The Logical Blog by IconLogic

TRAINING TIPS: Don't Write Trick Quiz Questions!

Have you ever written a quiz only to have some of your students come back and say the quiz wasn’t fair? Or that Number 5 was a trick question?   Here is a quiz scene from the classic movie My Cousin Vinnie, which contains a classic “trick” question. The District Attorney is trying to prove that the witness, Mona Lisa Vito, is not a qualified expert on automobiles.    D.A. Jim Trotter: Now, uh, Ms. Vito, being an expert on general automotive knowledge, can you tell me... what would the correct ignition timing be on a 1955 Bel Air Chevrolet, with a 327 cubic-inch engine and a four-barrel carburetor?   Mona Lisa Vito: It's a bull**** question, it's impossible to answer.   D.A. Jim Trotter: Impossible because you don't know the answer!   Mona Lisa Vito: No, it is a trick question!   Judge Chamberlain Haller: Why is it a trick question?   Vinny Gambini: [to Bill] Watch this.   Mona Lisa Vito: 'Cause Chevy didn't make a 327 in '55, the 327 didn't come out till '62. And it wasn't offered in the Bel Air with a four-barrel carb till '64. However, in 1964, the correct ignition timing would be four degrees before top-dead-center.   D.A. Jim Trotter: Well... um... she's acceptable, Your Honor.   Here’s some advice on how you can avoid writing any bull****, oops, I mean “trick” questions.   Realistic   Make sure the question is realistic—that it is something that would actually come up or happen in the workplace. Don’t fall into the mistake Trotter made: asking about something where there is no such thing. That may sound obvious, but it is worth having a colleague look over your questions to make sure.   Meaningful   If you write up your quiz at the end of a course development project when you are tired and in a hurry, you are at risk for cherry-picking trivial facts that are easy to write questions about. For example,  How many commands are on the Themes menu in Captivate? The right answer to that is, “Who cares?” Knowing how many items are on a software menu is meaningless with regard to whether you can use the software successfully. Your learners know it’s meaningless. So steer away from trivia, and ask relevant, meaningful questions.   Fair   Another kind of question that gets student hackles up is an unfair question. What makes a question unfair? First and foremost: it was not actually covered in the class. Sure, it may be some kind of common knowledge that does relate to the class, but if it was not actually, explicitly covered, steer clear.   No Double-Talk   Don’t use double-negatives in your quiz questions. Here’s an example of a double-negative: Which of these file formats is not unacceptable when importing images? Your learners will certainly not fail to feel like you are just messing with them, to see if you can trick them into not necessarily failing to read it incorrectly. See what I mean?   Take care in writing your quiz, and you can avoid any accusation that your quiz was unrealistic, meaningless, trivial, unfair, or unclear. And that’s a good thing!

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Jennie Ruby, CTT, COTP, is a veteran eLearning developer, certified master trainer, and author. Jennie has an M.A. from George Washington University and is a Certified Technical Trainer and Certified Online Training Professional. She teaches both classroom and online courses, and has authored courseware, published training books, and developed content for countless eLearning projects. She is also a publishing professional with more than 30 years of experience in writing, editing, print publishing, and eLearning.

