Following on from the discussion with Tim on my previous post, it occurs to me that our online quizzes that consistently attract the highest number of users are our diagnostic ‘Are you ready for?’ quizzes. Since it opened in April 2012, more than 6000 people have completed ‘Are you ready for S104?‘ and more than 13000 others have started but not completed this quiz. It’s open to the world, so take a look – are you ready? have you got sufficient time for study?
I wouldn’t claim that everyone who clicks on the link is seriously contemplating Open University study, but a lot are, and we have a huge amount of evidence that many students have found previous versions of this quiz to be useful, either informing them that they need to do more preparation before beginning their studies, or – just as important – reassuring them that they are ready.
But yet, I don’t think we make as much use of diagnostic quizzes as we should. It is all too easy to sign up for a qualification without any real understanding of the time required or the level of study. I think that we should be making engagement with a quiz of this type mandatory, as part of the registration process.