Importing Respondus Files with StudyMate

StudyMate has a powerful Import Wizard that allows you to convert materials from other formats, including MS Word, rich-text, IMS QTI, and Respondus format. The features for importing Respondus files are particularly powerful and seamless. By understanding how these import features work, you'll be able to make good use of materials that are already in Respondus format.

First, it's important to understand the three types of items (or "templates") that are available in StudyMate:

• No Answer - A fact, phrase, or question that doesn't have an associated answer. For example:
  
  Johannes Gutenberg invented the movable type printing press
   
• One Answer - A question or definition that has a specific answer or term associated with it. For example:
  
  Inventor of the movable type printing press
  Johannes Gutenberg
   
• Multiple Choice - A question followed by a set of answer choices (only one being correct). For example:
  
  Who invented the movable type printing press?
  a. Galileo
  b. Sir John Ambrose
  c. Johannes Gutenberg
  d. Thomas Edison

It's also important to remember that although items contained in one StudyMate template (eg. One Answer) can be used to generate a variety of activities (eg. Flash Cards, Pick a Letter, Glossary, etc.), a Flash activity created by StudyMate can only use items from one of the three templates. This approach differs from an exam where different question types can appear in the same exam.

Indeed, Respondus 2.0 is an exam authoring tool, so items are stored as traditional question types: multiple choice, true/false, fill in the blank, essay, and so forth. So when a Respondus file is converted to StudyMate format, questions must eventually conform to one of the three StudyMate types listed above. The goal, then, is to convert as many questions as possible from the Respondus file to the StudyMate format -- or even better, convert certain types of questions so that they can be used in more than one of the StudyMate templates.

To begin the importing of a Respondus file with StudyMate, do the following:

- Start StudyMate
- From the Start menu, click Import Wizard
- Select the third import option: Respondus or Respondus Archive
- Browse to and then select the Respondus file to be imported
- Indicate whether to append items to the current file or to create a new one
- Click Preview

A screen now appears with the following conversion options.

The first option listed determines whether Respondus questions that have large images will be retained or dropped during the conversion to StudyMate. If retained, StudyMate will automatically reduce the size of images that are too large for its three templates.

The next setting determines whether Respondus questions with exceptionally long text (or a large number of answer choices in multiple choice questions) will be dropped or truncated during the conversion. If you choose the "truncate text" option to prevent questions from being dropped, be sure to edit those items once the import process is complete (a log file will list the items that are truncated).

The next group of settings relates to the issues discussed earlier -- converting Respondus questions to the three formats supported by StudyMate.

When importing Multiple Choice questions, you will surely want to select the first option: Create a Multiple Choice item. This is the most straightforward type of conversion from a Respondus file to StudyMate.

The next setting for Multiple Choice questions, Create a "One Answer" item from the correct answer, is best explained with an example. Let's say that the multiple choice question being imported from Respondus is as follows:

	The founder of psychoanalysis
	a. Emile Durkheim
	b. C. G. Jung
	c. Sigmund Frued
	d. Eugen Bleuler

By selecting the option Create a "One Answer" item from the correct answer, the following "One Answer" item will be created during the import:

	The founder of psychoanalysis
	Sigmund Freud

Thus, the multiple choice question from the Respondus file can be used with both the "Multiple Choice" and "One Answer" templates in StudyMate. But caution must be taken when using this conversion option because not all conversions of multiple choice questions work this cleanly. Consider these two Respondus questions (the last answer choice is correct for both items):

	The founder of psychoanalysis
	a. Emile Durkheim
	b. C. G. Jung
	c. Eugen Bleuler
	d. None of the above

	An artistic style that occurred after the Baroque period
	a. Impressionism
	b. Art Deco
	c. Neoclassicism
	d. Realism
	e. All of the above

"One Answer" items created from these two questions will make little sense in StudyMate activities because they will be based on the following data:

	The founder of psychoanalysis
	None of the above
	An artistic style prevalent after the Baroque period
	All of the above

So it is good practice to carefully "preview" the items once the import is complete, particularly if this conversion option is selected. (Note, the Preview task in StudyMate has a "Mark for delete" feature that is quite useful when files have been imported from other sources. This feature provides a quick way to preview -- and then discard -- unwanted items from a StudyMate file.)

