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BarronsRegents.com -- Student Tutorial

Welcome to BarronsRegents.com! This tutorial will show you how to get started by creating your profile, creating practice exams to work with and registering for your teacher's class (if applicable). Print out this tutorial page to use as a reference guide for BarronsRegents.com.

INDEX

Initial Setup
Logging onto Website
Creating Your Profile
Creating A Practice Exam
Taking An Exam
Print Your First Practice Quiz
Grading Your Work and Viewing Your Report Card
Viewing Answer Explanations
Evaluate Your Progress
Changing Your Logon and Password
Registering For Classes
Teacher Assigned Exams

SETUP

Establish an Internet connection (Cable Modem and DSL customers are usually ALWAYS ON) and open your Internet browser ((Internet Explorer, Netscape, etc. Note: America Online users who use AOL as their primary Internet connection should open either Internet Explorer or Netscape independently once they have connected to AOL to ensure proper operation of BarronsRegents.com) and enter the URL for our site - http://www.barronsregents.com. After you arrive at our homepage you are ready to begin.

It is a good idea to Bookmark the main page in your web browser so that you may quickly return to this site at any time.

For Internet Explorer, select Favorites-->Add to Favorites.
For Netscape, select Bookmarks-->Add Bookmarks.

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LOGIN

Click on the .
Click in the "User Name" box and type in your user name.
Click in the "Password" box and type in your password.
****** will appear when you type your password, this is a normal security measure. Click "Login"
An important note: if you navigate away from Barronsregents.com for any reason, such as going to another site, you will need to login AGAIN, otherwise you may receive an error. If you do, the best remedy is to close and then reopen your browser and repeat the login process.

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CREATE YOUR PROFILE

You must now create a user profile. Click in each field and enter the appropriate data. Be sure to enter a new user name and password at this time. Use something that you will remember. When the profile form is complete, click "Create Profile". Your personal menu or "Home Page" will appear.
If for any reason you need to change you personal information with us, such as a home address or e-mail address change, use " Update Profile/Change Password" to update our database. This is important in the event that we need to contact you or verify your information should you require technical support.

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CREATING A PRACTICE EXAM

This is where you get to select Regents questions by exam date or Topic for practicing the NYS Regents exams. Click "Prepare Exam for Practice Area". Now you can select a Regents course from the pull-down list and click either "I want to take a specific Regents Exam" or "I want to create an exam by Topic."
- Selecting, "I want to take a specific Regents Exam" will allow you to take one part of an actual Regents exam. The exams are broken down into "parts," or sections on BarronsRegents.com just as they are on the actual Regents exams. Taking one part at a time will allow you to better concentrate on how these exams are given and learn from any weak areas that you may have. This will also help you get used to the way the different parts of a Regents exam are constructed.
  - Read the descriptions of the different parts of the Regents exam and select one for preparation. Note: you can only select ONE part of a Regents exam to practice at any one time. Now click "Next" to continue.
  - Once you select an exam part, the next screen will ask you to select an exam date and give the exam a name. Under the "test dates available" drop-down listing, you will see all of the available exam dates ready for testing. (Occasionally you may see "MT" in this area which stands for "Model Test." This refers to the sample tests the Board of Regents distributes to schools when changes are made to the format of an exam so students and teachers can see what the new exam will look like prior to actually taking the exam.
- Selecting "I want to create an exam by Topic," allows you to further hone your skills by creating an exam consisting of questions from specific Topics within the selected course.
- Now you need to give your exam a unique name. Highlight the word "(none)" by clicking and dragging your mouse over it and type an exam name such as, "My First Exam", and click the "Submit " button. This will place the exam in your practice area and send you back to your Home Page.
  (Try to remember to give each exam you create a unique name that you will remember, because leaving each exam with the default name "none" will get confusing!)
- A maximum of 5 exams can be stored under the heading "Ready to Practice". If you create an exam and you later decide you don't want to take it, you can click "Delete Exam From Practice Area" to remove the exam.