ARTICULATE STORYLINE 360: The Awesomeness of the Media Library

Have you ever had this happen to you? You insert an image into your Storyline project and then sometime later you decide to use the image on another slide. However, your project is large (multiple scenes and slides) and you're having a hard time finding that pesky image. How about this one? You're making your project accessible for learners with disabilities. You're pretty sure you added alternative text to a specific image but now you're doubting yourself. Is there a quick way to check? Or perhaps you've used an image in a project and someone on the team wants to use it too. Is there a quick way to share the image?   If you add images, characters, audio, or video to your projects (I think that covers all eLearning developers, everywhere), you'll love Articulate Storyline 360's Media Library (View tab > Views group).     The Media Library displays a list of all of the project's assets grouped on tabs for Images, Characters, Audio, and Video.     I love the ability to select an image and, from the right of the Media Library, add Alt text (for accessibility) and notes. You can also see where the image has been used throughout the project and add the same accessibility text to all instances of the image.     You can also import assets directly into the Media Library and export any asset (so it can be shared with team members).     ***   Looking for Storyline training? Check out these live, instructor-led classes. *** Kevin Siegel is the founder and president of IconLogic, Inc. He has written hundreds of step-by-step computer training books on applications such as Adobe Captivate, Articulate Storyline, Adobe RoboHelp, Adobe Presenter, and TechSmith Camtasia. Kevin spent five years in the U.S. Coast Guard as an award-winning photojournalist and has three decades’ experience as a trainer, publisher, technical writer, and eLearning developer. Kevin is a Certified Master Trainer (CMT), Certified Technical Trainer (CTT+), Certified Online Professional Trainer (COTP), and a frequent speaker at trade shows and conventions.

TEACHING TIPS: Writing Meaningful Quiz Questions

One guideline that textbooks tell us about quiz writing is that the questions have to be seen as meaningful to your learners. Each question should be about something important... something that the employee actually does need to know, or be able to do. The questions should be about something that everyone would agree matters in the workplace... at least for the intended audience of the training.

 

Let’s take an example. I was teaching a class for an organization, and one of the learning objectives was: The employee must know all five of our board members.

 

One of the questions on the quiz was this: What is Board Member Jane Jones’s middle initial?

 

Imagine what your students would say if you wrote a question about such a minor point of trivia like this! I can just hear the grumblings:

• That’s not fair! 
• Why does it matter?
• I can name all five board members. I forget one middle initial and I get dinged on my quiz score?

On the face of it, this question does not meet the criterion of meaningfulness.

 

But what if I told you that the students in this case were the administrative assistants responsible for proofreading all of the Board’s correspondence? 

 

Now, it makes sense that they need to know the middle initial. They need to be able to recognize immediately if the initial is wrong. And they need to know a lot of other details that would also seem like trivia to another training audience. They need to spell the names right. They need to know how many tabs to indent the signature line. They need to know whether to capitalize the phrase Board Member.

 

Let’s see what happens if the audience is different. What if I told you that the students are the security guards at the front door of the building. The objective is the same: They must know all five board members. But now, what is it that they have to know?

 

This time, the middle initial probably is meaningless trivia. What the guard needs to know is how to recognize Ms. Jones on sight! My proofreaders may know Ms. Jones’s middle initial, but they could walk right by her in the hallway and never realize it. But the guard needs to know immediately to allow Ms. Jones into the building. 

 

In sum, your quiz questions have to be meaningful, specifically to the audience of the training. It is all too easy to write questions about trivia. Think about your training audience to keep your questions meaningful.

 

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Jennie Ruby, CTT, COTP, is a veteran eLearning developer, certified master trainer, and author. Jennie has an M.A. from George Washington University and is a Certified Technical Trainer and Certified Online Training Professional. She teaches both classroom and online courses, and has authored courseware, published training books, and developed content for countless eLearning projects. She is also a publishing professional with more than 30 years of experience in writing, editing, print publishing, and eLearning.

ADOBE ROBOHELP CLASSIC: Modifying the Indigo Layout Copyright Notice

Sometimes a feature that seems like it would be simple to find is buried deep with an application's interface and becomes a challenge to locate. Such was the case when it came to changing the copyright notice in a responsive output.   In the image below, you can see that the default copyright year is 2017.

