Upload
others
View
3
Download
0
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Personal ICTSkills 9
UsingHot Potatoes
Alan JervisTorben Steeg
School of EducationThe University of Manchester
Sixth EditionNovember 2006
TM
Personal ICT Skills © 2006
© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
© 2006 The University of Manchester
All rights reserved. This document may not be reproduced in
whole or in part without the written permission of the School of
Education, The University of Manchester.
All of the booklets in this series may be downloaded from:
http://www.learn2teach.org.uk
Personal ICT Skills © 2006
© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
This series of booklets is intended to support you in acquiring and developing the ICT skills which
are needed for your course and for the QTS Skills Test. It concentrates on ‘personal competence’ -
the individual ICT skills which professionals need for their personal use. It contains reference material,
additional information, and practice exercises.
This Series consists of:
Book 1 is a ‘getting started guide’ which covers the basic use of a computer (the ‘operating system’)
plus sections on using e-mail and the World-Wide Web.
Book 2 covers the use of word processors, particularly Microsoft ‘Word’.
Book 3 covers the use of graphics and images.
Book 4 covers the use of desk-top publishing, particularly ‘Microsoft ‘Publisher’.
Book 5 covers the use of spreadsheets, particularly Microsoft ‘Excel’.
Book 6 covers the use of databases, particularly Microsoft ‘Access’.
Book 7 covers the use of presentation graphics, particularly Microsoft ‘PowerPoint’.
Book 8 covers writing Web pages.
Book 9 covers the use of the ‘Hot Potatoes’ test and quiz generating package.
A number of symbols are used at various points:
marks information which you need to be careful about; it may also indicate something to
check if you haven’t read the instructions and things seem to have gone wrong!
marks a link or reference to some other part of this book or booklet in the series;
marks more advanced information which you may not need at once;
marks features of an application which are not covered in this book: you should ask a member
of staff about them, or read the manual or on-line help system if you need to use them.
This book is written and produced within the School of Education. We have tried to make it as
comprehensible, complete, logical, helpful and encouraging as we can. If you have any comments or
suggestions for its improvement, we will be pleased to receive them for incorporation into future
editions.
Alan Jervis Torben Steeg
[email protected] [email protected]
READ.ME (Introduction)
1
�
Personal ICT Skills © 20062
3© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
Hot PotatoesHOT POTATOES is a suite of six programs for creating interactive
educational exercises for placing on web pages.
The suite is freely downloadable from
http://hotpot.uvic.ca/
The programs are:
JQuiz multiple-choice, true-false, text-entry or short-answer
quizzes
JCloze gap-fill exercises
JCross crosswords
JMix jumbled-sentence exercises
JMatch matching and ordering exercises
Masher a tool for managing sites containing many Hot Potatoes
exercises
The exercises are created using JavaScript and HTML, but you don’t
need to know JavaScript or HTML in order to use them; you simply
enter the data (questions, answers etc.) and the programs will cre-
ate the underlying code for the web pages automatically.
These notes are based on version 6 of the suite. You should note
that the output from version 6 will work only in Internet Explorer
6+, Mozilla 1.2+ and Netscape 7+.
“The HOT POTATOES suite is distributed as shareware. If you are anon-profit-making state-funded educational institution, and you postall materials made with Hot Potatoes on a public Web site whereeveryone can use them freely, then you may use Hot Potatoes freeof charge.
You will need to buy a commercial licence if you are not in compli-ance with these conditions. Information on commercial licensing isavailable at:
http://www.halfbakedsoftware.com/hotpot/licence.htm
Copyright laws apply to both commercial and freeware software,and the copyright holder retains all rights. You may distribute HOTPOTATOES to other users free of charge, PROVIDING THAT YOUPASS ON THE WHOLE SUITE IN ITS ORIGINAL ARCHIVE FORM,DO NOT ADD OR REMOVE ANY FILES FROM THE ARCHIVE,AND DO NOT MAKE ANY CHARGE FOR IT, AND THAT YOUOBTAIN THE WRITTEN PERMISSION OF THE UNIVERSITY OFVICTORIA AND HALF-BAKED SOFTWARE FIRST. We do not
usually give permission for distribution online or on CD-ROM.”
Introduction
Licence for use
�The files created by the suite
can be automatically uploaded to
the www.hotpotatoes.net hosting
service.
This service is not free; but you can
create a demo account to test out
the features. If you want your pages
to remain on the server for more
than a couple of days, you will have
to purchase an account.
This account is not related to li-
censing for Hot Potatoes.
