The Cloze Drop Down Question allows learners to select the correct answer from a response box drop down menu situated in a passage of text.

Figure 1: Cloze drop down Question example.

Create a Question

Watch the "How to create a Cloze Drop Down Question" tutorial video.

Enter the Question stem into the Compose question area. Text and response boxes can be added in the Template Markup area. To add a response box, click on the Insert Response button in the text formatting toolbar in the text editor. You can also use the keyboard shortcut, double underscore. See the example in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Cloze drop down template area.

In the Possible responses section, enter the response options for each drop-down menu. Each response section has fields where the possible responses for each drop-down menu should be entered. Please note that these fields do not support Math entry at this time. To add a new option to a drop-down menu, click on the +Add button. See example in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Listing possible responses.

You can now configure validation for your Question. Follow these steps to set up the score and correct response:

• Insert value in the Point(s) box to set up a mark for the Question. The default value is 1.
• Under the Correct tab, select the correct response for each drop-down box. See the example in Figure 4.

Figure 4: Question validation.

Authors can add Alternate Responses if there is more than one correct solution to a Question. See this Author Guide article for more information.

The Match all possible responses configuration will allow you to specify more than one valid response for one response option. Instead of creating multiple combinations of possible responses while setting the correct responses, Authors can simply add in the different versions of the response options in the alternative correct answers for that response position and choose the Match all possible responses option. See the Author Guide article for more information.

More Options

Under the More options button, in Scoring section, you can change formatting settings, scoring types and apply different styles to your Question.

The following scoring types are available in Cloze drop-down Questions:

• Exact Match - Learner must answer all parts of the Question correct to receive a mark.
• Partial Match Per Response - Each correct response element will be awarded an individual score.
• Partial Match - Each correct response element will be scored individually and the overall Question score will be divided between responses.

Other Scoring options:

• Unscored/Practice usage type - Enabling this option will remove all scoring from the Question.
• Penalty point(s) - The value entered here indicates marks that will be deducted from the learner for an incorrect response.
• Case sensitive - Determines whether learner responses must match letter casing exactly. By default, all Questions are not case sensitive; for example, “Yes” and “yes” are treated as the same answer. If you want learners to enter responses using the correct capitalization, enable Case sensitive.
• Check answer button - If this is enabled, a "Check answer button" will appear to the learner alongside the Question; clicking this button will indicate to the learner if their answer is correct or incorrect, but it will not tell them the correct response. This can be useful for informal assessment.
• Check answer attempts - The value entered here will indicate how many times the learner can use the "Check answer button". A value of 0 indicates an infinite number of times.
• Minimum points if attempted¹ - Points awarded to the learner for attempting the Question, regardless of a correct or incorrect response.

Layout

Authors can change the font size of the Question using the drop-down menu, ranging from extra small font size to a huge font size.

The width and height of all response boxes can be changed at once in the Response Container (global) section. However, if you only wish to change the size of specific boxes go to Response Container (individual). Similarly, placeholder text can be set up for all response boxes, or individual response boxes, depending on whether you configure the placeholder in the global or individual response container section.

'Extra' options

The extras section in the authoring interface allows you to add more information about the Question, information that we refer to as metadata.

There are a number of fields available: acknowledgements, contains math, distractor rationale, distractors, instructor stimulus, rubric reference, sample answer, and stimulus (review only).

To learn more about the options shown in the Extras section, see Understanding the Extras Section of the Question Editor.

1. Note: “Minimum points if attempted” replaces the earlier label “Minimum score if attempted”. Version added: v2026.1.LTS