Self-grading Spreadsheets

One of the disadvantages of many digital teaching tools (such as tests on Learning Management Systems) is a delay between the time that a student enters an answer and when they receive the feedback. Usually a student must complete an entire activity before they can get any feedback. This means that if they got something wrong, they may continue thinking that they got it right, and by the time they know better, they've already forgotten their train of thought for that question.

Self-grading spreadsheets overcome this problem by instantly providing feedback after each question is answered. By providing this instant feedback, self-grading spreadsheets allow learners to stay focused on one question at a time, until they learn it and get it right.

I have prepared a freely available downloadable self-grading spreadsheet template here. This template is for Microsoft Excel.*

Instructions for how to use the spreadsheet are included within the template itself.

This template allows you to create open-ended questions and multiple choice questions (which require a little bit more work for the instructor, but are very much preferred by the students!)

As always, if you have any comments, questions, etc. I'd love to hear from you!

*I don't recommend you use a Google Sheet for this particular activity type because the way Google locks cells is different (and messier), and you would also need to create a separate copy of the Google sheet for each student (unless, of course, you want them to collaborate.)