4 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
Starting
�If you have installed Hot Po-
tatoes yourself, you will need to
register the programs in order to
unlock all the features of the suite.
You can register directly from the
home page at:
http://web.uvic.ca/hrd/hotpot/
Just click on "Register". You will get
your code instantly (by email), and
go into the database of users.
To register, start one of the pota-
toes, click on "Register" on the Help
menu, and enter your user name
and key.
When Hot Potatoes is started a window opens providing direct
access to the five programs that create exercises and The Masher.
Within the window the mouse pointer changes to a hand holding a
potato and as it passes over the various options they are high-
lighted (note that the highlighting is not evident in this grey-scaled
image):
A full tutorial accompanies the suite. This is available from the Help
menu of the main window and runs in a browser.
The notes on the following pages are intended to get you started
with each element of the suite; you will need to spend some time
exploring and working with each program to discover its full capa-
bilities.
5© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
JQuizJQuiz is used to create four different types of question: multiple-
choice, short-answer, hybrid (a short-answer question that turns
into a multiple-choice question after several attempts), and multi-
select (in which the user has to choose several of a set of options,
then check the choices).
In multiple-choice questions, the user chooses an answer by click-
ing on a button. If the answer is correct, the button caption will
change to a smiley face :-), and if it's wrong, it will change to an X
(you can configure these bits of text). In either case, the user will
see feedback specific to that answer, explaining why it's right or
wrong. If the answer is wrong, the user can continue choosing an-
swers until a correct answer is selected. The score for each ques-
tion is based on the number of tries taken to get a correct answer.
Once a correct answer is chosen, the scoring is "frozen", but the
user can still click on buttons to see the feedback for other answers
without penalty.
In short-answer questions, the user has to type the answer into a
text box on the page, and press a Check button to see if it is
correct. The page will try to match the user's answer to a list of
correct or incorrect answers you have defined. If a match is found,
the feedback for that answer will be shown. If not, then the page will
try to find the nearest match among the specified correct answers,
and signal to the user which parts of their answer are right and
which parts are wrong. The score for each question is based on the
number of attempts the user makes before getting a correct an-
swer. You can include a Hint button, which will give the user one
letter of the answer; using hints incurs a score penalty.
A hybrid question is a combination of a multiple-choice question
and a short-answer question. Here the user is first presented with a
text box and asked to type the answer. If the user fails to get the
answer right after a specified number of tries (which you can choose),
the question changes to a multiple-choice question to make it easier.
When you are creating a hybrid question, you'll see an extra checkbox
on the right: Include in MC options. Tick this box for any an-
swer you want to appear as part of the multiple-choice answers in
the second phase of the question. For example, your short-answer
question may include four predicted correct answers which would
be acceptable, but you probably only want to include one of them
as a multiple-choice option.
A multi-select question asks the student to select several of a
specific set of items. The idea here is that the student must select all
the correct items, and not select any wrong items. This might take
the format "Which of the following are nouns?", followed by a list of
words. The student must check all the nouns, but not check any
answers which are not nouns, then press a Check button. If the
answer is not completely correct, the student will see a readout of
the number of correct choices, and one piece of feedback.
6 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
When you first run JQuiz you may be asked whether you want to
start in Beginner or Advanced mode; select Beginner for now.
If you are not asked the ques-
tion you can ensure that you are
in Beginner mode by selecting
Mode from the Options menu.
JQuiz opens straight into its main working window:
To create questions you simply type into the text boxes.
Start by giving your quiz a title (see image above).
Next, for each question, write in the question, the possible an-
swers and the feedback to be given for each answer. You need at
least two possible answers; if you don’t use C and D they will be
ignored. You can have as many answers as you wish.
Finally, indicate which answer is correct.
Select the type of question here
Write your quiz title here
Write your question here
Click here for next question
Click here for further answers
Setting up a quiz
7© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
The only visible difference when you select a different question
types is in the Settings Column.
The options for Multiple-choice are shown above and are
identical for Short-Answer. The other options are shown below:
�You can mix question types
within the same quiz. That is, you
can, say, have a mixture of multi-
ple choice and short answer ques-
tions within the same quiz.
Simply select the question type
you want for each question.
The Manage Ques-
tions menu provides a
number of useful tools
including the deletion
of questions and rearrangement of
their order.
You can also shuffle answers within
a question.
8 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
There are three routes to more sophisticated question design.
The INSERT menu allows you to add pictures and a range of
HTML objects to your questions.
Configure Output under the Options Menu includes options
such as a question timer.