I searched every area of the layout for an option that controlled the default copyright information but could not find it. The reason? The option is not part of the layout. Instead, it's a project setting. To change the copyright information, follow these steps:

Choose Project > Project Settings From the General tab, click the Advanced button Click the Labels tab Scroll down the long list to the Responsive Help section Locate Copyright= followed by the copyright info

Click on the copyright info and then click the Edit button Edit the text as necessary Dismiss the dialog boxes and re-generate

ADOBE CAPTIVATE 2019: Free Assets Make New Projects a Snap to Create

In a previous article, I showed you the hot new assets that are available in Adobe Captivate 2019 (update 11.5). This update, which is free to current Captivate 2019 users, really does fill a void found in older versions of the software: a lack of quality templates to use as the starting point for new projects.   In previous versions of Captivate, blank projects weren't the most attractive things to look at. Sure, there were (and are) themes that quickly allow you to change the look of a project in mere seconds. However, many people have complained that the default themes are hardly a visual party nor do the themes add new slides to your project with usable placeholder objects. If you are not a content person or a designer, you are pretty much on your own.   Adobe Captivate 11.5 offers several project assets that will help both the non-designer and non-content expert get off to an awesome start.   To begin, create a blank project. Locate the Assets icon in the upper right of the Captivate 11.5 window.

From the left side of the Assets dialog box, select Projects. There are two project options: Projects and Slides. Projects will create a complete project with wonderful placeholders. Slides will add slides to existing projects.

Select Slides and then select Intro.   Select Title 01 and then click the Insert (1) slide button.

A single slide is added to your blank project. You can now edit the placeholder content as appropriate. (I love that the slide already contains an interactive button and that is preset to go to the next slide when clicked.)

As cool as the slide assets are, and as nice as they look, things are about to get crazy. Go back and click Assets, and then select Projects (instead of Slides).   Select one of the project templates (I selected Rhapsody) and then click the Open as New Project button.

I ended up with a new, 44-slide project. (That's right... 44 ready-to-use content slides.) And the slides look awesome! Kudos to Adobe for doing these Assets right!

All that I needed to do was replace the placeholder text with my content, perhaps add a few slides here or there, and maybe swap out some of the images... and that was that. Spend some time with the Project and Slide assets. I'd love to hear your thoughts about them. Cool? Lame? What do you think?

***   Looking for Captivate training? Check out these live, instructor-led classes.

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Kevin Siegel is the founder and president of IconLogic, Inc. He has written hundreds of step-by-step computer training books on applications such as Adobe Captivate, Articulate Storyline, Adobe RoboHelp, Adobe Presenter, and TechSmith Camtasia. Kevin spent five years in the U.S. Coast Guard as an award-winning photojournalist and has three decades’ experience as a trainer, publisher, technical writer, and eLearning developer. Kevin is a Certified Master Trainer (CMT), Certified Technical Trainer (CTT+), Certified Online Professional Trainer (COTP), and a frequent speaker at trade shows and conventions.

ADOBE CAPTIVATE 2019 (11.5): Branching View Broken?

Adobe recently updated Captivate 2019 from version 11 to 11.5. While most of the interface remains unchanged between 11 and 11.5, there are several enhancements that I've been writing about here (such as the improved assets).

I have noticed one bug so far in Captivate 2019 (11.5): It appears that the Branching View is broken (you can access the Branching View via Window > Branching View).

In Captivate 11, the image below represents what the Branching View looks like if you have jumps or branches built into your lesson. Notice that I have two branches from slide 1 and both branches are clearly shown in the Branching View.

Here's the same file opened in Captivate 11.5. Notice that the two paths are not displayed.

I have tested the branching feature on both new projects (projects created from scratch in Captivate 11.5) and upgraded projects (projects created in older versions of Captivate and upgraded to version 11.5). The result are the same: a broken Branching View.

I'm curious if other Captivate developers in version 11.5 are seeing the same thing?

ARTICULATE RISE: Rise to the Challenge with Tables

Articulate 360 Rise allows you to create beautiful, responsive eLearning courses using just your web browser and the Articulate 360 Rise application. Since its launch in late 2016, Articulate has been slowly but surely adding amazing new features to Rise. One of the latest is the ability to display data and structured information in tables.    If you’ve worked with Rise, you know that everything is created in “blocks.” There are text blocks and image blocks and multimedia blocks–and now, there is the new table block. Here’s how it works:   Inserting a Rise Table In Rise, choose All Blocks from the Blocks Shortcut Bar. Choose Text from the Block Library. Choose Table from the list.

