KoboToolbox Food Security Survey Design Training Course

Course overview

Food security teams need survey instruments that produce defensible evidence under field conditions: evidence that can distinguish poor food consumption from temporary coping, identify households facing livelihood stress, and support decisions on targeting, response design and monitoring. Poorly structured forms create duplicated questions, inconsistent recall periods, invalid skip patterns, missing consent records and datasets that cannot be compared across sites or survey rounds. This course addresses the practical work of converting an assessment objective and indicator plan into a reliable KoboToolbox survey ready for mobile data collection.

Participants learn to design household food security questionnaires in KoboToolbox using XLSForm structure and Kobo’s Formbuilder. They define modules for demographics, food consumption, household hunger, reduced coping strategies, livelihoods and market access; apply appropriate recall periods; build relevance logic, constraints, calculations, repeat groups and validation rules; and configure survey metadata, consent and enumerator workflows. The course also covers form testing, deployment, user permissions, field data review, exports and basic quality checks so participants can identify incomplete records, implausible values and logic failures before analysis begins.

Teaching combines instructor demonstrations with daily form-building labs based on a realistic rapid food security assessment scenario. Participants work from a survey brief, indicator matrix and sample questionnaire, then build, test and revise a KoboToolbox form on their own laptop or in the live online environment. They leave with a tested, deployable food security survey package: an XLSForm, KoboToolbox project, enumerator instructions, validation checklist and a field-testing plan that can be adapted to their organisation’s programme area.

The course is suited to development, humanitarian and resilience professionals who commission, design, manage or quality-assure household surveys. It is particularly valuable for staff who need to work confidently with MEAL colleagues, enumerator teams and programme managers while retaining a clear link between each Kobo question, the indicator it supports and the decision it is intended to inform.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Translate a food security assessment objective into an indicator matrix and KoboToolbox survey structure
• Build a household questionnaire in KoboToolbox using groups, question types, required fields and metadata
• Create XLSForm sheets with choices, settings, appearance options and consistent variable names
• Configure relevance logic, skip patterns, constraints and calculations for food security screening questions
• Design Food Consumption Score, Household Hunger Scale and reduced Coping Strategies Index question modules with correct recall periods
• Set up repeat groups and roster questions for household members, livelihood activities and market observations
• Test a KoboToolbox form using preview, Enketo web forms and mobile collection workflows and document defects
• Produce a deployable survey package including an XLSForm, enumerator guidance and data-quality review checklist

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• MEAL Officers — who design and quality-assure monitoring and assessment forms for programme evidence
• Food Security Officers — who need household-level data to inform targeting, response options and seasonal monitoring
• Humanitarian Programme Officers — who commission rapid assessments and must ensure questions support operational decisions
• Assessment and Information Management Officers — who configure mobile data-collection tools and prepare usable datasets
• Field Coordinators — who supervise enumerator teams and need forms that work reliably in low-connectivity settings
• Research Assistants — who support survey design, piloting and data checks for development or humanitarian studies

Requirements and prerequisites

This is a foundation-to-intermediate course and does not require previous KoboToolbox use, programming experience or advanced statistics. Participants should be comfortable using a laptop, working with spreadsheets and navigating web-based applications. Familiarity with household surveys, humanitarian needs assessments, MEAL concepts or food security indicators is helpful but not essential; key concepts are introduced before form construction begins. Complete beginners should expect to learn both KoboToolbox navigation and basic XLSForm logic, with time set aside to practise. Participants should bring a laptop with a modern browser and permission to create or access a KoboToolbox account.

Training methodology

The instructor introduces each survey-design decision through a food security assessment case, then demonstrates the corresponding KoboToolbox and XLSForm workflow. Participants build form sections in short, supervised labs, test each other’s forms through Enketo and KoboCollect-style mobile workflows, and diagnose deliberately planted logic and validation errors. Small groups review question wording, recall periods and indicator alignment as a survey quality panel. The final day is an application workshop in which each participant refines a deployable form package and records the actions needed for piloting, enumerator briefing and launch.

Course outline

Day 1: Assessment objectives and KoboToolbox foundations

• Food security assessment purposes: rapid assessment, baseline, post-distribution monitoring and seasonal monitoring
• Indicator-to-question mapping for household food security surveys
• KoboToolbox project creation and Formbuilder navigation
• Question types, groups, required responses and field metadata
• Household consent statements and respondent confidentiality fields
• Survey flow design using modules and respondent-friendly sequencing
• Variable naming conventions and data dictionary planning

Workshop: Participants convert a food security assessment brief into an indicator matrix and build the consent, household profile and location sections of a KoboToolbox form.

Day 2: Building food security measurement modules

• Food Consumption Score food-group questions and seven-day recall periods
• Household Hunger Scale occurrence and frequency-of-occurrence questions
• Reduced Coping Strategies Index behaviour and severity-weight inputs
• Livelihoods, income-source and asset questions for vulnerability profiling
• Market access, food prices and availability question design
• Response-list design, local terminology and translation management
• Question wording techniques to reduce recall, social-desirability and interviewer bias

Workshop: Participants build Food Consumption Score, Household Hunger Scale and coping strategy modules and peer-review them against an indicator specification.

Day 3: XLSForm logic, validation and calculations

• XLSForm survey, choices and settings worksheets
• Relevance expressions and skip logic for respondent pathways
• Constraint expressions for age, household size, dates and numeric ranges
• Constraint messages and respondent-facing error prompts
• Calculate fields for derived values and hidden workflow variables
• Repeat groups for household member and livelihood rosters
• Appearance settings, hints and required-field behaviour in Kobo forms

Workshop: Participants export their form to XLSForm, add logic and constraints, then repair a deliberately faulty household roster and validation sequence.

Day 4: Testing, deployment and field data quality

• KoboToolbox form validation and version-control practices
• Preview testing and Enketo web-form testing procedures
• KoboCollect configuration and offline mobile collection considerations
• Enumerator accounts, project sharing and permission settings
• Pilot protocols, test cases and defect logging
• Submission review, incomplete-record checks and audit metadata
• Data export formats for Excel, CSV and statistical analysis workflows

Workshop: Participants conduct a structured pilot of a peer’s form, log defects in a test checklist and deploy a corrected version to a controlled project.

Day 5: Survey package completion and operational application

• Reviewing submissions for missing values, outliers and logic inconsistencies
• Using KoboToolbox data tables, filters and saved views for field monitoring
• Ethical handling of household data and minimum-data collection principles
• Form versioning and change control during active data collection
• Enumerator briefing notes and field troubleshooting guidance
• Sampling and questionnaire limitations that affect interpretation
• Action planning from survey design through pilot, launch and handover

Workshop: Participants finalise and present a deployable food security survey package comprising a KoboToolbox project, XLSForm, enumerator guide, test record and launch plan.

Tools & standards covered

KoboToolbox, XLSForm, KoboCollect, Sphere Handbook

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions