Forum Discussion
TIP: Build a Rise Course with a Pretest
There is a way to include a pretest in a Rise course!
Rise doesn't have pretest functionality built in—at least, not yet. But it can be done using a few Storyline blocks, some button blocks,...
Hi Judy, thank you so much for this valuable tutorial on adding a pre-test using a storyline block! I have successfully added this to a Rise course (getting completion through both pathways), but I am running into one issue and wondering if you have further advice?
If a user fails the pre-test but doesn't use the button to start the course, choosing instead to close the course and then re-launch, they are able to have a second chance at taking the pre-test.
I unsuccessfully tried using triggers in Storyline to prevent this, as it seems that when a user re-opens that page in the Rise lesson, the SL project starts over as if it's a brand-new user. And since the button that directs the users who pass relies on the SL block, I can't move those to a new page.
Have you come across this issue before or have any suggestions on preventing a user from having multiple attempts at the pre-test?
Thank you again and in advance of any guidance you are willing to share.
Hi, Ingrid,
Thanks for sharing your concern. Are you seeing that ability to close-relaunch-retake in an LMS? Or is that just what you're experiencing when looking at the course in Review or on another website?
- When a course is on a website, the program has nowhere to store "resume" data. Thus, the course always restarts from the beginning when the user exits and re-opens the course.
- When a course is in an LMS, the program stores "resume" data in the LMS. That allows the user to restart the course at the point where they left it.
I'd assume that Rise's LMS resume data would include the settings for the SL block. But, frankly, I've never tested that. In fact, I've never used this pre-test method myself. The courses I develop for clients are typically in Storyline. When I use Rise, it's usually for simpler courses where a pre-test isn't needed. I only figured out this pre-testing method in Rise because I saw a few posts asking about it, and that presented an interesting challenge.
So...
- If your Rise-with-pre-test course is in an LMS (with any LMS-specific relaunch functions set to resume the course), and it resets the SL block to allow another attempt whenever the user relaunches the course, then, alas, this method isn't fool-proof.
- If you've only checked your Rise-with-pre-test course on the web, check it in your LMS or the SCORM Cloud to see if the SL block will reset or not.
Hi Judy,
Thank you for the quick response.
Yes, this was testing in an LMS. I did connect with Articulate support, who unfortunately confirmed that the storyline blocks will always reset when revisiting the page in Rise — regardless of what triggers and restrictions have been set in the storyline project. Therefore this is the expected behavior. So even though the rest of the Rise content in the course bookmarks as expected, the storyline block will not.
I should add that if the user moves on from that first page, then this is not a problem. The only time this presents an issue is if the user takes the pre-test, fails, and then closes the course before using the button to go to the first content lesson. However, in our arena (compliance), we can't take that risk.
We were hopeful this would work, as we have an existing Rise course and just wanted to add a pre-test without rebuilding in Storyline or another platform. The completions both worked beautifully when set up as you demonstrated in your example, so thank you for that!
Hopefully this feature will be available in the future.
Thanks again!
Thanks so much for sharing what you found out. I'm sorry to hear that SL blocks always reset when resuming a Rise course, but that's vital to know! I added an update to the original post to make this info more visible.
And I absolutely understand that the possibility of someone using that loophole to retake the pretest wouldn't be acceptable to compliance folks.
As I said in a comment above, "Personally, if I were going to develop a course with a pretest, I'd probably do it in Storyline, since that has the functionality built-in, without having to give up the menu and such."
FYI: Lots of folks here in the Forum have asked for pretest functionality in Rise. You can submit a feature request here: https://access.articulate.com/support/contact/feature-request
Submitting a request doesn't guarantee that a feature will be implemented. But the more folks submit a given request, the more likely it is that it will be added to the roadmap (https://access.articulate.com/support/article/Articulate-360-Feature-Roadmap ).