The table that is added defaults to 5 columns and 3 rows and, like other Rise blocks, contains dummy text in each cell. You can modify the cell contents by selecting the dummy text in the cell and typing over it.   Formatting Rise Table Text    Formatting table text works the same way as formatting any other text in Rise. If you select text in a single cell (or select text in multiple tables) a floating formatting toolbar (pictured below) appears to let you change fonts, size, styles, colors, and alignment.

Modifying the Structure of a Rise Table   The Table Toolbar is easy to use. Begin by selecting the cells, rows, or columns you want to work with and then: Click Table Header to toggle the colored top row on or off. Click Delete to delete the entire table. Click Row to insert or delete a row. Click Column to insert or delete a column. Click Table Style to add a dashed border or to have every other row sport a colored background. Click Cell to merge two or more cells together or to split a single cell into multiple cells. Click Cell Background to assign a color to the background of the selected cell(s). Click Vertical Alignment to align text to the top, middle, or bottom of the cell(s). Click Horizontal Alignment to align text to be left, center, right, or justified. Click Cell Style to call attention to the selected cell(s) with highlighting or a thicker border.

Table Tricks To add a new row at the bottom of a table, click in the bottom right cell of the table and tap the Tab key. (This is how it works in most other programs that allow you to create tables.) To add a line break above or below a table, hover your mouse pointer along the top line of the top row or the bottom line of the bottom row. When you are in the right place, the Break arrow icon appears (pictured below). Click the icon to insert the break. To delete a break, place your cursor on the line below your table and use the keyboard shortcut or place your cursor in front of your table and tap Backspace.

To change the width of a column, position your mouse on the right side of the column. When you are in the right place a double-headed arrow icon appears, which will allow you to click and drag to change the column width. (This is how it works in most other programs that allow you to create tables)   Ready to learn more about Rise? Sign up for my 3-hour Rapid eLearning Development with Articulate 360 Rise program July 17. You will come away from this program being able to use Rise like a pro!

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Geeky Girl Karin Rex is an online learning pioneer and infographic evangelist. Since 1989, Karin has owned Geeky Girl, LLC, a boutique learning organization, where she devotes her time to writing, course development (instructor led and eLearning), and teaching. Karin has authored several technology books, including: "Office 2010 Demystified" (McGraw-Hill) and hundreds of user guides, reference manuals, and tutorials. She’s also developed an extensive number of learning programs for a wide variety of global clients. Karin is a certified synchronous facilitator, designer, and producer, with a master’s degree in professional writing. Additionally, Karin teaches undergraduate writing courses for Penn State University and is the Instructional Design Lead for InSync Training.

ADOBE CAPTIVATE 2019 11.5: Alert Messages When Updating

Adobe recently updated Captivate 2019 from 11.0 to 11.5. While much of the look and feel between versions 11 and 11.5 remain unchanged, there are some feature enhancements that I'll be addressing in future posts (if you scroll down you'll see a recent post on the new Assets).

Legacy versions of Captivate upgrade to version 11.5 nearly seamlessly. I say "nearly" because there are a few dialog boxes you'll come across during the upgrade process.

First, you'll likely get a message about missing fonts (even if you weren't using the missing fonts in your project... it seems those pesky missing fonts were being using behind your back by default styles, etc.)

Clicking the Replace Fonts button has not altered the look of any of my slide objects in any projects I've upgraded so far (nor has replacing the fonts messed about this my object styles). Nevertheless, you should go from slide to slide and ensure all is well with your upgraded projects.

