Re: Would like to find study group for computer science comprehensive exams.

Jamie Andrews; real address @ bottom of message wrote:
If you would prefer an open-book test, you may not have
seen the creative ways in which students use the blank spaces in
a textbook... even at the graduate level.

Patricia Shanahan <pats@xxxxxxx> wrote:
If the concern is understanding, why is memorization any better
than writing things in the blank pages of a textbook?

Memorization can only go so far. Students can't accurately
memorize correct answers to all the questions on all the similar
exams over the past 5 years. (Or at least, if they can, they
have a great aptitude that should be put to better use.)
However, students can (and do) painstakingly copy correct
answers to all the questions on all the similar exams over the
past 5 years onto flyleaves, blank spaces, the 3mm space closest
to the spine on each page, etc. etc. This takes no memorization
or understanding at all, just penmanship skills.

Now I guess the discussion will move on to "profs who are
too lazy and/or unimaginative to think up completely new,
foolproof exam questions for a 6th straight year". :-)

I dislike
closed-book tests partly because the time I waste memorizing the facts
and formulas is time I would far rather have spent thinking and
understanding.

As far as formulas and highly technical things like that,
yes, I would (and do) give, with the exam, a reference ***
that I have written myself, containing things that I would
expect people to look up in practical situations.

Why not write questions that require the student to demonstrate
understanding, and let us use whatever resources we want?

From that point of view, the best exam would be a take-home
exam where you get several hard questions that would take an
hour each, and you can use whatever texts, papers, libraries,
and Internet resources you want. Unfortunately, that kind of
exam is wide open to abuse.

It's a balance. Getting the students to demonstrate
understanding is what we want, but we have to balance it off
against the other, technical goal of preventing students from
subverting the intent of the evaluation process.

Looking at it a bit differently, some of the problems I encountered in
industry required me to achieve deeper understanding of far more
complicated issues than I've seen in any academic test, even though, in
analyzing them, I was expected to use all the books, articles, reference
manuals and web pages I could lay my hands on.

Absolutely. Unfortunately, because of mechanical and
technical constraints, the university can be only a pale
imitation of the real world.

--Jamie. (efil4dreN)
andrews .uwo } Merge these two lines to obtain my e-mail address.
@csd .ca } (Unsolicited "bulk" e-mail costs everyone.)
.

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