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What is Test Center all about?

The Pedosphere.Com Soil Science Test Center provides interactivity for learning and exploring soil science and soil resources at an introductory level. It also allows the user to custom design sample quizzes, practice mid-terms & practice final exams. Answers and explanations for each question attempted provide quick and precise feedback, and encourage learning. Performance is measured in terms of overall score, and scores for definitions, concepts and applications. This unique approach identifies competency as well as weaknesses in comprehension of the course material. All these resources have been designed to engage the user in learning the material and also help the instructors to deliver their courses.

Learning is an active process which involves the instructor and students. Ideally, a one-to-one, face-to face, positive interaction is highly productive. However, instructors teaching introductory courses to very large classes may have very little time to actively engage with students on a one-to-one basis. Fortunately, it is possible to build high quality web applications that simultaneously engage the student to learn the subject material, and provide rich & timely feedback.

Resources at the Test Center are organized at three levels of access:

• Guest
• Registered Student
• Registered Instructor

A guest does not have to log onto the site but can study the basic features of the Test Center. He/She can take a 14 question demonstration test to closely examine the types of questions, answers, and explanations that are available. The application questions have been specially developed to provide a dynamic synthesis of the subject matter. Guests can also view the features which are available to the registered users. To see more of this for yourself, click here.

Registered students and instructors have accesses a number of additional resources after they login into the site. See "How do I use Test Center" for more information.

How do I obtain access as a registered user?

There are two ways to activate a membership on Test Center.

• Purchase "The Pedosphere and its Dynamics" textbook. If you have a copy of this textbook, then you can use the serial number in the book to activate your account, for no charge. Go to the registration form to activate your account.
• Purchase a membership on this site.

Student Access provides the user with access to all the basic test center features, such as creating personal tests, personal notes, and viewing their scores.

Teaching Assistant Access is exactly the same as Student Access, except the Teaching Assistant's scores will not be counted in any class averages.

Instructor Access includes all of the basic features of the student, plus the ability to create a class, set up tests for their class, track scores of all the students in their class, make announcements to the class, and more.

STUDENT ACCESS:
Student Licences are valid for one year, although you may renew your membership at any time before your membership expires. To buy a Student Licence, go to the Purchase Single User License link on the "Registration" page. Choose your payment option from the three available choices:

• cheque/money order - fill out the information requested. When you submit your info, a printable form will be generated. Print this form, and mail it to the address shown on the form, with your payment.
• purchase order - fill out the information requested. When you submit your info, a printable form will be generated. Print this form, and mail it to the address shown on the form, with your purchase order.
• credit card using the PayPal system - fill out the information requested. You will be sent to PayPal's secure system to enter your credit card information. PayPal handles the transaction in US Dollars, so daily exchange rates may vary. When your payment has successfully been processed by PayPal, click on the link that returns you to Test Center, and your account should be activated. You will be able to log in with the username and password you choose during the registration process.

When you are activating your account, you will be given the option of joining a class. If you were given a registration number by an instructor, and he has set up a class, you can join the class at this point. Your instructor will need to have told you the class name and class password, in order for you to join. If you have trouble joining, skip this step and join later, when you get the correct class name and password.

TEACHING ASSISTANT ACCESS:
Registration is exactly the same as for a student, except when filling out the form, make sure you select "T / A: Do Not Include My Marks in Class Ave" in the "User Type" field.

INSTRUCTOR + MULTIPLE STUDENT LICENCE PACK (MULTI-PACK):
A Multi-Pack consists of one instructor account, and anywhere from 5 to 5,000 student accounts. The instructor account is good for one year from the date of activation. When you purchase the Multi-Pack, you will also receive registration numbers for the number of students you choose in your class. Give each student a registration number, and tell them to come to the "Registration" page, to activate their account. Their accounts will be good for one year from when they activate their account. Its a good idea for you to activate your account and configure your class information, before the students activate their accounts.

In order to avoid classes from different years being mixed together, instructor accounts are not renewable. It's recommended that you buy a separate Multipack for each class you intend to administer on Test Center. NOTE: Special arrangements regarding price can be discussed for instructors purchasing Multi-Packs with a large number of students, or purchasing a large numbers of Multi-Packs. Phone us at (780) 421-7834 for more information.

Contact Us
Any questions or comments? Send us an email at: admin@pedosphere.com or phone us at (780) 416-4724. Our fax number is (780) 416-4725.

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