Upon saving your upgraded project for the first time, you'll be warned that saving the project as the newer version means you will no longer be able to open that project in an older version of Captivate. For that reason, it's a good idea to make a backup of your legacy projects prior to upgrading.

I'm currently updating all of the data assets that are used in my Captivate Essentials and Beyond Essentials books so students won't get hit with either of the messages shown below.

And of course, if you need Captivate training, we've got you covered with a huge selection of instructor-led courses.

ADOBE CAPTIVATE 2019: Three Cheers for Improved Assets in Version 11.5

Adobe recently released a significant, and free, update to Captivate 2019, its flagship eLearning development tool. The updated version of the software is 11.5 (11.5.0.476 to be precise).   Over the coming weeks, I'll highlight the biggest improvements/enhancements. This time, it's all about the awesome new assets.   If you're a veteran Captivate developer, you'll see that the interface remains mostly unchanged. However, notice that the Assets tool has been moved to the right (and is now grouped with Library and Properties).

In the previous version of Captivate, clicking Assets opened a dialog box where you'd find find some free Characters and other assets (most of the cool stuff was provided by the eLearning Brothers).   In Captivate 2019 (11.5), clicking Assets still opens the Assets dialog box, but wow-oh-wow will you find some wonderful new stuff here.

There are still Characters, and lots of them, so definitely check them out. However, what I'm loving is the addition of Icons, more 360 Assets, Images, Videos, Audio, and Buttons.   In the image below, I searched for "checkmark" and was presented with two options.

I selected the image I wanted, clicked the Insert button and the image appeared on my slide. All of the images are SVGs so you can scale them up or down without fear of losing any quality. I love that. And if you double-click the SVGs you can change the color on the Properties Inspector. (Note that it will actually take three clicks to change the icon's color. Two clicks to get to edit mode, one more click on the existing color to modify it.)

Back with the Assets dialog box, I played around with the Videos and Audio options and found plenty of potential here. Keep in mind that after inserting these assets, you can still edit them within Captivate just like always.

Speaking of buttons (were we speaking about buttons?), I think we can all agree that the buttons provided in every version of Captivate, back to the beginning of time, left much to be desired. It's time to rejoice. To be clear, if you add a button to a slide via the Interactions tool you'll end up with the same boring button as always. And if you switch to an Image button the same ghastly images are available (all the more reason to use Shapes as buttons). Nevertheless, the button Assets in Captivate 11.5 can be added to your project in seconds and are a welcome upgrade.   In the image below, I've selected the Play button.

After inserting the button Asset onto a slide, the button behaves like any button (you'll find Actions you can modify on the Properties inspector). What I'd love to see down the road are either buttons as Shapes available in the Assets area or some way to modify the button images that are currently available without having to leave Captivate.   Note: If you'd like to see a video where I demonstrate the concepts detailed in this article, visit the IconLogic YouTube channel.   Next time: Project and Slide Assets (both of which are game changers and worth a deep dive). ***   Looking for Captivate training? Check out these live, instructor-led classes.

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Kevin Siegel is the founder and president of IconLogic, Inc. He has written hundreds of step-by-step computer training books on applications such as Adobe Captivate, Articulate Storyline, Adobe RoboHelp, Adobe Presenter, and TechSmith Camtasia. Kevin spent five years in the U.S. Coast Guard as an award-winning photojournalist and has three decades’ experience as a trainer, publisher, technical writer, and eLearning developer. Kevin is a Certified Master Trainer (CMT), Certified Technical Trainer (CTT+), Certified Online Professional Trainer (COTP), and a frequent speaker at trade shows and conventions.

