Steps in EXAM

The teacher/EXAMiner can select questions in EXAM’s question library to be saved in an XML-formatted transfer file, which allows the questions to be imported into Moodle’s question bank.

choosing questions for Moodle XML export in EXAM

When the teacher/EXAMiner selects at least one question in the question bank, a "Transfer questions to Moodle XML format (only essays and multiple-choice)" link appears on the page. The selected questions are saved to a `moodle-export.xml` file that can be saved to your computer by clicking this link.


Error Situation During Transfer

Sometimes, when a question (or questions) has been selected and the "Transfer questions to Moodle XML format..." link is clicked, no XML file is generated, and a red exclamation mark banner appears in the top right corner of the EXAM interface. This is likely due to problematic characters in the question text.

  • Characters like `&` and `<` in the question texts cause the problem. These must be removed or replaced with other characters in the question text.
    •   if necessary, the `&` and `<` characters can be added to the text after successfully transferring the question to the XML file.
  • Line break tags `<br>` or `<br />` in the questions also cause issues. These tags are visible in the editor's code/HTML view and should be removed. If necessary, the line break removed in the code view can be added back to the normal editor view so the line break appears in a form compatible with the XML file transfer.
  • The problematic elements must be removed to transfer the question to the XML file.

Steps in Moodle

In Moodle, the course teacher can import questions into the question bank. The teacher can find the question bank either through the course administration settings or through the management settings of an individual quiz activity. The teacher can create a separate category for questions imported from EXAM in the question bank. The question bank has an "Import" tab, where the teacher can import the questions.

import settings in Moodle

In the Import function, "Moodle XML format" must be selected as the file format, and the `moodle-export.xml` file can either be dragged from your computer’s file management window to Moodle's "Add files by dragging them here." area or the file can be selected using the "Choose a file..." button. After selecting the file, clicking the "Import" button will add the file’s questions to Moodle's question bank. Moodle will confirm the successful import of the questions on a dedicated page, where the imported files are listed.

successful import notification in Moodle

Clicking the "Continue" button will return to Moodle's question bank, where the questions imported from EXAM are now available and can be added to Moodle quizzes.

Import Error

Sometimes, the import of questions might fail with an import error, resulting in the message "Grades do not match the grading settings - question skipped."

failed import notification in Moodle

This error can occur with Multiple Choice (multiple correct answers) questions where EXAM allows any scoring for answer options, while Moodle only allows certain types of scoring. To complete the import in such an error situation, the import must be reattempted with the "Combine grades" option set to "Nearest grade if not listed" under the General settings on the Import page (these settings are hidden by default but can be opened by clicking the section). Other settings on the Import page remain as described above. With this setting, the import should go through. However, the scoring for one or more of the multiple-choice answer options may change from the original. A more detailed description of rounding and known issues is provided in the notes and known issues list below. 

settings to override grades in import in Moodle


Additional instructions: Moodle Question Bank, Importing questions 

Notes and Known Issues

  • The transfer of questions only works for essay and multiple-choice questions. It is not possible to transfer cloze or true/false questions. These can still be selected from EXAM’s question bank, but they will not be saved in the XML file or transferred to Moodle.
  • In Moodle, each question has a separate name, while in EXAM, questions do not have names. The name of a question transferred from EXAM will be the first 30 characters of the question text in Moodle.
  • The ownership information of the questions in EXAM is not transferred to Moodle. The questions imported into Moodle are marked under the name of the person who imports them.
  • There is no specific field for an attachment in a Moodle question. Any attachment to the question will appear at the end of the question text in Moodle, labeled as "Attachment:" (This text is always in English by default after the transfer to Moodle. The text can be changed in Moodle's question text if needed).
  • Essay questions in EXAM that have a grading scale of Pass/Fail will be converted to point-based grading in Moodle, where the maximum/default points are 1. The idea is that a "Pass" grade in EXAM corresponds to 1 point in Moodle, and a "Fail" grade corresponds to 0 points.
  • In Moodle, there is no specific field/setting for instructions related to the question or the recommended answer length in essay questions. These details are added to the end of the question text in Moodle under the "Answer instructions:" and "Expected word count" sections. (These sections are always in English by default after the transfer to Moodle).
  • The Single Correct and Multiple Correct Multiple-Choice questions in EXAM are treated as Multiple Choice-type questions in Moodle (Moodle does not have separate question types for Single Correct and Multiple Correct). Despite this, these questions generally function as they did in EXAM.
  • In Multiple Correct multiple-choice questions in the EXAM, the teacher defines + or - points for each answer option. In Moodle, the teacher only defines the maximum points for such a multiple-choice question and the percentage of + or - points for each answer option relative to the question’s maximum points. As a result, the points given in EXAM are converted to percentages when transferred to Moodle.
    • Moodle has predefined percentage values (±100, 90, 83.333, 80, 75, 70, 66.666, 60, 50, 40, 33.333, 30, 25, 20, 16.666, 14.2857, 12.5, 11.111, 10, 5, 0) that are allowed for an answer option’s percentage (whereas in EXAM, the option's points can be anything). Some of the point values for answer options in EXAM may need to be rounded in this step for Moodle to accept the option's points. In this case, the points available for the option in Moodle may not precisely match the points defined in EXAM.
    • Additionally, Moodle limits the negative points for an answer option to no more than the question’s maximum points. For example, if the maximum points are +5, the maximum negative points for an option can be -100% or -5 points. In EXAM, there is no such limit for negative points. If the negative points for an option exceed the question’s maximum points, they will be changed to -100% in Moodle.
    • Due to the rounding related to this issue, importing a Multiple Correct Multiple-Choice question into Moodle may result in an import error, for which solutions are discussed in the Import Error section.


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