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New Question Formats for Microsoft Exams
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By Jason Zandri
Microsoft is in the process of rolling out
new exam question types for some of the Microsoft
Certified Professional exams, which are slated to portray a
more realistic, "on the job", representation of the products
being tested on for a given exam.
[NOTES
FROM THE FIELD] - This information is reflective of
the data being provided by Microsoft via their public website and is subject to change.
On the
site they are also providing everyone the opportunity to
download demos and samples of new question types.
Some of the
new testing aspects that may be included are Hot Area
Questions, which asks you to indicate the correct answer
by selecting one or more elements within the graphic. Test
takers will be able to quickly identify selectable elements
as they are marked with a border and are shaded when you
move the mouse pointer over them. Clicking an element will
select it and will be identified as such when the area
around the element turns gray. If the test taker wishes to
make changes to their selection or selections they can
either click a single choice a second time to deselect it or
click the Reset button to reset that entire question.
There is a
demo available for download from Microsoft concerning
Hot Area Questions.
Another new
question design is the Active Screen Questions which
allows the test taker to configure a particular dialog box
by changing one or more elements provided within it. This
will vary depending on what may be provided for a given
question.
For
instance, if the test taker were provided a dialog text box
that needed to be filled in with text they would drag the
appropriate text element from a "chooser" pane to the
required text box. If they made a selection and then decided
they wanted to replace the text in the text box they would
simply drag another text selection from the provided menu to
the text box or in the case of removing one selected phrase
only (and keeping the others there) they would simply grab
the "extra" text and drag it back out of the "answer" box.
In the
situation where a few radio buttons or check boxes are
provided, the test taker can select them as if they were
configuring the options on an actual workstation or server.
They would undo their choices if they desired in much the
same fashion.
Drag-and-Drop Questions, which have been in some of the
exams for over a year or so will be showing up in more of
them and more often. These questions allow the test taker to
drag source objects from a selection box or a small list or
table to targets options within the "question" area.
Sometimes all of the options are used, sometimes some are
left behind, there are also situations where single options
can be used more than once and there are some questions that
use a combination of these elections.
[NOTES
FROM THE FIELD] - In almost all cases, somewhere in
the question it will read, "use all of the selections only
once - all selections will be used" or "choose the
appropriate actions from the list provided - choices may be
used more than once and some may not be used at all" or
something along those lines.
Recently,
Case Study–based Questions are found, for the most
part, in the following exams:
-
Designing a
Microsoft Windows 2000 Directory Services Infrastructure (70-219)
-
Designing
Security for a Microsoft Windows 2000 Network (70-220)
-
Designing a
Microsoft Windows 2000 Network Infrastructure (70-221)
-
Migrating
from Microsoft Windows NT 4.0 to Microsoft Windows 2000 (70-222)
-
Designing
Highly Available Web Solutions with Microsoft Windows 2000
Server Technologies (70-226)
[NOTES
FROM THE FIELD] - For these five exams, the ENTIRE
exam is made up different scenarios and relevant questions.
There are no stray, generic-knowledge multiple choice type
questions that are not relevant to the scenarios.
These types
of questions are scenario based which rely on a short
overview (several paragraphs long) of a fictitious company
and a design and / or implementation scenario for which the
test taker is tasked with assuming the role (to a degree) of
a network architect or a project manager to design and
implement and / or troubleshoot the solution which is
brought about in 10 to 12 questions following the scenario.
For some
questions, you can receive partial credit for partially
correct responses and in certain situations there are
questions that have more than one correct choice. In this
event, you would receive full credit for choosing any of the
supplied options that are correct and have your score marked
as such.
[NOTES
FROM THE FIELD] - Candidates for the above outlined
exams, which are ENTIRELY Case Study based, as well as
future test takers (as they will be slipped into more and
more "mainstream exams") are encouraged to
download the case study based test demo in order to get
a look and feel for it.
More
information on the
case study based test demo
is available on the Microsoft
website.
Also,
with regards to these types of questions, there is no way to
get less than a zero on any given question. For example, if
there are eight options to choose from and only two are
correct and you choose three incorrect options you will not
receive a score less than zero for that question.
The last
question type is the Simulators. There is a
simulation example available for download and this type
of question outlines a scenario or problem which requires
one or more tasks to be completed and how the test taker
goes about completing the necessary tasks for a given
scenario using the simulator factors in their grading for
that particular question.
The simulator is sensitive to its particular "protocol" as
far as procedure goes and a few tips regarding the scenario
situation include
-
Test takers
should not change any simulation settings that don't pertain
to the solution directly.
-
Default
settings should be assumed anytime alternative information
is not provided.
-
All text
entries MUST be spelled correctly. (Misspellings are
interpreted as incorrect options and marked wrong.)
-
All
simulation application windows must be after completing the
set of tasks in the simulation or the simulation is not
considered "completed".
Best of luck in your
studies and please feel free to contact me with any
questions or comments on my columns and remember,
“Being prepared is half the battle, knowing the material is
the rest.”
Jason Zandri
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