MICROSOFT POWERPOINT 365: Meet the Shape Union and Shape Subtract Tools

Nine years ago I wrote some articles about the Shape Union and Shape Subtract tools, but, friends, it’s been a while. And can you believe these tools are still lying dormant in secrecy, waiting for you to discover them?    First, I’ll show you what you can do with these tools. Then I’ll show you where to find them. And then I’ll show you how to use them.   If you’re using PowerPoint 365, you have access to a limited (but decent) selection of icons by choosing Insert > Icons from the ribbon.   Let’s say you’re looking for a flower. PowerPoint’s got you covered with the free icon below:

But what if you want other flowers to match, and with a bit of variation? Not a ton of flower options readily accessible here. Using some basic shapes and the shape union and subtract tool, you could easily create your own that mimic the original with a cut-out, transparent circle center:

Here’s How to Add the Tools to Your Ribbon First, you’ll need to add the Shape Union and Shape Subtract tools to your ribbon, as they are not there by default.  Choose where you’d like the tools to live. I put mine on the Home tab of the ribbon. Right-click the ribbon of your selected tab and choose Customize the Ribbon. (The PowerPoint Options dialog box will appear.) On the right-hand side of the dialog box, you’ll find the Customize the Ribbon area. With your desired tab selected (I’m going to put these on my Home tab), click the New Group button.

A group called New Group (Custom) will be added for that tab. Right-click the New Group, choose Rename, and give the new group a relevant name. I’m going to call mine Shape Editing. From the Choose Commands From drop-down menu on the left, choose All Commands. Click within the list of commands and hit the [M] key on your keyboard. Scroll until you find the Merge Shapes command and select it. Ensure your new, custom group is selected on the right and click the Add button to add the command to your new group.

This will add the Merge Shapes command to your ribbon which includes the Union, Subtract, Fragment, Intersect, and Combine tools. I'll cover the last three in future articles.    Here’s How to Use the Shape Union Tool   To make my second flower pictured above, I combined four Heart shapes.  Choose Insert > Shapes and from the Basic Shapes area, choose the heart.  Draw one heart and then press [Ctrl] [D] to duplicate it. Select the second heart and from the Drawing Tools Format tab, choose Rotate > FlipVertical. (Now you have two hearts, one of which is upside down. ) Select the second heart and press [Ctrl] [D] to duplicate it.  Select the third heart and from the Drawing Tools Format tab, choose Rotate > Rotate Right 90 degrees.  Select the third heart and press [Ctrl] [D] to duplicate it.  Select the fourth heart and from the Drawing Tools Format tab, choose Rotate > Flip Horizontal. (You now have four identical hearts rotated in four different directions.) Align them like this:

With all four hearts selected, but not grouped, navigate to your new custom group on your ribbon and choose Merge Shapes > Union to turn the four shapes into one united shape.

Here’s How to Use the Shape Subtract Tool Insert a circle by choosing Insert > Shapes > Oval. Hold down the [Shift] key as you draw to create a perfect circle instead of an oval. Duplicate your circle so you can use the exact circle for your next flower (if you are creating more than one) and put it to the side. Align the circle to the center and the middle of your heart-shape creation by holding the [Ctrl] key and selecting both shapes. From the ribbon, choose Drawing Tools Format > Align > Align Center and then Align Middle.

Click to deselect both shapes. Select the outer shape, hold down the [Ctrl] key, and then select the circle. Yes, the order matters.  From your Merge Shapes tool, choose Subtract.

You’ll be left a flower similar to the PowerPoint icon with a cutout circle center. For the third flower I used this same process but used the Teardrop shape for the flower petals.

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We've added a new PowerPoint class to our catalog: PowerPoint for eLearning 301: Bring Your Project to Class. Bring your existing presentation to this open-forum style live, online workshop where AJ will help get you moving toward a fresh and modern design for your presentation.

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AJ Walther, COTP, is IconLogic's Chief Creative Officer (CCO), a seasoned online trainer, eLearning graphic designer, and author of both "PowerPoint 2007: The Essentials" and "PowerPoint 2008 for the Macintosh: The Essentials." AJ made her own interdisciplinary studies major, focusing on writing and art. Her combined expertise in PowerPoint, graphic design, and writing allows her to bring a unique skillset to the eLearning community.