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TAKING AN EXAM

From your Home Page, click "Practice a Prepared Exam" to start an exam. A table appears with the names of the exams you've already created within your practice area. If you have not yet created a practice exam, goto Creating A Practice Exam to see how. Remember that exams will remain in this practice area until they are either graded or deleted by you. Click on the name of the exam you wish to practice now.
You will then be taken to the Exam Console. A list of all exam questions in abbreviated form appears in the list on the left. Hold the mouse over the to see the complete question (Internet Explorer only).
The first question appears in the question area towards the middle of the screen. Depending upon the "part" of the Regents exam you have selected, you will have one of three ways of answering a question:
- Multiple-Choice Questions: For these questions, you would simply click on the radio button next to your answer, then click Submit.
- Short Answer Questions: These questions will have a text box where you will be expected to type in an answer. Answers will be less than 20 characters in length and SPELLING AND LETTER CASE DO COUNT! Math questions will usually have a special "NOTE:" to indicate what form the answer should be typed in as. Again, click Submit when you're ready for the next question.
- Extended-Response Questions: These are questions that will either expect you to write an essay, perform an extended math equation, draw on a graph, etc. You are expected to answer these questions on a separate sheet of paper then click "Finished" to continue on to the next question. Note that when there are essay questions included in the exam, at the bottom of the screen will be a button labeled "." Clicking this button shows two additional buttons that you can click on to get a sense of what the graders are looking for in how they score essays. One button shows the scoring rubric for a "Thematic Essay," while the other shows how a "Document Based Essay" is scored.
  
  A note on grading: Because it is impossible to have an exact match between your answer for a question like this and a pre-written answer in our database, we cannot grade these questions. When you're finished with your practice exam, you can compare your answer with the one we supply.
As you answer each multiple-choice or short answer question, the questions' status icon (on the left side of the screen) will change from a to a to help you keep track of what has been answered and not answered. For extended-response questions, the question status icon will change from a to to indicate you are finished with that question.
You can continue to answer questions, one by one, in the same order as they appear in the leftside question list and the next unanswered question will be displayed in the question area.
To answer a question out of sequence, simply click on that question directly in the Question List. In this manner, you can skip around to any question that you wish including questions you've already answered, but once you answer that question you will be brought back to the FIRST UNANSWERED QUESTION in the question list.

A note on question numbering: When you are taking a Regents exam by date, the numbering system will reflect the actual numbering used on the Regents exam. Therefore if you are taking Part III of a particular exam, the numbering may start off with question number "50," etc. When you choose exam questions by topic, they will be numbered from "1" through the number of questions on the exam that you have created.
You also have the option of "Flagging a Question for Review." When taking the exam, you can click on the box marked, "Remind me to check this question later." This will mark the question on the left with a to remind you to check this question later before grading or completing the exam. Later, when attempting to grade the exam, you will notified that you still have question(s) flagged for review. You have the choice of reviewing these questions and changing your response, leaving your response as is, or ignoring the warning and re-clicking the "Grade It" or "Completed" button.
At the bottom of the left list is a button that says . This means that each time you send an answer, both the question area and the Question List will be refreshed. Click the "Refresh" button so that is says . Answer a few questions. Notice that only the question area of the screen is refreshed each time you submit an answer. Turning refresh off will display each question faster, especially if the Internet is experiencing heavy traffic or if you have a slower connection.
: If you selected a course that uses reference tables, a reference table button will appear at the bottom of the screen to the right of the Print button. You may click it at any time to display a pop up window containing a listing of all reference tables the NYS Board of Regents allows for the actual exams. Clicking again on the name of a particular table will show that specific table in another pop up window. When you are finished, you may simply close these table windows and continue on with your exam. You may open a reference table at any time during your exam.
When you have finished answering all of the questions you can click on either or at the bottom of the screen, depending on the type of questions involved. Take care of any questions still "Flagged" at this time if you have any. You may now go on to examining your report card for graded questions and/or reviewing the answers and explanations for both the graded questions and non-graded questions. (see below)
Once you've completed an exam it is placed in your "Exam Library" where you can review your Report Card for the exam or view and/or print all the exam questions. To access your "Exam Library" click on that link from your Home page.

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GRADE YOUR WORK AND VIEW YOUR REPORT CARD

When you are satisfied with all of your answers, click at the bottom of the screen. You will receive your grade for this exam.
For a more detailed look at your exam results, click on the to see a list of questions and answers.
The table at the top of the report card lists the Topics on the test, and the percent correct for each Topic. Below this is a table with an analysis of each question, as well as a scoring key:
indicates you answered the question correctly.
indicates your choice was incorrect.

indicates that you did not answer the question, and is considered incorrect.
By clicking on any question you can see the answer and its explanation. (see below)
Finally, statistics are provided which show the percentage of all students in the database who missed each question.

