In a bizarre alteration of examination rules, the Danish government has taken the bold steps of allowing pupils full access to the internet during their final school exams, according to the BBC's technology page.Currently, a total of fourteen schools in the country are piloting the scheme and all schools are invited to do the same by 2011. It seems like a great deal of trust is put into the students themselves not to cheat. BBC News journalist Judy Hobson describes the Danish exam hall at Greve High School, south of Copenhagen as a strange place:
"On the morning of the exam, the exam room the floor is covered in cables. IT experts are busy helping the teenagers set up their laptops, making sure they all work. At five to nine, the room falls silent. CD-roms and exam papers are handed out together. This is the Danish language exam. One of the teachers stands in front of the class and explains the rules. She tells the candidates they can use the internet to answer any of the four questions."
The candidates may access any website they wish, including Facebook, in order to answer the questions, but are not allowed to contact any individual outside or within the exam hall. According to the Danish government, the internet is such an intrinsic part of an individual's day-to-day life now that it should be included in examinations and classrooms. For some time now, Danish students have been allowed to type up answers to exam questions on computers, having the use of the internet in examinations is logically the next step, but is it a step too far?
According to the BBC, Sanne Yde Schmidt, who heads the project at Greve, says: "If we're going to be a modern school and teach them things that are relevant for them in modern life, we have to teach them how to use the internet."
Minister for education in Denmark, Bertel Haarder, says: "Our exams have to reflect daily life in the classroom and daily life in the classroom has to reflect life in society. The internet is indispensible, including in the exam situation. I'm sure that is would be a matter of very few years when most European countries will be on the same line." He says he is proud of the fact Denmark is leading the way and believes other countries will adopt this system.
The main issue with this groundbreaking examination method is cheating. Despite communication being "banned" there is actually no way a student can be stopped from cheating using this method; however severe the consequences of doing so. Ms. Schmidt says they rely on the integrity of the pupil and the threat of expulsion if they are caught. "The main precaution is that we trust them. I think the cheat rate is very low because the consequences of cheating are very big."
According to the students at the school, cheating is too hard with the new types of exams. Instead of simply regurgitating facts, they are now required to sift through, and analyse an amount of information.
Didn't read it did you... ?
According to the students at the school, cheating is too hard with the new types of exams. Instead of simply regurgitating facts, they are now required to sift through, and analyse an amount of information.
you got that right.
No need for books, why even bother going to class...Online School.
Yes, it says to analyze information, but how hard is that really?
I'm sorry but testing in it's current method(s) is flawed. You tell a student to sit in class for 50 minutes to an hour and a half (block schedule) and listen to a teacher lecture the entire time. Lecture, no interaction, nothing remotely interesting, and you expect the child to retain this information? There's really no reason a student should have to remember 15-20 equations for math when they are likely to use maybe 3 in daily life situations.
No need for books, why even bother going to class...Online School.
Yes, it says to analyze information, but how hard is that really?
Against the clock? I'd imagine it'd be pretty difficult. Balancing research time and writing time must be pretty tough.
This so hard. I hate going to lectures... give me practical work and I will learn much faster and retain a lot more.
That's a good point. I hated school because it was so boring. Sitting and listening to lectures or copying stuff out of a book. The only learning you did was memorization, which of course is eventually forgotten because you never used any of this info in any meaningful way. It was a complete waste of time.
I'm inclined to agree with this point. I have to have hour long lectures about English Literature at university. Whilst I often find the subjects fascinating, I'd be hard pushed to accurately regurgitate the information given.
That is the problem with most states like my own Florida with their FCAT tests. The teachers spend all of their time covering the test and not teaching the subject itself. Exams can be written in such a way that even with the internet you "cannot" cheat unless you have a very good understanding of the subject at hand. I'm more worried about kids cheating knowing the tests will be focused on facts "and" multiple choice. You can cheat ahead of time and get a passing score without learning the subject. You just cram the heck out of the subject and the students with better short term memory can get great grades even though the same test taken a month later would have a dismal grade.
That is the problem with most states like my own Florida with their FCAT tests. The teachers spend all of their time covering the test and not teaching the subject itself. Exams can be written in such a way that even with the internet you "cannot" cheat unless you have a very good understanding of the subject at hand. I'm more worried about kids cheating knowing the tests will be focused on facts "and" multiple choice. You can cheat ahead of time and get a passing score without learning the subject. You just cram the heck out of the subject and the students with better short term memory can get great grades even though the same test taken a month later would have a dismal grade.
Exactly my point below. The FCAT, WASL (Washington) and most other 'standardized' tests are an absolute joke. They make the rich schools richer and the poor schools poorer.
