Updated in April 2025

 

27.1 Question Bank

27.2 Test for Creating Questions (similar to the Question Bank)

27.3 Question Types

27.4 Upload Questions

Blackboard Reference Materials

 

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27.1 Question Bank (for Creating Questions)

A question bank is a collection of questions that is stored for repeated use across assessments. Teachers can use banks to create a database of questions they can reuse in multiple assessments. Teachers can create new question banks or import existing ones to use in their courses.

• Create new, empty question banks
• View and search for questions within a question bank.
• Add, edit, and delete all aspects of a question within new and existing question banks.
• Copy questions from other banks or assessments into a question bank.

 

[Blackboard Official Website] Question Banks

• Create question banks
• Generate question banks
• Using question banks
• Sort and search question banks
• Copy question banks from other courses
• Import question banks

 

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27.2 Test for Creating Questions (similar to the Question Bank)

Apart from using "Question Bank" for creating questions, teachers can create a hidden test for creating the questions.

Note The question order can be kept if using test for creating questions.
For Question Bank, teachers can use the search function to locate specific questions. However, the question order is sorted by the Question Text and cannot be adjusted.

 

1 Visibility: "Hidden from students", for storing the questions only, students should NOT be able to access it.

2 Name: For indicating the use of test, e.g. '(Question Bank) Category A'.

3 Due Date: Set a passed date.

4 Grade Category (optional): Create a new "Mark Category" in Course Gradebook.

5 Change mark posting settings: The submission content and feedback should NOT be shown all the time.

6 Access code: Enable the access code to enhance the protection. (If teachers accidentally make the test visible to students, access code is required before viewing the content.)

 

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27.3 Question Types

[Blackboard Official Website] Question Types

 

• 27.1.1 Calculated Formula Questions

  Calculated Formula questions present students with a question that requires them to make a calculation and respond with a numeric answer. The numbers in the question change with each student and are pulled from a range that you set. The correct answer is a specific value or a range of values.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] Calculated Formula Questions



• 27.1.2 Calculated Numeric Questions

  With Calculated Numeric questions, students are presented with a question that requires a numeric answer. The question doesn't need to be a mathematical formula. Teachers can provide a text question that requires a numeric answer. Calculated Numeric questions resemble Fill in the Blank questions where correct answers are numbers.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] Calculated Numeric Questions



• 27.1.3 Essay Questions

  Essay questions require students to type an answer in a text box, and you need to grade these questions manually.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] Essay Questions



• 27.1.4 Fill in the Blank Questions

  A Fill in the Blank question consists of a phrase, sentence, or paragraph with a blank space where a student provides the missing word or words. Teachers can also create a question with multiple blanks.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] Fill in the Blank Questions
  [Blackboard Official Website] Fill in Multiple Blanks Questions



• 27.1.5 Hotspot Questions

  Hotspot questions present students with an image that requires them to drop a pin on one or more hotspots within that image. Hotspot questions are great for a variety of disciplines.

  In an anatomy course, for instance, students might be asked to identify parts of a body. In a geography course, a specific location on a map. In a foreign language course, specific articles of clothing. In an ecology or biology course, students might be asked to identify which animal species or individuals belong to the corresponding habitat described by the main image, or don't. Possibilities are endless.

  Types of hotspot questions

  • Standard Hotspot : Presents students with an image that requires them to drop a pin inside of one or more hotspots created by you within the image. Students aren't aware of where the hotspots are located.
  • Multiple Choice Hotspot : Presents students with an image that requires them to drop a pin inside of one or more hotspots created by you. Students are aware of where the hotspots are located. One hotspot is correct and the other hotspots are distractors.
  • Multiple Answer Hotspot : Presents students with an image that requires them to drop a pin inside of one or more hotspots created by you. Students are aware of where the hotspots are located. One or more hotspots are correct and the remaining hotspots are distractors.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] Hotspot Questions



• 27.1.6 Matching Questions

  With Matching questions, students pair items in the prompts column to items in the answers column. The number of items in each column doesn’t have to be equal because teachers can reuse answers and add additional answers. Additional answers are distractors that don’t match any of the prompts and increase the question's difficulty. Some teachers use distractors so students can’t guess at answers by the process of elimination.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] Matching Questions



• 27.1.7 Multiple Choice Questions / Multiple Answer Questions

  With Multiple Choice questions, students select one or more correct answers from several choices. Students aren't told if they need to choose one or multiple answers.

  Multiple Choice and Multiple Answer questions are graded automatically. If you include multiple correct answers for a question, you can choose to give partial or negative credit.

  Note Teachers can only randomize answers for Matching and Multiple Choice questions. If teachers want to randomize answers for True/False questions, use the Multiple Choice question type with True and False answer choices.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] Multiple Choice Questions
  [Blackboard Official Website] Multiple Answer Questions



• 27.1.8 True/False Questions

  With True/False questions, students choose true or false in response to a statement question. True/False questions are graded automatically. Teachers can't change the points an individual student earned for an automatically graded question.

  Note Teachers can only randomize answers for Matching and Multiple Choice questions. If teachers want to randomize answers for True/False questions, use the Multiple Choice question type with True and False answer choices.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] True/False Questions



• 27.1.9 Extra credit questions

  Teachers can add extra credit questions to allow students to overachieve on an assessment or earn back points lost on other assessments or activities.

  A correct answer results in adding the extra credit question points to the points earned for the assessment. Students are not penalized for incorrect answers to an extra credit question. In other words, points are not deducted because the question is excluded from the assessment’s possible points. If a student answers extra credit questions correctly, it may be possible for the student to earn a score greater than 100% on the assessment.

  Students can discern how many extra credit points are available on the assessment. While students are taking an assessment, they can identify questions designated as extra credit. Students can also filter the test to find extra credit questions if present.

  Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
  [Blackboard Official Website] Extra credit questions

 

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27.4 Upload Questions

Teachers can write questions offline in a text file and upload it into tests, surveys, and question pools. After uploading the file, teachers can edit and use the questions exactly like the questions that you create inside your course.

Note When saving the file to Text (Tab delimited) (*.txt), pairs of double quotation mark ("") will be added if the content containing commas (,). Moreover, if the original content containing quotation marks (' or "), it will become double quotation marks ('' or "") after saving to Text (Tab delimited) (*.txt). Therefore, before uploading questions to Blackboard, teachers can remove the quotation marks in the Text (Tab delimited) (*.txt). Otherwise, teachers need to remove the quotation marks on Blackboard one by one manually. For more information, please refer to Save txt with tab delimited then remove quotation mark .

Note If the original content is comes from a WORD file and containing apostrophe(’), after saving the file to Text (Tab delimited) (*.txt), teachers need to replace the apostrophe(’) comes from WORD by typing '. Otherwise, the the apostrophe(’) comes from WORD will be skipped on Blackboard that teachers need to add them back one by one manually.

Please refer to the Blackboard Official Guide for details:
[Blackboard Official Website] Upload Questions

 

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Blackboard Reference Materials:

[Blackboard Official Website] Question Banks
[Blackboard Official Website] Question Types
[Blackboard Official Website] Upload Questions