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Re: Test question



Is this, as I suspect, a question from the 8th grade assessment? It
will be interesting to see what the state has in store for the Physics
Regents exam this year.

Kim

Hugh Haskell wrote:

At 14:02 -0400 6/4/03, John S. Denker wrote:


I find the question itself highly entertaining.

Behind a disarming smile it has sharp teeth.

It requires some out-of-the-box thinking just
to realize that the answer is highly dependent
on assumptions.



JD's thoughts here are right on. The question as originally posed was
formatted as a multiple choice question. Preparers of standardized
tests, which are almost always multiple choice, to be able to take
advantage of automated scoring, face these problems all the time,
although many times they have either ignored them or not realized
them. Once the question is presented as multiple choice, the test
taker is not free to "think outside the box" (one of the major
problems with this kind of test). Clearly the preparer had a
particular set of assumptions in mind, either consciously or
unconsciously, and, as in this case, the "correct" answer often
depends on the test taker's assumptions being congruent with the test
preparer's, which are all too often, again as in this case, unstated
and therefore hidden to the test taker.

So now the test becomes a psychological battle. What assumptions can
the test taker assume that the test preparer might reasonably have
made? Is the test maker trying to trip up the test taker, by
including an unstated assumption that will make the right answer
different from what would be a "normal" assumption? What is a
"normal" assumption, anyway? Can the test taker assume that the test
maker didn't realize the tacit assumptions (not always unreasonable
for the test taker to do), and proceed on the basis that the test
maker is just ignorant of the niceties of the subject? This type of
test, then, becomes something in which the taker's knowledge or
understanding of the subject matter becomes irrelevant, perhaps even
an impediment to success.

Is it any wonder that students who are raised on multiple-choice
tests have great troubles thinking when faced with real world
problems that are not posed in multiple-choice format?

Hugh
--

Hugh Haskell
<mailto:haskell@ncssm.edu>
<mailto:hhaskell@mindspring.com>

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