This is a huge step forward. I remember in school when it was frowned upon to find information on the internet (IE Wikipedia) because of the potential for inaccurate information. The problem with that concept is that the books and encyclopedias they were using to 'teach' us were often so outdated that the information was totally wrong.
By having access to the internet, students can learn based upon the most up-to-date data available, not something written in a school book that is out of date a few years later.
As a friend of mine just told me, he had access to the internet during a personal finance exam in college and found it nearly impossible to find a direct answer due to the nature and complexity of the question.
If the system is setup correctly and teachers are held accountable for TEACHING rather than handing out papers and saying "go learn", this will be a very successful step in bringing our educational systems up to date (if the US can ever comprehend that not every 12 year old is a hacker and a cheat).
Memorizing is the whole problem... who cares what a Noun / Verb / Adjective is if you don't know how to use them in their proper form when reading, writing, and speaking.
And I think this applies to all of their exams, they just used the language exam as an example...
We are talking about high school students; I really hope that you did not memorize words when you had classes in your native language in high school. I'm from Norway, and my final norwegian exam wouldn't be any easier if I had internet access. You are recuired to do all kinds of text analyzing, and the only thing that would make it possible to "cheat" is if you find somebody who did exaaactly the same as the task you're working on. Its not like you're asked to write a small essay about something whatever you would like
you know, the fundementals of the language, you cant really use the language without them... also fundemental doesnt mean basic, but it does mean important... with things like grammar , its not as important, all you'll end up with is a broken language, but if you are missing words, the language becomes impossible
you know, the fundementals of the language, you cant really use the language without them... also fundemental doesnt mean basic, but it does mean important... with things like grammar , its not as important, all you'll end up with is a broken language, but if you are missing words, the language becomes impossible
I don't mean to sound callous but honestly that description of a native language exam sounds very much like primary school. In High School in my country the final examinations for English were very much about critically analysing texts and interpretations of texts; synonyms and antonyms were about 6 years prior.
yeah but the point is, if the language isnt English or anything similar, this type of exam might not work... like there could be literally dozens of ways to interpret a given piece of text, but to the examiners, there is only one correct way, and that takes memorization, you cant reason your way through it because its completely arbitary
kind of a big reason i dropped out of college...
kind of a big reason i dropped out of college...
There is not only one way to the examiners. Interpretation of text would change for languages but not as drastically as you seem to believe.
In the case of lit it isn't so much memorisation as it is understanding the process and the concepts and you cannot get that from the internet (especially since it will vary between different lecturers and classes).
I can see this being a problem in some IT or mathematics but definitely not in languages.
Have to agree on this. Having spent all my school time in Sweden, a well done language exam as well as pretty much any other subject, would be immune against internet cheating. The complexity of the questions would simply not make it for Google or any other source. Also as someone else here said, the race against the clock would make it even harder and pointless even trying to cheat.
I know that exams are way different in different countries, for example, having been in school from the age of 6 until 26, from elementary through medschool, I haven't had a single multiple-choice test! Definately not saying what's right and wrong, just trying to explain that that's the way we do it over here in Scandinavia
Bravo, great way to put it!
Nice responce
Don't know how many times I get a call about something which involves replying with, "Okay, go to Google... and type in [keywords]..."
exams need to resemble real world situations more, too many ppl go out unprepared still despite having good marks
+1. Nicely put!
You've failed to understand exactly what skills and knowledge they are examining.
It sounds like you've never even seen a higher education level exam question. They are not along the lines of "What is the square root of 1331?" Rather, you get questions like "Based on current knowledge, devise a practical strategy for curing cancer." I would expect someone with pre-high school knowledge to solve the former and **** bricks when confronted with the latter. For someone who has had a high school level education, I would expect them to be able to hit the literature and come up with something plausible.
It sounds like you've never even seen a higher education level exam question.
I've did doing my alevels at the moment.
Good for you. Can you explain to me why the reasoning behind your original comment is flawed?
Feel free to look up answers on the internet.
Feel free to look up answers on the internet.
It sounds like you've never even seen a higher education level exam question.
I've did doing my alevels at the moment.
you obviously failed at english though
j/k
Feel free to look up answers on the internet.
anything thats not what you are studying for does feel kind of worthless sometimes...
Feel free to look up answers on the internet.
Bwahahaha. Nice.
?!
It sounds like you've never even seen a higher education level exam question.
I've did doing my alevels at the moment.
you obviously failed at english though
j/k
Meh I did ok at English at GCSE, got a B in English Lang and a B in English Lit.
im sorry but if you are trying to defend your education system, its coming across as your an example of how bad it is instead... like to get a B and still not be able to type a proper sentence...
