How to Write True/False, Multiple Choice, and Matching Solutions

A debate for another day...

Ryan and I have been getting a ton of questions from the expert community about the best way to approach those darned multiple choice, true/false, and matching questions. This post in particular was inspired by two business experts who were stuck with true/false and multiple choice problems in their discipline. It would seem so simple to just write the answer and be done with it. However, students looking for help on questions of this type need context for your answer. You're there to save their day (or night, as we know students often working into the wee hours of the morning), and we know you are up to the task! 

To help you do your job, here are best practices for answering these tricky question types.

True/False
The below solution is a perfect example of how to approach a True/False solution. The expert details the main idea behind the question (what a monopoly is) then goes on to define the key terms needed and use examples to elaborate on what the question is really getting at. Then the author concludes with a sample statement, "The provided statement is false". Notice she even boxed the final answer at the end. Beautiful!

The main things to keep in mind for true/false questions are:

• Don't simply write "True" or "False". We will reject these solutions.
• Don't simply write one sentence saying "This statement is true". 
• At the VERY least, write "This statement is true because...". Then add a sentence or two to elaborate on why it's true. Refer to other relevant concepts or use an example. Students will thank you!

A Lovely True/False Example

Multiple Choice
These can be a bit trickier and they do require a bit more time. However, once you get the hang of these (they usually come in bunches in a textbook), you can get a solid template going and get moving quickly. You need to go over each and every option provided. Simply stating that the correct answer is "A" and defining what "A" means is NOT enough. If a student needs help with a problem of this type, they need more context than that.

The main things to keep in mind for multiple choice questions are:

• Don't simply write "A" or "B" and the answer. 
• Include definitions (in your OWN WORDS) of the other options. Perhaps talk about why that is not the correct answer.
• Conclude with the correct option and box it. You can either box just the letter answer or, if the option is short, box both the letter and the answer option. You'll want to explain this one a little more in-depth, perhaps with examples, to enlighten the student further.

A Wonderful Multiple Choice Example

Matching
I am not including a matching example here, as they are so similar to multiple choice. Except these are actually even easier, since you have the same answer options for a whole set of questions. That means you can create a template and re-use it. Just make sure that you always end with the correct letter answer and explain a bit more in-depth why it is correct.

The main things to keep in mind for matching questions are:

• Again, never simple state the answer without explanation.
• Always include all answer options with a short definition/explanation for each.
• Make a template! You will save yourself worlds of time!

I hope these tips help. As always, email either me or Ryan if you have further questions. Many of our blog posts come from questions from our experts, so keep 'em comin'!

MathType Tips: How to Remove Italics

Just a quick Thursday tip for all of your writers who use MathType, which I happen to know is most of you...

You may have noticed that we often tell you not to italicize units in MathType or we ask you kindly to add a space between the unit and the value, but maybe you're not sure how to un-italicize them because you're stuck in "Math" mode. Well, here's how to easily fix that issue. No more italicized units or weird formatting problems.

Italicized units look like this screenshot, and you'll confuse students if you randomly italicize something like "feet", "meters", or "inches" for no good reason.

 To fix this, just double-click on the Mathtype and the editing box will open. Then highlight the right side of the equation (you want that L' variable to remain italicized, so leave that little guy alone). From there, go to "Style". You'll see that "Math" is selected by default. This automatically assumes you're typing equations so it will italicize everything and will not allow you to input spaces at all. Instead, click "Text" style.

Voila! This screenshot below is exactly what you want to see:

Then when you exit out of the box, make sure to hit "Save". Your answer will now look proper and lovely and have the correct italics or non-italics. 

Now, on to the next solution... 

How To Create a Template in Word (.dot)

Happy Friday! We're bringing you another helpful tip on authoring today to close out the week.

This week's tip is a HUGE time-saver. We're teaching you how to create templates in Word. Do this now and save yourself hours and hours of boring formatting work over the long run! That means more solutions written, more productivity, and more money for you. That's good all around.

Now, let's get started. We'll go over what a template is, how to create one, and how to save it. If you have further questions, ask them here on the blog or on the LinkedIn group.

What is a template?
A template is a document that saves all of its formatting (fonts, delimiters, margins, page size, headers) so you can easily duplicate your solution format again and again. Imagine all the tedious time saved! A template saves in a .dot format, so make sure that when you finish each solution and save it, you change the name and convert this to .docx. More on that in the final part of this tutorial.

