over content selection and options. Both assignment types limit you to 150 questions. See Choosing an Assignment Type for details.
Click Create Assignment and after selecting either Homework or Test as the assignment type, you can then select your assignment's content as well as enter basic information, such as name and availability dates, and customizing assignment options.
To create a Homework or Test assignment
Be careful when choosing assignment content. Students must have current access rights to all the textbook materials you select.
- 1. Go to the Assignments page, and if necessary, make a new selection from the Course or Section dropdown menu.
- 2. Click the Create Assignment button and select either the Homework or Test assignment type.
- 3. Enter the assignment name in the Name Your Assignment field. (Required)
- 4. Click the calendar icon in the header to open the Select Dates pane where you can enter your assignment's dates.
- 5. Use the calendar widget to enter dates for the Assignment Available On and Assignment Due On fields. Click Done to exit the calendar (the Available Date is required).
- 6. Click the Add Content button to open the Available Items page, where you can choose the individual items to appear in your assignment.
- 7. Click any content title to expand the list hierarchy and choose from the available questions. Questions can be located within chapters, sections, and self-authored question folders (if any).
- 8. Include questions by selecting a check box or remove a selection by clearing a checkbox. Check boxes are available for individual items, while the Assign Listed check box at the top of each section allows you to assign all.
- 9. (Optional) Click the Create New Question button to open the Instructor Authoring page where you can create your own questions to add to your assignment. See To author and insert a new Homework or Test question for an overview.
- 10. (Optional) Click the Refresh link to manually force an update of recently published self-authored questions.
- 11. (Optional) Enter all or part of an item name in the search by name field to limit the display of items.
- 12. (Optional) Make a note of the Avg Time for each item, especially when creating timed assignments.
- 13. (Optional) Click Quick View to see a partial preview of the item's content within the Available Items list. Clicking Quick View again toggles the preview off.
- 14. (Optional) Review individual items by clicking the item name or the Preview button that appears when you mouse over the item name. From the preview window you have the following options (your available options may vary, depending on the assignment's settings):
- ° Click the Show Answer Key button to display the correct answers in the preview for Test or Homework assignments. You can then click on a selection on the content menu to see the correct response for individual questions. Choose a pool from a dropdown list to see the answer key for any questions in that pool. Click Hide Answer Key to return to the view with unanswered questions.
- ° Click Calculator to open a basic calculator.
- ° Click Print Item to open your browser's print options.
- ° Click Done to return to the Available Items page.
- 15. (Optional) Click one of the filtering options on the right to open a pane allowing you to limit your list of available items to those tagged as related to a specific taxonomy, business program standard, algorithmically regenerated content, gradability, difficulty, or problem type. See Applying Item Filters for more information.
- 16. Click Done when your content selections are complete to return to the Available Items page where your list of selected items is displayed.
- 17. (Optional) Adjust the point value of items by entering a number greater or equal to 0 in the Weight box next to the item name.
- 18. (Optional) You can reorder the items in your assignment by clicking and dragging pools and/or items within your list.
- 19. (Optional) Expand the panels on the right to edit any of the default assignment options. The default options are determined by the type of assignment you've selected.
- 20. Click the Publish button at the top of the page once you have the assignment content and options to your liking.
Note: Clicking the icon to the left of the Name Your Assignment field allows you to switch to a different assignment type.
(Optional) Deselect the check box next to Same as Due Date to set an Assignment Unavailable On date. You can also set a penalty for assignments turned after the Due Date in the Grading assignment option. Also see Setting the Due and Unavailable Dates for more information.
Note: See Creating and Editing Question Pools for information on randomizing the content of your assignment by using customized question Pools.
Note: The state of the Assign Listed check box indicates the status of your selections. A check mark indicates all selections, a clear check box indicates no selections, and a check box with a horizontal line indicates some but not all are choices are selected.
Note: You must click Publish on the Instructor Authoring page to have your new question appear in the Available Items list.
Those items with an Avg Time label provide global data on the average time for an item take. The time is based on real student interactions with the item listed and is updated by Cengage twice a year. Newer items may not yet have a time and will instead display Unknown.
Note: At the bottom of the page is a counter showing how many items are assigned out of the number of items allowed.
Note: You edit the Weight values for individual items after placing them in a Pool.
Consider creating a customized option set, if you opted to adjust the default options. See Choosing Assignment Options for details about option properties and creating reusable option sets.
Note: If the Save Option Set Changes window appears, you can choose to save a new set or update the current set. Click Continue to save your assignment.
At this point, your assignment is complete and assigned to the current course. However, you still have the ability to work with and modify your assignment using the links on the Assignment Created page.
The Assignment Created page provides you with options to preview the assignment as a student, edit the assignment, print the assignment, view an answer key, customize options for students, take the assignment offline, create a new assignment, or return to the Assignments page. See Using the Assignment Created Page for additional details.
To author and insert a new Homework or Test question
- 1. On your Assignments page, select the course containing the assignment you want to edit in the dropdown menu.
- 2. Click Edit in the Assignments' page Actions column.
- 3. Click Add Content to open the Available Items page.
- 4. At the top of the Available Items page, click the Create New Question button.
- 5. Click Create under My Questions.
- 6. Select the Accounting as the Discipline.
- 7. Select the appropriate template from the Question Template menu.
- 8. (Optional) Select or create a new folder for storing your new question.
- 9. Create the content for your question and edit the properties to suit your needs. See Authoring in CengageNOWv2 for details on creating specific templates.
- 10. When the question is complete, click Save to save your work.
- 11. Click Publish to put your new question on the Available Items page in the Self-Authored Questions section.
- 12. Click Done when you are finished to return to the Available Items page.
The assignment creation wizard will open.
The Instructor Authoring page opens.
