CALS Survey Builder
Software: Survey Builder
Cost:
free to N.C. State faculty and staff
Available: http://harvest.cals.ncsu.edu/applications/calswebsite/websitebuilder2/
Competencies Covered: accessing Survey Builder on the Web, creating folders to store different
surveys/tests, changing basic settings and creating collaborators, creating different question types and
sets, scoring questions and enabling feedback, accessing and exporting survey results
Table of Contents:
Navigating Survey Builder Screens
Logging In and Creating Folders
Creating Surveys and Question Items
Viewing Survey Results
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Navigating Survey Builder Screens
Survey Builder contains numerous screens that allow you to create folders for holding surveys, create
new surveys, create and edit question items, access survey results, and more. In this documentation,
screen names are underlined to help you identify them more easily. The primary screens you should
learn to navigate include:
View Folders screen
pp. 2, 3, 5, 7, 8
Folder Options screen
p. 2
Choose Questions screen
pp. 3, 4, 5, 6
Select Questions screen
p. 4
Survey Edit screen
pp. 6, 8
Survey Results screen
p. 8
choose existing folders, move or delete question items, create global
question items not yet tied to any specific survey (i.e, question banks)
create new folders, choose collaborators for the folder, delete folders
sort and arrange question items that have already been added to a specific
survey; this screen may be thought of as an assembly area where you
arrange and put together the pieces or parts that were selected for one
specific survey
pick or create questions to add to a specific survey; this screen may be
thought of as a market (pool of questions) where you pick out or create the
question items you will need; note, you can use a question item from this
market (pool of questions) in more than one survey, just as you can use an
item from the grocery market in more than one dish
place a survey online or take it offline, copy the survey URL, get back into
a survey to choose more questions or edit existing questions
view individual submissions, view statistics of overall submissions, export
results in HTML or Excel formats, manage a public statistics page to
display survey results online for others to see
From most any screen, you can get back to the top-level View Folders screen by
clicking the "view folders" link in the upper right corner of the screen.
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Logging In and Creating Folders
Log-In: Use your Unity ID and password to log-into Survey Builder at the
following Web site: http://ceres.cals.ncsu.edu/websitebuilder/index.cfm
The main menu for a tool called "WebSiteBuilder" will appear, which includes the
Survey Builder features of interest.
Folders: Survey Builder
allows you to sort your
surveys into folders, which
can help you stay organized
when you begin to develop
multiple surveys. For
example, you can have a
different folder for every
course you teach.
The View Folders screen
allows you to select an
existing folder or create a
new one to hold your survey. If this is your first time in the program, the default is the "Main Folder."
Click the link for "Folder options" to create a new folder. On the Folder Options
screen, click the link to "create a new Folder" and create a test folder called
"Practice Folder."
You can change other folder settings
at this time, including adding
collaborators who can add new
surveys and/or edit your surveys in
this folder. If using collaborators,
they can log into Survey Builder to
access the new folder and any
embedded surveys within the folder.
Click "view folders" on the top right of your screen to return to your main menu.
This link may be thought of as your "back button" in Survey Builder, as it will
always take you back out of a given screen toward the main View Folders screen.
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Creating Surveys and Question Items
From the View Folders screen, you can begin creating question items, or you can create the survey into
which question items will go. It doesn't matter which step you do first; the program is very flexible:
• If you create question items before developing a survey to hold them, you can go back and
dump those previously created questions into one or more surveys at a later time.
• If you create a survey and then a group of question items for that specific survey, you can reuse those question items again in other future surveys.
New question items always go into a bank of questions specific to your survey folder
(e.g., Practice Folder). They can be assigned to or re-used across any number of surveys.
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Create a Survey and Edit Properties. Click the link for "Create Test or Survey."
Select your survey properties on the page that displays, including the following:
title for your survey that respondents will see (e.g., Survey 1)
any instructions that should appear relevant to the survey in general
whether or not users must log-in with a Unity ID to access the survey
when the survey should be online (now, not yet, or range of dates)
what feedback the users will receive when they submit a survey
You must also indicate in your properties if you are creating a survey or a test. A survey will simply
collect responses, while a test will include added features to actually grade/score responses. For the
purposes of this documentation, we will create a survey, with reference to added test features.
The Choose Questions Screen. After
making your initial settings, you will be
shown the Choose Questions screen. This
is the place you sort and arrange question
items that have ALREADY been added to
the survey.
Since you have not yet added any questions
to this survey, click "insert question here"
to add a question to the survey.