How do I create a template?
It's super easy. For our purposes, you can actually use our template document that we send you when you start a project, and then just go to File>Save As>Word Template. Alternatively, create your own template for certain types of solutions (i.e. maybe you have a lot of similar discussion questions or accounting questions with similar tables). Now, each time you open that file, it will preserve all formatting so you can start fresh with each new solution. Voila!

How do I save each solution?
Now, you know you'll need to change certain things in each file, like the chapter ID and problem ID, possibly the date (unless you also make that update automatically too, smart idea.). Then you're all done writing the solution. You can't simply hit Ctrl+S. You'll need to go to the file menu and Save As. Just hit .docx, update the file name to reflect your BookID-ChapID-ProbID, and then you're all set.

It's as easy as that. Imagine how much time that will save you in the long run if you set that up now. In solutions authoring, time really is the same thing as money, so we recommend you do this today!

For more information on this, check out Microsoft's tutorial on their website. Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!

Templates: The Secret to Writing Quick, Quality Solutions

One of the most effective ways to write quick, high-quality solutions is to create your own template for your work and fill it in with each subsequent problem. We've spoken to our most efficient and highest-scoring authors, and they've all said that they do some variation of this. Maybe the bulk of the solution cannot be cloned, but at least you can have ready the key elements of a solution and duplicate them over again to maintain consistency and quality overall. But first, what are these key elements of a good solution? We need to know that first and create the skeleton of the solution in each template.

Key Elements of a High-Quality Textbook Solution:

1. Introductory sentence. This can be short and just sums up what is being asked in your own words. This gives your solution a clear direction. 
2. If needed, a diagram to set up the problem. Point out the relevant areas in the diagram and label with Times New Roman size 12 font.
3. Set-up problem-solving tactic. Briefly describe how you plan to work through the problem. The textbook you're working from may specify a specific procedure. Make sure you review the worked out solutions in the book. 
4. Individual steps separated by delimiters (single lines). Steps should be direct and not get off track. You don't want to confuse students with unnecessary information. 
5. A conclusion that re-states the answer in a full sentence. 
6. A box around the final numerical answer. See how to do that in our blog post on the subject.

So you can see that you could easily have a template at-ready with your heading setup, delimiters in place, and a general introductory sentence in place. Once you have one top-quality solution, why not duplicate that quality over and again?

We highly recommend you create your own template that fits your style and your text. But to get you started, we'll link you to some of the best solutions we've seen in physics, statistics, engineering, and business. If you find these helpful and want to see more, just email me or Ryan. We'll be happy to set you up with templates. We may even have one for the book you're working on! Imagine all the time saved! Imagine all the money earned! 

• A Business Template (This is for a matching problem and can be used for any discipline): Here. 
• Several Engineering Templates in One Word Document: Here. 
• A Physics Template: Here. 
• A Statistics Template: Here. 
• A few levels of math templates can be found in another blog post: Here.

How To Box Your Answers in Word

Many of you have asked me or Ryan how you go about boxing answers in Word without MathType. In MathType, it's simple. You just highlight the text you need, and you click the box option, like so:

But if you don't use MathType (because you use Word's Equation Editor 3.0 or because your text isn't equation-oriented), there is another option for you in Microsoft Word. To box the answer, you just highlight the final answer and click “Outside Borders” in the Paragraph menu.You should not box with a text box. This is way easier anyway, so I'm not so sure why you'd even want to! :-)

How to Deal with Sent Back Solutions

One of the most discouraging things that can happen to our solutions authors is receiving a "sent back" batch of solutions. These aren't fun for anyone and we do our best to prevent this from happening.

But just remember that this doesn't reflect on your intellect, passion, enthusiasm, teaching ability, learning ability, or any other facet of your being. We promise! It just means that there's room to improve and that you're going to get better as you keep working problems. We're here to help you improve your work, so don't hesitate to reach out and ask for help.

We've heard many times that (after the initial shock) send backs actually teach our authors many valuable techniques for writing that actually help them work more efficiently.

Nonetheless, re-working problems can be time-consuming and annoying. So, to save you some time and guesswork, here are some of the most common reasons for send backs and the quickest ways to edit your batches for re-submission.