The Advanced mode allows you to control the weightings given
to each question and each answer within the question.
When you have completed the setting up of your quiz you can
publish it as a web page.
Click the Export to a v6web page icon. This opens a standard
Save dialogue asking you where you wish to save the HTML file.
After clicking Save you will be offered some options:
To take these in reverse order, Nothing does literally that; it
saves the fie and then returns you to JQuiz to continue working.
The Upload option requires you first to have set up an account
with the www.hotpotatoes.net website. If you have no other
way to publish your Hot Potatoes files, this is an effective way to
do so. See the website for details of how to go about this.
Finally, View the exercise in my Browser does exactly what
it says and the result will be similar to that shown opposite.
Publishing a quiz
Some moreadvanced
question options
9© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
This web page can be included on your own website or used on a
local network or individual computer by simply opening the file
within a modern browser.
Clicking an answer brings up a feedback pop-up; on the right is
shown the feedback for a correct answer selected the first time -
hence a score of 100%. With four possible responses (as above)
the scoring is as follows:
Correct first time 100%
Correct second time 66%
Correct third time 33%
Correct fourth time 0%
Full control over the appearance of the web page created by
JQuiz is available through Configure Output under the Op-
tions Menu. The font used can also be chosen through this
menu.
10 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
A cloze procedure is a "fill-in-the-blanks" activity where the
learner uses clues from the context to supply words that have
been deliberately removed from the text. Thus a cloze procedure
is a test of reading comprehension. Cloze is also known as a ‘fill
in the blanks’ activity.
JCloze lets you easily prepare Cloze activities as web pages. The
main working window is shown below:
Text for clozing can either typed straight into the main area of
the window or pasted in from elsewhere. There is a spell checking
facility.
The Title box provides the title for the whole web page.
Once there is text in the box, gaps can be created either individu-
ally, by selecting a word or phrase and then the Gap button, or
by using the Auto-gap button which places a gap every nth word.
‘Gapped’ words remain visible but highlighted in this window.
Gaps can be removed by clicking within some gapped text and
then clicking the Delete Gap button.
All gaps can be removed with the Clear Gaps button.
JCloze
11© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
When a highlighted word is gapped a dialogue opens allowing
clues and alternative acceptable words to be provided.
This dialogue can be opened at any time for any gap by clicking in
the gap and then on the Show Words button.
A completed Cloze exercise is shown below.
Here every 6th word has been gapped; this has resulted in some
unfortunate choices for gaps including a date and proper names.
Using the Font option the Comic Sans font has been chosen
which effects not only the above view of the exercise but also the
resulting web page shown overleaf.
12 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
You can see that on the web page the length of each hidden
word has been obscured by the use of a minimum standard size
box to write into.
Clicking a ‘?’ button reveals the hint provided in the ‘alternative
words’ dialogue (see previous page).
At the foot of the page are the Check and Hint buttons re-
ferred to in the page introduction.
13© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
As with JQuiz it is possible to add pictures and a range of HTML
objects to your questions, to include a question timer and to
control the style of the created web page.
Within the configuration dialogue there are some further op-
tions including:
Use dropdown list instead of textbox in output. If you
choose this, the following will happen:
1. Instead of text boxes, each gap will show as a dropdown list,
consisting of a list of all the gapped words in the exercise.
2. The hint button will not be shown (because there's no need
for hints if the words are all shown in the list).
Include word list with text. This allows you to include a list
of the gapped words from the text, mixed up, in a box at the top
of the page, to make the exercise a little easier.
Some moreadvanced cloze
options
14 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
JCross allows you to create web based crosswords as an assess-
ment tool.
JCross opens showing a 20 by 20 blank grid:
If you want a larger grid you can change the grid size through the
Manage Grid menu. If you only use a part of the grid the
unused rows and columns will be discarded when the web page is
created.
There are two ways to establish a grid of words; you can either
add them to the grid yourself or give JCross a list of words to fit
into a grid.
If you enter the words directly onto the grid note that you have
to move to a new square, using the arrow keys, before typing
each letter. The clues are added subsequently through the Add
Clues button.
JCross
�If you haven’t registered Hot
Potatoes, you will be restricted to
an 8 by 8 grid.
15© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
Alternatively, using the Automatic Grid Maker from the
Manage Grid menu, you can provide JCross with a list of
answers and clues from which it will then attempt to make a grid.
The answers are separated from the clues by a pair of colons.
Clicking Make the grid creates a grid of the provided words;
this is a dynamic process that, for a complex grid, can be ob-
served in process. It can also be stopped by clicking the Stop
now button.
