Enterprise Portal: Create and Preview a Practice Exam

If you are a new exam-maker, you'll find it helpful to learn about the exam-takers' experience in Examplify. By installing the software on your device and taking a practice exam, you'll understand what the exam-takers do and see in Examplify and how the various assessment options affect the exam-taking experience. These insights will help you to create assessments that suit your purposes. They'll also help you to provide support and guidance to your exam-takers on exam day. 

Before You Begin

Since you'll need to create the exam that you take in Examplify, this is an advanced tutorial. Before you begin, complete these activities:

• You'll need a department, a course, and an admin account that you can use to create your practice assessment. If you do not already have them, see: Enterprise Portal: ExamSoft 101 - Setup: Foundation Training
• Because we'll create the practice exam from a sample question file, you should be familiar with importing a question file. If you have not gone through this process before, see: Enterprise Portal: Import Questions from an LMS or a Question File
• You should be familiar with the basics of creating and editing questions. If you have not gone through these processes before, see: Enterprise Portal: Basic Steps to Create Questions
• You should be familiar with the basics of  creating assessments and posting them. If you have not gone through these processes before, see: 
  • Enterprise Portal: Get Started Creating an Assessment
  • Enterprise Portal: Get Started with Assessment Options
  • Enterprise Portal: Post an Assessment

Procedure Overview

1. Add yourself as a course administrator.
2. Create a practice exam.
3. Preview your exam in Examplify.

Procedures

Add Yourself as a Course Administrator

You must be a course admin to see the preview exams for a course. You will have access to previews for all assessments that are drafted or posted in this course.

1. If you have access to more than one department, select the department that you want to use for this practice exam.
2. On the My Courses page, select the pencil icon for the course that you want to use.

   

3. Enter your name in the Course Admin field. 

   

4. Select Save (near the top right corner of the screen).

Create a Practice Exam

This section explains how to create a practice exam by importing a sample file that includes a variety of question types. However, you can create your assessment in other ways, if you wish.

1. Download our sample practice quiz file.
2. In a course in which you are a Course Admin, import the file, and complete the import process by selecting the Create New Assessment option. 

   

   Note: If you need help with importing, see: Enterprise Portal: Import Questions from an LMS or a Question File

3. In the Create Assessment window, enter a Title, set the Assessment Classification to Exam, and then select Create.
4. (Optional) If you want to be able to see how exam-level attachments appear in Examplify, add an attachment.
5. Select any other options that you want to enable for this practice exam.

   Note: If you need help with Assessment Options, see: Enterprise Portal: Get Started with Assessment Options

6. Select Save and Continue to go to the Build Assessment page.
7. (Optional) If you want to be able to see how question-level attachments appear in Examplify, edit one of the questions (any question will do), add an attachment to it, and then select Save. 
8. Select Save and Continue to go to the Post Settings page.
9. Ignore the Post Settings for now because they are not required for the preview.

   Note: For information about the Post Settings, see: Enterprise Portal: Post an Assessment

Preview Your Practice Exam in Examplify

Notes:

• It is highly recommended that you do not use a shared computer (such as in a lab) to use the Preview Exam Mode.
• If you do not exit properly, students could potentially log into preview mode to review exams.

1. If you have not previously installed Examplify, follow these instructions: Examplify for Windows and Mac: Download, Install, and Register Examplify
2. If this is your first time using Examplify, become familiar with the exam-taking interface by referring to the following exam-taker resources: 
   • General Guidelines: Exam-Taker Best Practices
   • Exam-Taking Tips: 
     • Exam-Taker Quick Start Guide
     • Examplify: Exam-Taking Features and Options
     • Examplify: Get Started with Examplify (Video Guide)

   Tip: Also share the above resources with your exam-takers before their first exam.

3. Start Examplify, and select Add New Account.
4. Start typing the name of your institution, and then select it from the list.
5. Log in with the same email address and password that you use to log in to your institution's ExamSoft Portal.

   Your preview exams appear on the left side of the screen. This list includes all drafted and posted exams in courses in which you are a course administrator.

6. Select the practice exam that you created earlier, and then select Download Exam Preview.
7. Review the on-screen information to see the assessment details. This is the same information that your exam-takers will see.
8. Select Start Exam Preview.

   Note:Your exam-takers would first enter the exam password and then start the exam.

9. Follow the on-screen prompts to start the exam.
10. Take the exam, and explore the interface. For example, view the attachments, use the Tool Kit, and try different navigation options.
11. When ready, submit the exam.

    Note: At this point, an exam-taker would wait for the on-screen confirmation that the answer file was submitted. However, since you are only previewing the exam, no answer file is submitted. The dashboard reappears.

12. Log out and close Examplify.