Taking an assessment

To take an assessment, click its name in the list of available assessments in Tests & Quizzes, or use the URL supplied by your instructor, if applicable.

To start an assessment from within Tests & Quizzes:

1. From the site's menubar, click Tests & Quizzes.
   
   
2. Under "Take an assessment", you'll see a list of available assessments. Click an assessment's title to get started. You'll see information about the assessment, such as the date due, whether or not there is a time limit, and whether or not the assessment will automatically be submitted if the time limit expires. Your instructor may have also included special instructions.

   Warning: Be sure you understand how much time you have to submit the test.

3. Click Begin Assessment to take the assessment, or Cancel to abort.
   
   
4. How you proceed through the questions will depend on how the instructor has set up the assessment. If the assessment has more than one page, click Next to save the current page and advance to the next one. If you have the option to do so, click Previous or use the Table of Contents to return to earlier questions.
   
   
5. When you're ready to submit the assessment, click Submit for Grading on the last page of the assessment or on the Table of Contents page, and then click Submit for Grading again to confirm your submission. You'll receive a confirmation number, which you should keep.

Tips and tricks

• Back button: Never click your browser's Back button while taking an assessment. Doing so may throw you out of the assessment and/or generate an error message.
  
  
• Backspace: Don't use the Backspace key unless your cursor is in a field where you can enter text. Pressing Backspace under other circumstances may throw you out of the assessment and/or generate an error message (like the browser Back button).
  
  
• If you lose access: If you lose access to an assessment for any reason, and there is still time left to complete it, return to the tool and re-enter the assessment. You should be able to pick up where you left off.
  
  
• Saving your answers: If an assessment page contains multiple questions or an essay question that takes time to answer, click Save periodically to protect yourself from losing data if the due date passes or you lose access to the assessment.

  Some prefer to draft answers to essay questions in a word processor and then paste them into the answer field. If you do so, be sure to click Save immediately after pasting your response.

• Formatting: In short answer/essay questions, you may have the option of formatting your text with the WYSIWYG editor; to do so, click Show/Hide Rich-Text Editor.

  Note: If you use the WYSIWYG toolbar to format your text, do not click Show/Hide Rich-Text Editor again to hide the toolbar afterwards. If you do, when you save your work, it will display with HTML codes, rather than the formatting you intended.

• Reviewing your work: If your instructor has enabled the Mark for Review feature, you can check a box under each question that you would like to review later. To go back to questions you marked, before submitting the test, click Table of Contents. Questions you have marked for review will appear with a question mark.

  Note: You must select an answer before checking the Mark for Review box.