A resulting web page is shown overleaf.
Creating the grid and clues by hand
16 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
As with the other Hot Potatoes applications, it is possible to add
pictures and HTML links to your questions, to include a question
timer and to control the style of the created web page.
Some moreadvancedcrossword
options
17© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
JMix jumbles up a provided sentence to create an exercise where
the user is asked to recreate the sentence.
The main window provides space for the sentence showing the
sentence segments and alternate sentences that are legitimate.
Note in the above that punctuation marks are included as sepa-
rate segments of the jumbled sentence.
You can also break up one word into individual letters, to create a
mixed-up word puzzle.
As with the other Hot Potatoes applications, it is possible to add
pictures and HTML links to your sentence, to include a question
timer and to control the style of the created web page. One use
of pictures in this application would be to create a drag-and-drop
output page which uses pictures instead of words.
JMix offers two output possibilities; one where the sentence is
constructed by clicking on the segments in the correct order and
one where it is constructed by clicking and dragging the seg-
ments.
The web pages resulting from the window above are shown
overleaf.
JMix
�It is not possible for the pro-
gram to tell whether a single quo-
tation mark ( ' ) is being used as
an apostrophe or as a quotation
marker. The single quotation is
therefore always treated as an
apostrophe; if you want to use quo-
tation marks, use the double quo-
tation ( " ).
Angle brackets ( < and > ) should
be avoided as they cause confu-
sion with HTML tags.
18 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
Click the words in thecorrect order to create
the sentence
Drag the words into thecorrect order to create
the sentence
19© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
JMatch allows you to create matching and ordering exercises.
In the main window there are two columns; the left hand one
contains items that will remain in the same order on the final web
page, the right hand column contains items matching items that
will be jumbled in the final web page. The ‘Fix’ column allows you
to prevent a pair of items from being jumbled.
In this example the left hand column contains links to images of
the items named in the right hand column (though, as with the
other applications in the suite, ordinary text is perfectly accept-
able here).
As with JMix, JMatch offers two output possibilities; one where
the match options are chosen from a drop down list and one
where they are dragged into the correct position. In the first of
these pictures are permitted only in the left hand column (since
they can’t appear in a drop down textual list). In the drag-and-
drop approach pictures can be placed in the right hand column as
well, or instead.
The Default item at the foot of the right hand column is the
text that is visible in the drop down list before a choice has been
made.
The web pages resulting from the window above are shown
overleaf.
JMatch
�As you can see in the image
above, the links to the pictures con-
sist of HTML. Do not be alarmed.
All you need to do is click Insert
> Picture > Picture from
Local File and navigate to the
image you want to use. JMatch then
creates this code.
In a similar way it is possible to
insert images from web pages.
20 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
Select items from adrop down list to match
the item
drag answers into placeto match the item
21© 2006 Alan Jervis and Torben Steeg - The University of Manchester School of Education
Book 9Hot Potatoes
The Masher is a tool for automatically compiling batches of Hot
Potatoes exercises into units.
You might have five Hot Potatoes exercises that form a single unit
of materials. You want to build HTML files from all the exercises,
with the same colours and appearance settings; you also want to
link the exercises together using the navigation buttons, and
create an index file for the unit. The Masher will do that for you.
This is what you do:
1. Add the Hot Potatoes files you want to include in the unit into
the main screen Files box. Each time you add a file you will see
a dialogue box in which you can set the output (*.htm) file
name and choose either standard or drag-and-drop web pages.
2. The arrow buttons on the right allow you to order sequence
of exercises.
3. Specify the Output folder for your unit. If you leave this blank,
the program will use the folder in which the first page or exer-
cise is located.
4. Set the appropriate appearance options on the Appearance
tab.
The MasherTo make use of the masher
you need to have some
competence and confidence
in web page creation.
See Chapter 11.
22 Personal ICT Skills © 2006
Book 9 Hot Potatoes
5. Select the Navigation buttons and their captions on the But-
tons tab.
6. On the Index tab, set a title for the index page.
7. Click on Build unit.
The Masher processes each file in turn, by launching the appro-
priate Hot Potato, loading the file into it, setting the configura-
tion data, and compiling the Web page.
When all the Web pages are compiled, the program creates an
index page for the entire unit. You can then view the index
page, and test the exercises.
The Masher can also be used to upload files to a
hotpotatoes.net account.
Note that without a (purchased) licence for The Masher (which is
distinct from the licence for the rest of the suite) it will only
process three files at a time.