Add a Choice Activity (Single Question Poll) in Moodle

A Choice activity allows you to present a single question to students with multiple responses as possible answers. Each student can then pick one of the given choices.

This activity can be useful as a quick survey of your class, for example to poll for student votes on which readings they want to discuss further in class. It can also be used as a "sign up sheet" by limiting the number of responses allowed per option.

To survey your students with multiple questions, use the Moodle Questionnaire activity (see Add a Questionnaire Activity in Moodle.)

Create a Choice Question

1. On your course page, click Turn editing on (top right). Editing icons and links will appear.
2. Locate the Topic or Weekly Section where you will add the page. (If you are using the Collapsed topics format, open the Section.)
3. At the bottom-right of the Section, click + Add an activity or resource. The Activity chooser will open.
4. In the Activity chooser, select Choice ( ). A description will be displayed at right with links to help.
5. Click Add. The Adding a new Choice screen will open, allowing you to configure settings for the Choice.
6. On the Adding a new Choice screen, in the Name field, enter a title for the page (required). The name you enter will display as the link to the page on your course page.
7. In the Introduction text field, enter the text for the question that you want students to answer (required).
   Note: You will specify responses for them to choose from below.
8. To display the introduction on your course page, check Display description on course page. This is only recommended if the introduction is brief.
9. Under Limit, choose whether you want to limit the number of students who can pick a particular choice (use this to set up a "sign up sheet" for activities such as group projects or lab sessions):
   • Disable (default) sets no limit on how many students can select a response. When this option is selected, the Limit edit field is disabled under each response option.
   • Enable lets you limit the number of students who can choose a particular response. When this option is selected, the Limit edit field becomes editable under each response option, allowing you to enter a number to specify how many students can choose that response.
10. Under Option 1, Option 2, etc.:
    • Enter the text for each response.
    • If you enabled Limit (above) specify the number of responses allowed for each response.
    Note: There are five option slots provided by default, but options left blank will be ignored. You can add more options by clicking on the "Add 3 fields to form" button.
11. (Optional) There are several other settings you may choose to configure:
    • Restrict answering to this time period
      Set start and end dates and times during which students can submit to this Choice activity. The default is for the Choice to become available immediately and to remain available until the end of the course (i.e., no limit).
      Note: These dates are not automatically added to the course Calendar.
    • Publish results
      Configure how and when results are displayed to students:
      • Do not publish results to students: (default)
      • Show results to students after they answer: Allows a student to see results only after they answer the question first.
      • Show results to students only after the choice is closed: Allows students to see results only after the closing date/time specified under Restrict answering to this time period.
      • Always show results to students: Allows students to see results even if they have not answered the question yet.
    • Privacy of results: 
      If results are published (above) choose between:
      • Publish anonymous results, do not show student names: (default) Results are displayed as totals without student names.
      • Publish full results, showing names and their choices: Results are displayed as a list of student names for each response.
      Note: This setting only affects how students see results; instructors see student names even if Privacy of results is set to anonymous.
    • Allow choice to be updated
      Configure whether students can change their choice after they have picked a response and saved it. The default is No, meaning that once a student saves their response they cannot change it.
    • Show column for unanswered
      Configure whether you see a separate column in the results view showing you a list of students names who have not answered this question yet. The default is No.
    • Common module settings
      Assign groups of students to a Choice activity by choosing a group mode (separate or visible).  The groups must already exist. See Create & Modify Groups in Moodle, and Assign an Activity to Groups in Moodle.
    • Restrict access
      Set the range of dates the Choice activity will be available, or set conditions for completing other activities before the Choice activity will be available to each student. For more information on these settings, see Control Access to Resources and Activities in Moodle.
      Note: These settings operate separately from the Restrict answering to this time period settings above.  During the restricted period, the activity is hidden from students, both on the course page, and in their view of grades.
    • Completion tracking 
      If Completion tracking is enabled for the course (in the Settings block, under Course Administration, click Edit Settings, and scroll down to the Student Progress area) you can enable Completion tracking for the activity and a check box will appear on each student's course page allowing students and instructors to view progress completing course activities.
12. Click Save and return to course or Save and display.

View Choice Responses

1. Click the link to the Choice activity to open it. The Choice contents page will open showing the question text you provided when you set up the activity, and a list of the specified allowed choices (i.e. you can cast your own vote).
2. If students have answered the poll, on the top right you will see a link "View # responses,"  where # is the number of submitted responses.
   Click the View # responses link (if present) to view the responses. The Responses screen will open, showing the choices of answers, the number of students who picked each answer, and under each answer a list of names of students who picked that answer.
3. On the Responses screen (optional):
   • To delete a student's response, select the checkbox for a student and from the Choose an action ... menu select Delete.
   • To download submitted responses, click the Download in ... format button. You can download the responses in Excel, text, or ODS (OpenDocument Spreadsheet) formats.