AMC

If you ask the students to tick the correct boxes, they can correct a ticked box ereasing their mark with a eraser or white-out fluid. However, they must not try to draw the boxes back. Trying to do so, they could draw lines inside the boxes, that could then be considered as ticked boxes.

You can also let the students correct ticked boxes filling them completely. If you choose this option, you have to set the upper darkness threshold (from Preferences menu, Project tab) to some value less than 1 (but not too low). If the darkness ratio of a box is between the darkness threshold and the upper darkness threshold, the box is considered as been ticked. If the darkness ratio is greater than the upper darkness ratio, the box is considered as not ticked.

When the letters (or numbers) referencing the answers are drawn inside the boxes, you must tell the students to fill the correct boxes, as AMC can't make the difference between a box with a letter and ticked box.

The stiudents can correct a ticked box ereasing their mark with a eraser or white-out fluid, but they don't have any other solution to correct a ticked box. You must set the upper darkness threshold to 1.

For automatic recognition of the checked boxes in the students' pages, they must be previously digitalized. I use a copier/scanner which does it automatically (all the pages in a bundle without interaction with me), with the following settings: 300 dpi, OCR mode (for the characters' recognition, black and white without grayscale - but the scanner does not process any character recognition), each scan delivered as a single TIFF file per page.

	Note
	To analyze the scans, we must have them in one or several image files (TIFF, JPG, PNG, etc.). Vector graphics formats (PDF, PS or EPS) are also suitable: scans will then be converted into PNG by AMC before analysis.

	Note
	When giving scans for automated data capture the first time, you will have tell AMC which method you used: either different papers printed, or photocopied papers (see Printing and exam).

Then we select this set of scan files in the dialog opened by the button Automated of the section Data capture after examination, then we validate with the OK button. AMC begins with Optical Mark Recognition to detect the position of the four circle corner marks on the scans, position the boxes, and detects the amount of black pixels in each box.

The result of the analysis of each page is indicated in the lists of the section Diagnosis:

If we cannot use easily the scanner, or if, for a few copies, the automated input did not work as expected, we can manage the input manually. To do so, let's open the right window thanks to the button Manual of the section Input of the copies after exam. In that window, we can input the boxes which have been checked ourselves (by clicking them) on the wanted pages.

	Warning
	Every manual input will overwrite results eventually coming from a previous or posterior automated input for the same page.

Select a specific question

This option make it possible to manually mark on-screen a specific question. This save your having to search on each page the question if they are shuffled.

Mark an open question on-screen

• open the manual input tab and select "scan" as background,

• select the question to mark (drop-down menu above the list of pages) .

The open question's check-boxes are on the top of the window, and when you click next you move forward to the following student, always for the same question.

	Note
	All questions can be checked like this.

Check on-screen pages with invalid or empty questions

• The marking must be ended before use (see Process section Correction),

• open the manual input tab and select "scan" as background,

• choose if you want to navigate through all pages, through pages with invalid answers (inv), or through pages with invalid or empty answers (i & e).

The computation of the scores is launched with the button Mark, but we must previously make the following choice:

When we click the button Mark, the correction is made (this can take some time if we also asked for the reading of the scale).

The strategy used to score the copies is indicated in the LaTeX source file, with the command scoring. It can be used in an environment question or questionmult, to set it for every response, but also in the environment choices, to give scaling indications about a single response. The argument of the LaTeX command scoring is made of indications like parameter=value, separated by comas. The usable parameters are the following (the table shows also in which context those parameters can be used):

\begin{questionmult}{Q1}
\bareme{default.CONF=1,m=-CONF,b=CONF}

The default scale for a simple question is e=0,v=0,b=1,m=0, which gives one point for a good response and no point in the other cases. The default scaling for a multiple question is

e=0,v=0,b=1,m=0,p=-100,d=0

which gives a point for every checked box, either good or not (good box checked or wrong box not checked).

The LaTeX command \scoring can also be used outside question definitions, for whole examination parameters:

Using all of these parameters in combination allows to define many kinds of scoring strategies, as in the following example:

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[utf8x]{inputenc}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}

\usepackage[box,completemulti]{automultiplechoice}

\begin{document}

\element{qqs}{
\begin{question}{good choice}
  How many points would you like for this question?
  \begin{choices}
    \correctchoice{Maximum: 10}\scoring{10}
    \wrongchoice{Only 5}\scoring{5}
    \wrongchoice{Two will be enough}\scoring{2}
    \wrongchoice{None, thanks}\scoring{0}
  \end{choices}
\end{question}
}

\element{qqs}{
\begin{questionmult}{added}
  Get free points checking the following boxes:
  \begin{choices}
    \correctchoice{2 points}\scoring{b=2}
    \wrongchoice{One negative point!}\scoring{b=0,m=-1}
    \correctchoice{3 points}\scoring{b=3}
    \correctchoice{1 point}
    \correctchoice{Half point}\scoring{b=0.5}
  \end{choices}
\end{questionmult}
}

\element{qqs}{
\begin{questionmult}{3 or zero}\scoring{mz=3}
  Only a perfect response will be scored 3 points - otherwise, null score.
  \begin{choices}
    \wrongchoice{Wrong}
    \wrongchoice{Wrong}
    \correctchoice{Right}
    \correctchoice{Right}
  \end{choices}
\end{questionmult}
}

\element{qqs}{
\begin{questionmult}{all for 2}\scoring{haut=2}
  Perfect response scored 2 points, and give back one point for any error...
  \begin{choices}
    \correctchoice{Right}
    \correctchoice{This one is OK}
    \correctchoice{Yes!}
    \wrongchoice{False!}
    \wrongchoice{Don't check!}
  \end{choices}
\end{questionmult}
}