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VIEWING ANSWER EXPLANATIONS

This is possibly the most valuable section of BarronsRegents.com. When you are viewing your report card and click on the underlined text of a question for more detail, the question will appear on its own page along with an explanation of the correct answer as well as (if available) an analysis of why the other choices are incorrect. These explanations appear in our Barrons Regents Exams and Answers review books and come from experts and acclaimed teachers in each field of study. If you were incorrect in your answer, always check here to find out why to avoid the mistake again. Even if you were correct (or guessed) come here to reinforce your understanding of the Topic.
When you are finished with the report card, you can return to your Home Page by clicking on the at the bottom of the page.

PRINTING YOUR PRACTICE QUIZ

You are able to print out a copy of the exam questions at any time while you're on the exam console. First click the at the bottom of the screen. Your test is now formatted for printing.
To print this exam, simply click on the print button in your Internet browser or select FILE, then PRINT from the browser's drop down menus.
Occasionally, some printers, when encountering an image within a question near the bottom of a page, will split the image between that page and the next one or not print the image at all. This can be especially troublesome with math questions, many of which are all image and no text. To solve this problem, after you've formatted the exam for printing by clicking , copy and paste the entire test into a WORD document and insert page breaks where necessary.
Click your browser's back button to return to the test taking console.

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EVALUATE YOUR PROGRESS

BarronsRegents.com keeps track of what questions you've been shown and whether you answered them correctly or incorrectly. When creating an exam by Topic and enough questions are still available in the database, you will not be given a question you've already answered correctly.
To check on your Regents review progress, click on "Evaluate My Progress" from your Home Page. You will be shown a list of courses for which you've completed practice exams.
Selecting a course and clicking on "Create Report", displays a bar graph showing your performance for each Topic within the course.
If you are using Internet Explorer, you can hold your mouse over each bar and see the percent correct and the total number of questions.
Clicking on a bar will display another bar graph showing the results by exam for this Topic.
Clicking on one of these bars will display the results by question for this exam, similar to your report card you see for an exam.

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CHANGING YOUR LOGIN AND PASSWORD

Never give your password to anyone. If you need to change your password for one reason or another click on "Update Profile/Change Password " from your Home Page. Highlight your old password, type your new password, confirm the new password, and click "Submit" at the bottom of the screen. Any changes made by you will not take affect until you click "Submit".
If you forget your username or password, click on "FORGOT LOGIN INFO" on the login screen. Your login information will be emailed to you within one business day.

The following applies only to students who are subscribed through a Classroom account or who have BarronsRegents.com teacher subscribers in their school and have been instructed by those teachers to register for a class created by a teacher.

REGISTER FOR CLASSES

(do this step only if your teacher instructs you to do so)

From your Home Page, click on "My Classes". If this is your first time here, it will show that you are not registered for any classes yet.
Click on "Register for a Class". From the list of teacher-created classes in your school, select the class you would like to register for.
Click on the "Register" button and you will be returned to your Home Page.
If you register for a class by mistake, you can click "My Classes" anytime from your menu and delete the class from your list by clicking on " DROP a Class".

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TEACHER ASSIGNED EXAMS

You must be registered for that teacher's class (see above) in order to take an exam assigned to it.
Teacher assigned exams are those made by teachers for online classes they've created. These exams usually have a due date, so check back often to see if you have any waiting for you.
If your teacher assigns an exam to a particular class, you can take it by clicking on "Take a Teacher Assigned Exam" from your Home Page. You will see a list of exams assigned to the class. To begin taking an exam, clikc on the exam title.
If you choose not to start the exam at this time, click on at the bottom of the exam console screen to return to your Home Page. Selecting an assigned exam places it in your practice area, so remember that you are allowed only 5 exams there at any one time. Once added to your practice area, teacher-assigned CANNOT BE DELETED! They must be completed before they will be removed and added to your exam library.

You should now have a good understanding of navigating around and using barronsregents.com. If you have any further questions, please call or e-mail us below.

And, of course...

GOOD LUCK ON YOUR REGENTS EXAMS!!!

Email any questions to HelpDesk@barronseduc.com Or contact us at 1-800-645-3476.