How to start with checkdown

1.1 Ask question with the check_question() function

Imagine that we want to create a checkbox with the answer 4. All you need is to create a following chunk in your rmarkdown document:

check_question(answer = 4)

It is possible to change wrong and right answer’s messages using wrong and right arguments of the check_question() function. Let’s create some more questions.

Solve 3+3:

check_question(answer = 6, right = "correct", wrong = "not correct")

Type la-la:

check_question(answer = "la-la")

It is possible to use placeholder argument in order to show what kind of answer you expect:

check_question(answer = "la-la", placeholder = "ta-ta-ta")

Number of answers is not limited:

check_question(answer = 1:5)

It is also possible to create a list of answers for students to choose:

check_question("banana", options = c("apple", "banana", "bread"), type = "select")

check_question("banana", options = c("apple", "banana", "bread"), type = "radio")

check_question(c("banana", "apple"), options = c("apple", "banana", "bread"), type = "checkbox")

If the list of possible answers is small, it is possible to align them in one line using alignment argument:

check_question("banana", options = c("apple", "banana", "bread"), type = "radio", alignment = "horizontal")

You can shuffle answers using the random_answer_order argument:

check_question("banana", options = c("apple", "banana", "bread"), type = "radio", random_answer_order = TRUE)

If you don’t want to give the possibility of automatically check your question, just put NULL in the answer argument:

check_question(NULL, options = c("apple", "banana", "bread"), type = "radio")

There is also an experimental type of question in_order, wheere students need to drag and drop words in the correct order:

check_question(answer = c("What", "do", "you", "think?"), type = "in_order")

In this type you need to provide correct order to the answer argument and options will be shuffled automatically.

In case answers are long, it is possible to use vertical alignment:

check_question(c("heat the water", 
                 "place a tea bag into the cup",
                 "pour the hot water over the tea bag",
                 "steep the tea bag into cup",
                 "remove the tea bag"), 
               type = "in_order", alignment = "vertical")

You can put the question itself within the check_question() function using the title argument.

check_question(answer = 42, title = "Put a number from 1 to 100")

It is possible to put some markdown markup whithin the title argument. Since this argument wraps the form contents with tags, you can redefine it appearance with CSS.

There is an additional function insert_score() that make it possible to add a counter of the correct answers on the page (thanks to Julieblas for an idea). It make sense to use this function inline like here:

#### Results: `r insert_score()` out of 13

1.2 Give some hints with the check_hint() function

Sometimes you know in advance what kind of mistakes will your students do. Some students are shy and don’t like asking questions, so hints could partially solve this problem. Again all you need is to create a following chunk with the chunck atribute results='asis' in your rmarkdown document:

check_hint("You can use the rmarkdown package")

Of course it is possible to change the message of the part that should be clicked, just use the hint_title argument:

check_hint("You can use the rmarkdown package inside checkdown",
           hint_title = "🔎 CLICK HERE")

By default you need to click on the hint in order to make it appear, but this behaviour can be changed with the type argument:

check_hint("You can use the rmarkdown package inside checkdown",
           hint_title = "🔎 Put mouse over here",
           type = "onmouseover")

check_hint("You can use the rmarkdown package inside checkdown",
           hint_title = "🔎 Double click here",
           type = "ondblclick")

It is possible to use Markdown inside messages:

check_hint("- You can use `markdown` **inside** the [`chcekdown` package](https://agricolamz.github.io/checkdown/)",
           hint_title = "Click he`R`e")

check_question(answer = 4, 
               wrong = "a**R**e you su**R**e?", 
               right = "### `R`ight")

There is also a function for multiple hints:

check_hints(hint_text = c("look into the hint 2", "look into the hint 1"),
            hint_title = c("hint 1", "hint 2"), 
            list_title = "list of hints")

It is worth mentioning that \n will be removed from hint_text and hint_title arguments, so in case you want to have a new line use html tag <br>.

check_hint(hint_text = "this<br>is<br>a<br>multiline<br>sentence")