Sections

Creating sectioned exams, strict vs soft sections

Sections let you split up questions in to distinct parts of a quiz or exam, the most important things to note about sections are:

1. Once a section has been submitted, users cannot go back to the section to change their responses.

2. EMQ Groups cannot be split across sections

There are two types of sections on quizzes and exams on Synap which can be configured from the experience page. If you're creating a static exam, titles, timers, instructions and instruction timers will be copied over from the source quiz but can all be modified in the exam

Sections in a static exam

See the Dynamic exams page for information on sections in Dynamic exams.

Section Type	Description
Strict	Users cannot go back into a submitted section. They cannot view or modify answers from submitted sections. They cannot move forward into other sections without submitting the section they are on
Soft	Users can go back to view only previously submitted sections - but they cannot change their responses.

⏳ Timers

A source quiz or exam will need to have Timed exam mode enabled in order to have timed sections. You can choose whether to have an overall time for the exam or a time per section.

You will need to enable and save section timers on the Experience page before setting the timers for your sections

Selecting a timed exam with section timers

A section timer is the total amount of time allowed on that section. Once the timer runs out the user will be progressed onto the first question in the next question. If the finish a section early they won't be able to use any remaining time on other sections.

Section timer

The section timer can also be inferred as the total of all time allowed on individual questions, by default this is 2 minutes per question unless it has been modified.

🗺 Section Instructions

Section instructions can be enabled which are shown before the start of each section. These Instructions can be given an additional timer to give users a reading time on a section instruction page which is shown before a section starts, this will be included in the total time allowed on an exam. Users who finish instruction reading before the timer has run out, will not be able to use that time in other sections.

Creating section instructions with a timer

Title: Displays as the H1 for your instructions

Body: Use the rich text editor to add in your instructions

How instructions are presented in quiz mode

🗂 Sections for users

To enable soft sections use the Settings page on an exam. Enabling soft sections will allow users to go back and review a previously submitted sections. They will not be able to edit their responses.

Configuration for soft sections

Soft sections in an exam or quiz

On the users exam-hall page they'll be shown a breakdown of the allowed time in terms of what they get on instructions and what they get on answering questions