The next two options relate to True/False questions. The first option is straightforward -- it allows a True/False question to be converted to the "Multiple Choice" format in StudyMate. The second option, Create a No Answer Item if the answer is True, is worth an example. Let's say that the original True/False question is as follows:

	"Renaissance" is a French term meaning "rebirth"
	a. TRUE
	b. FALSE

When the item is converted to a "No Answer" item in StudyMate, it will display as:

"Renaissance" is a French term meaning "rebirth"

This is ideal for the Fact Cards and Fact Cards+ activities in StudyMate where simple facts are shown on cards.

The next option relates to Fill in the Blank questions. If only one correct answer is specified for a Fill in the Blank question, this setting will allow it to be converted to a "One Answer" question in StudyMate. Consider the following Fill in the Blank question:

	The founder of psychoanalysis _______
	[correct answer: Sigmund Freud]

With this option selected, it will be converted to the following "One Answer" question type in StudyMate:

	The founder of psychoanalysis
	Sigmund Freud

But if the Fill in the Blank question being converted has more than one answer field (eg. Roses are ____, violets are ____ ), or if more than one correct answer is acceptable in the original question (eg. New York, New York City, NYC), then the question won't be converted for use in StudyMate.

This next setting allows Essay questions from the Respondus file to be converted to "No Answer" items in StudyMate. Consider the following essay question from Respondus:

Describe the process of mitosis?

The essay question will be unchanged when brought into the "No Answer" template and will be usable with StudyMate's Fact Cards and Fact Cards+ activities.

This final setting will convert Matching questions in the Respondus file to "One Answer" items in StudyMate. For example, here is a matching question from a Respondus file (for the sake of simplicity, the correct matches are shown on the same line):

	Match the following items:
	___ Invented dynamite	A. Alfred Nobel
	___ Invented photographic film	B. George Eastman
	___ Invented the thermometer	C. Galileo
	___ Invented the wireless radio	D. Guglielmo Marconi

If this import setting is selected, each match would be turned into a unique "One Answer" item in StudyMate, as follows:

	Invented dynamite
	Alfred Nobel
	Invented photographic film
	George Eastman
	Invented the thermometer
	Galileo
	Invented the wireless radio
	Guglielmo Marconi

You'll need to decide whether this feature is appropriate for the type of matching questions being imported from Respondus. Certain matches won't make sense when taken out of the context of the original set of items. So, again, remember to preview the questions after the import is complete.

After choosing your conversion settings and clicking [OK], StudyMate will complete the conversion process and create a log file that details all aspects of the import process. Any items that were dropped, truncated, or skipped are listed in the log file, as well as tallies for each type of item that was created in StudyMate. Remember, the next step is to go to the Preview task to see if further editing is needed!

There are two additional items worth mentioning about importing Respondus files. First, StudyMate allows you to import and convert an entire archive of Respondus files in one step. For example, the publisher test banks that are available through the Respondus Test Bank Network can be downloaded directly from StudyMate (in StudyMate select Open, then select Download Test Bank). Each Respondus-formatted test bank contains a set of files, typically one for each chapter in the textbook. StudyMate will convert this entire archive of Respondus files in one step.

The second point is that it is possible to import a Respondus file without using StudyMate's "Import Wizard." Simply click Open, Browse, change the "Files of Type" to Respondus Files and Archives and then select the file.

Using StudyMate to import Respondus files is a great way to convert existing content into StudyMate format. By following some of the suggestions above, it will take very little time to create interactive learning activities for your students.

Source: Respondus, Inc. (www.respondus.com)
Originally Published: October 5, 2004

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