\element{qqs}{
\begin{question}{attention}\scoring{b=2}
  Some very bad answer yields here to a negative score (-2), but the correct answer is rewarded 2 points.
  \begin{choices}
    \correctchoice{Good!}
    \wrongchoice{Not correct}
    \wrongchoice{Not correct}
    \wrongchoice{Not correct}
    \wrongchoice{Very bad answer!}\scoring{-2}
  \end{choices}
\end{question}
}

\element{qqs}{
\begin{questionmult}{as you like}
  Choose how much points you need:
  \begin{choices}
    \correctchoice{You take two points here}\scoring{b=2}
    \wrongchoice{Check to give 3 points}\scoring{b=0,m=3}
    \correctchoice{Get one if checked, but give one if not}\scoring{m=-1}
  \end{choices}
\end{questionmult}
}

\element{qqs}{
\begin{questionmult}{03}
scoring{default.COMP=10,default.PROP=11,formula=(COMP==PROP ? 1 : 0),MAX=1}
  Name an important gas in the air and its percentage.
    \begin{choices}
      \wrongchoice{steam}
      \wrongchoice{gas}
      \correctchoice{nitrogen}\scoring{set.COMP=1}
      \correctchoice{oxygen}\scoring{set.COMP=2}
      \wrongchoice{carbon dioxide}
      \correctchoice{20\%}\scoringset.PROP=2}
      \wrongchoice{40\%}
      \wrongchoice{60\%}
      \correctchoice{80\%}\scoring{set.PROP=1}
    \end{choices}
\end{questionmult}
}

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

\onecopy{20}{

\noindent{\bf QCM  \hfill Scoring strategy test}

\vspace*{.5cm}
\begin{minipage}{.4\linewidth}
\centering\large\bf Test\\ Jan. 2008\end{minipage}
\namefield{\fbox{\begin{minipage}{.5\linewidth}
Name:

\vspace*{.5cm}\dotfill
\vspace*{1mm}
\end{minipage}}}

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

\shufflegroup{qqs}

\insertgroup{qqs}

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

}

\end{document}

To use a strategy globally for a set of questions, one can define it in a LaTeX command, as in the following example:

\def\barQmult{haut=3,p=-1}

\begin{questionmult}\scoring{\barQmult}
  [...]
\end{questionmult}

Another possibility comes with the LaTeX commands \scoringDefaultS and \scoringDefaultM, to be used in the begin of the document (outside the command \onecopy), which allow to give default values for the scoring strategy of simple and multiple questions:

\scoringDefaultM{haut=3,p=-1}

If you use formula with \scoringDefautM or \scoringDefautS, you must cancel it to score different questions with a specific scoring.

\begin{questionmult}\scoring{b=1,m=-0.5,formula=}
  [...]
\end{questionmult}

In some cases, defining a global strategy can be interesting depending of the number of proposed responses. To do so, just input the value N. For example, to get a scale yielding 4 as the maximal score and such as the mean expected score of a student checking randomly the boxes is 1, one can use the scale d=4,b=0,m=-(4-1)*2/N (which give the score -2 if every response is false, i.e. the wrong boxes have been checked and the right boxes are not). Operations allowed in those formulas are the four simple operations (+ - * /), test operator ( ? : ), parenthesis and all perl operators.

	Note
	The test operator is written ( test ? if true: if false) The test part can use operators like > (greater), >= (greater or equal), < (lesser), <= (lesser or equal), == (equal), != (different), || (or), && (and).

Other variables can also be used:

Here is how students' marks are computed: for every student,

You may, even after the test, change the scoring. However, you must not never update the document. It is better to open the file with a text editor to make changes and save it.

You may :

You can not :

	Note
	If you want to cancel a question use this strategy \scoring{b=0,m=0,e=0,v=0} or this one \QuestionIndicative.

We must previously supply a list of students. This list can obviously be used for many multiple-choices tests. This list is a CSV file with optional comments lines at the beginning with prefix `#', as in the following example:

# STUDENTS / 1ST YEAR
surname:name:id:email
Bienvenüe:Alexis:001:paamc@passoire.fr
Boulix:Jojo:002:jojo.boulix@rien.xx
Noël:Père:003:pere.noel@pole-nord.xx

The first lines of the file which begin with the character `#' are comments. The first of the other lines contains (separated by the character `:') the column titles. Then, with one line per student, we write the corresponding information. There must be at least one column named name or surname.

	Note
	One can replace the separator `:' by a comma, a semicolon or a tabulation. However the same separator must be used everywhere in the file which contains the list of students. The used separator is detected by taking the character (out of the four possible characters) which appears most frequently in the first line which is not a comment. Any CSV file should be suitable.

	Warning
	Type carefully the CSV file to send the same test to multiple recipients. A semi-colon or colon or tabulation to separate the headers and a comma to separate the email adresses. A comma to separate the headers and email adresses between inverted comma/quotation marks. name,forenama,email Boulix,Jojo,"jojo@boulix.fr,parents@boulix.com"

The prepared list of students will then be selected with the button Set file in the Students identification section. We must also choose one of the columns as a unique key which will identify the students (generally, one chooses the column containing the student's number). Last, to prepare an automated association, we must choose the name of the relevant code used in the LaTeX command \AMCcode (if used).

In the exported file, the following colors are used:

You may choose marks's position with the menu Edit → Preference → Project → Marks position

Default choices