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The Select Questions Screen. When you
click "insert question" on the Choose
Questions screen, you are taken to the
Select Questions screen as shown at right.
This is the place you pick previously
created questions or create new questions
that have NOT been added to the survey
yet. In the sample shown, four previously
created questions are displayed. The
questions marked with asterisks have
already been added to the survey. Click the
check boxes and the "Add Checked Items"
button to add other previously created
questions to the survey.
Create New Questions. From the Select Questions screen you also have the option of creating entirely
new questions.
Practice adding one question
of each type into your first
survey. You have the option
of adding all that apply,
multiple choice, short answer,
and text answer questions to
your survey. You can also add
Likert scale questions to your
survey as shown at right (e.g.,
strongly agree, agree, neutral,
disagree, strongly disagree).
Scoring Questions and
Providing Feedback. When
creating new questions, look
at settings 2. and 3. If you
check "yes," for item 2., you
can specify that one answer is
correct, allowing you to
assign students a score. This
is useful when creating tests.
If you check "yes" for item 3.,
you can enable feedback.
After a respondent submits
their answers, they will
receive the feedback you
provide.
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If you are creating a test or a
survey, and if your items have
correct answers with feedback
enabled, the screen at right
will display after the
respondent submits their
answers. The one difference
between test/survey is you
can change a test's properties
to assign a pass/fail grade
based on some criterion (e.g.,
80% correct). The student will
then see their percentage
grade and a pass/fail
statement, as shown.
Inserting Instructions into Your Survey. One other item you can add into your survey is
"Instruction." If you have a series of questions that should be preceded by instructions, you can insert
an instruction item into your survey with that text.
Re-Ordering, Editing, and
Removing Questions. Once you
have added questions to your survey
from the Select Questions screen,
they will be displayed on the
Choose Questions screen as shown
at right.
Use the arrows in the "Move" column to move the questions up and down in the
survey (re-ordering the items). If you need to edit an item, click "Edit."
Once a new question is created, it can be removed from the Choose Questions screen,
but will remain in the overall question set for your folder (i.e., Practice Folder). You can
delete a question permanently on the View Folders screen.
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The Survey Edit Screen. After adding one question of each type into your
survey, click "Done" on the Choose Questions screen. The Survey Edit screen will
display, as shown below. From this screen, the following actions are possible:
place your survey online, or take it offline (default is offline)
preview the completed survey
edit the original survey properties
return to the Choose Questions screen to choose more questions, or edit existing questions
copy the URL for the survey to share with your respondents
view results of the survey once it has been taken by someone
enable a notification feature that allows you to receive an e-mail notice every time someone
responds to the survey
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The Main View Folders Screen. When finished editing your survey, click "View
Folders" in the upper right corner to return to your main View Folders screen.
From the View Folders screen, you can choose a specific folder, and you can view and edit the surveys
in each folder (e.g., Survey 1, Survey 2). The View Folders screen may also be thought of as a question
bank, as it displays ALL the questions in a specific folder. You can view, edit, copy, or delete specific
question items. You can also move a question item from one folder to another folder.
If you delete a question from
the View Folders screen, it will
be deleted from every survey
to which it is attached. When
deleting an item, you will be
shown the surveys/tests in
which an item is used.
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Viewing Survey Results
Access Survey
Results. On the View
Folders screen, you
can access any results
that exist for your
surveys by clicking
on the "results" link
next to the survey
name.
Place Your Survey Online. If you haven't already done so, place your practice
survey online. Click the "Edit" link next to your survey's name on the View
Folders screen, then click "Change Online Status" on the Survey Edit screen.
Select the option for "Online" to make the survey available online.
Create Some Results: Click the survey URL on the Survey Edit screen and
respond to your practice survey at least two times. Once you have responded to
your own survey, return to the View Folders screen. You should now have a link
next to your survey's name, indicating "results." Click the "Results" link to open
the Survey Results screen.
The Survey Results
Screen. This screen allows
you to view your results in
several ways:
• view a list of
submissions by
individual
• view a page of overall
statistics with basic
graphs
• generate response tables
in HTML or Excel
formats
• enable or disable a
public statistics page that
you can share with
others; several levels of access are possible (by individual Unity IDs the survey creator selects, by
anyone who responds to the survey, by anyone at NCSU, or by anyone in general); for public pages,
it is also possible to enable/disable text responses and graphs
Note: The bottom of the Survey Results screen also indicates the number of respondents to the survey
and the date and time of the last submission.
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