1. Lack of written explanation. All solutions need at the very least one descriptive phrase or sentence of written explanation per step.  Before each step, add a little bit of description so students can follow logically.
2. Lack of introduction to solution. The introduction can be as simple as, "Consider the given vector triangle for the velocities of the cars A and B." Don't just start randomly telling us what the variables stand for in the solution. Give context first!
3. Missing conclusion statement. Just write a simple sentence like, "Therefore, the velocity of the car A with respect to the car B is 15 m/s acting at an angle of 35 degrees with the horizontal.". Then box the "15 m/s" as the numerical answer.
4. Lack of individual steps separated by delimiters (those line thingys that you insert between steps). Just add in some delimiters if you have adequate explanation. Do this where it makes the most sense for your problem. Or maybe you didn't write enough steps and now you've learned to break up big paragraphs or blocks of mathematical solving and place them in their own steps with explanation.
5. Incorrect answers or miscalculations. These do happen, even for mechanical engineers! Just go through and fix them. We understand that mistakes happen.
6. Plagiarism. Just don't plagiarize or copy anything from the text. It's not okay for anyone. Your work must must be your own.
7. Not following the textbook model for solving. Make your life easier by reviewing the textbook examples before solving and using the authors' template for problem-solving.

If you didn't read any of that: My best advice overall is to study the guidelines before you start to work. Also, ask us for sample solutions in Word document format. You can even use these exemplary solutions as templates for your own work!

As always, we appreciate the great content that you produce and we never want you to feel discouraged. We're here to support you through the authoring process, not to make it any more challenging than it already is. We know you're experts, now we just need to support you on your way to becoming expert solutions authors!

What's Your Solution Authoring Strategy?

We hope you're not using a typewriter...

As some of you may know, we've been working hard to improve the quality of our engineering solutions authoring program. We actually conducted a short survey for our engineering authors about six weeks ago, and we learned all kinds of tactics and approaches that some of you take to tackle the problems assigned to you. 

We were so impressed by some of the feedback that we've decided to share it with everyone here. Read on for tips and tricks, and then share your strategies in the comments! If you work differently, we'd love to hear how you attack the difficult stuff.

Best free program for creating diagrams:

• DrawPlus (http://www.serif.com/free-graphic-design-software/). Once you are familiar with how to use this program, it becomes very easy to use. Our authors say it is just as useful as CorelDraw.
• For geometry, try Geogebra.

Best way to approach problem-solving:

1. Solve on paper first quickly, grouping similar problems so that you can concentrate on one topic/equation/method at once (if you need to explain these concepts more than once, you can even copy-paste your descriptions).
2. Then begin to create any helpful diagrams you need. If a problem does not require that you manipulate the diagram at all, save time by referring to the diagram in the text. Say something like, “See the diagram of the pulley-system with a length of 5 ft. and…”. Do not refer to page numbers, figure numbers, or problem numbers, as these change from edition to edition while many of the problems remain the same.
3. Finally, begin typing up the solutions.
4. Save time by creating a universal introduction template and/or filling in the blanks in a template for similar problems.
5. Start by inputting just the MathType equations, and then decide the best places to add in student-friendly explanations. Place delimiters (steps) before each short written explanation.  
6. Never include more than 4 lines of MathType. Instead, break up these lines and add written explanation between them, separating each step with delimiters.
7. Always box the final numeric answer.

Some tactics from our authors that help them work more quickly:

• Derive on scratch paper before typing.
• Try to use the best suited equation for given parameters of the problem.
• If the problem is very simple, don’t use scratch paper! Instead, type directly in order to minimize the time it takes to write the problem.
• For harder problems, quickly solve the solution on paper first and then transfer to Word.
• Verify the final answer with the available software that you have.
• Work on one section or topic at a time.
• Type the solutions in the same section on the same day so your brain is all warmed up for that particular type of problem, rather than typing one problem a day.
• Spend time creating meaningful diagrams and sketches, because they help to make the solution easier to understand for the student. This initial time investment will also save you from getting sent back solutions and having to create them all over again.
• Provide a logical order to the solution process so that the reasoning behind the solution is easy to follow.
• Break up lengthy solutions into logical, modular segments, in a similar fashion as writing very lengthy software. This makes it easy to review the solution and to spot mistakes.