When it comes to measuring training, educators face the problem of choosing the best way to do that. With so many methods available to test learners knowledge and performance, multiple choice quizzes still remain controversial. Why?

Some instructors consider quizzes a childish way to test smart and experienced learners. They believe quizzes insult the intelligence and don't provide accurate results to estimate students performance. Others don't see anything wrong in quizzes, considering them a vital part of learning process and a great way to find out whether learners have understood a course to the full. 

The latter ones are right. 

Over the last few years, much research has been conducted to the topic with the goal to find out if quizzes were worth using in learning and determine their benefits, if any. It turned out that at least three benefits of multiple choice quizzes exist, justifying their active usage in education. 

1) They help learners remember

While learning, every student should stop and review what he or she has learned; that is why repetition plays an important role in education. One of the best ways to repeat content is through multiple choice quizzes, isn't it? They should not necessarily be graded, as their purpose is not to assess but give a way to remember materials. Teachers can use such quiz types as labeling or sequencing, for example, to achieve that. 

2) They motivate

Educators can use quizzes to motivate students to learn. When you start a course, organize a non-graded quiz as a pre-test to see what learners already know and don't know, covering major points of the course there. Such quizzes prepare learners for what they need to pay attention to, and if they miss some questions they will be motivated to learn that topic when it comes up. 

3) They assess knowledge

Certainly, every educator wants to know whether his or her students learned something; so, a standard multiple choice quiz at the end of the course could be a good variant to assess their knowledge. True-false questions are a good variant to grade students, too. 

• They keep learners engaged

Fact: no teacher wants their students to plagiarize / pay for essays. As far as quizzes can be a motivator to study, they keep students engaged into the process of learning. Knowing that their progress will be graded during exams, learners understand they must adhere to deadlines and study harder to perform better. 

• They develop research skills

When educators give online quizzes, they should keep in mind the fact students will go to the web for answers. It doesn't mean one should create a test with too hard and off-topic questions to make it difficult for learners to find answers online; instructors can make a quiz that would develop research skills of their students, creating questions in a way some additional info had to be searched to answer them.

Though it doesn't seem difficult for teachers to present questions in a quiz, they should do it right if want to get a clear picture of where their students stand. 

1. Quiz questions should be aligned with course objective.

2. It is always better to use different question types in quizzes. 

3. All quiz questions should be clear and concise.

4. Answer choices should not be at the surface but encourage students to think critically  and “dig deeper” to come up with a right variant. 

With so many tools available online, educators can create different types of quizzes and set good answer choices that ask learners to distinguish nuances rather than provide easy and downright variants only. My English Teacher distinguished more than 50 online quiz makers for teachers, and here comes five most useful of them:

1. Articulate Quiz Maker – lets teachers create various types of assessments such as surveys, quizzes, and drag-and-drops, and add them to their online courses. 

2. Lectora Inspire – provides everything educators need for teaching and creating a professional-looking course: online review tools, interactions, animations, quiz templates, etc.  

3. Mindflash – lets to use many templates and create various types of quizzes: multiple choices questions, true-false questions, order-the-steps tasks, and more. It grades each question automatically, showing each trainee's score. 

4. iSpring Quiz Maker – saves teachers time and lets them create sharp quizzes and surveys to ensure e-learning process. It's customizable and mobile-ready, it keeps learners engaged, and it makes every quiz look remarkable. 

5.  ProProf Quiz Maker – lets teachers use many templates to create quizzes, polls, and surveys from scratch.

Quizzes are a vital part of learning process, as they help educators engage students, motivate them, and assess their knowledge of courses. Thanks to a big variety of specific tools available online, it becomes easier for teachers to create quizzes and represent them to students today. But it is still important to pay attention to how questions are presented in a quiz and if answer choices allow to test learners knowledge and performance to the full. That's why educators should consider quiz makers just instruments that help to structure questions and answers, not question-answer makers that do teachers job for them.