Really? You've never encountered a problem that doesn't have a solution that can be found on the internet?
an exam problem, no ... especially not a high school level exam problem...
Yes, but the examiners can easily spot where things have been blindly pasted from other sources. Typical signs are things written out of context of the original question and of course the examiners being able to recognise common sources, e.g. wikipedia articles on the subject.
If there's doubt, then the resolution is trivial - type parts of the student's answer as quoted strings into Google and see what comes up!
obviously they would change to exam to reflect these changes, to show that the student has proper understanding of the situation
Then again, we were a classroom full of geeks and I guess our teacher respected us enough to do that (and vice versa)
At least all the people who 'do better on coursework' will be happy.
This new method means students need to learn how to do research efficiently: I have no doubt they will be more productive later on in life when it comes to writing essays and reports.
I took a Physics course 2 years ago, our professor had quizes that were open note, open person. This worked out nice. Most people immediately think thats cheating, but I learned a lot more that way because you can work collaboratly on a question. In the real world you arent always forced to memorize and spit out info, in fact thats the worst way of learning because you dont remember all of that in the long term
unless your history problems are about analysis and processing, not regurgitating facts...
look at it this way, if you rely on facts for questions, you are limited by the amount of facts... if you are using analysis and processing, you are limited by the number of combinations of facts.....
look at it this way, if you rely on facts for questions, you are limited by the amount of facts... if you are using analysis and processing, you are limited by the number of combinations of facts.....
It shouldn't be about either regurgitating facts (dates, names, etc) or simply empty abstract analysis. It should be about understanding history and the course of events that happened in history and why they happened, which is about the facts. That includes knowing some names and events, but not necessarily thinking the specificity of dates is important, just knowing what events happened before what other events.
If you do an essay question involving analysis, and you can rely on quick reference, you can look up the information, analyse it, and then forget about it later. For a good understanding of a subject you need all of the information in your head, where you're ready to pull out any of that information at any time you need it, because you understand the significance of it.
When I was in high school my history class every week had multiple choice exams which were basically fact regurgitation ... the facts that were asked were really obscure things that you really didn't need to know and could easily miss in the chapter.. like exact numbers of tonnage that a ship was carrying, and so and so. The point behind that wasn't that you should know all those things or that those things mattered.. it was to force you to read the chapter very thoroughly with a fine-toothed comb. That helped by the time you had to write an essay exam--which was about analysis--because the thorough reading made you understood the details of the chapter better. Regurgitating facts is about preparing the student, its never the point in itself.
Having the Internet available is fine in theory--the students with the best understanding of the subject will still write the best essays. But it doesn't help in preparing the students for the subject. It doesn't force them to learn. And by the time the essay test comes, they'll go into it thinking they can look everything up and don't have to worry.
Last edited by brianshapiro on 06 Nov 2009 - 19:47
The difficulty of these exams requires an open book test due to the number of equations and derivations required. Having the internet only gives you access to applet calculators and such which don't provide that much assistance in terms of solving these "real world" type engineering problems.
In the classes allowed personal computers, the mean still hovered around/below 50%, with the highest score approaching 70%, falling in line with most other engineering score distributions.
But I think this idea is rather relevant in this era. I don't understand why, in Chemistry for example, I have to memorise tons of reagents and conditions that are so readily available. I mean, do chemists, when they carry out their experiments, not have relevant data on hand?
Same applies to other subjects as well.
But one thing I realised that 'open-book' tests and such are designed so that you can't really find anything using those reference materials, heh. So I guess more analysing skills would be needed than just plain old rote learning which, unfortunately, is what my country (S'pore) is doing.
A language exam could be analysing on various world issues as well, so I don't see how analysis is lacking.
Same applies to other subjects as well.
I was in chemistry for a few years at the undergraduate level. I also took a cognitive psychology class and learned how people learn. The basic gist is that the most productive way to learn is to accumulate a foundation of basic knowledge through memorization, integrate those memorized facts (or to put it as an analogy, put the pieces of the puzzle together), and then be able to use that derived knowledge to solve new problems.
Also, in more technical fields, you need to be exposed to the language. If I say "Serine 184 acts as a nucleophile and attacks the scissile phosphate 3' of the bound adenine - S184A has no endonucleolytic activity," that means nothing to most people that have no background in chemistry and biochemistry. If you don't understand the words or the question, it will take a hell of a long time to dig out enough information online to respond to a question like, "Write a series of experimental protocols for optimizing the activity of the given nuclease."
The benefits are two-fold: It puts the focus on developing students' critical thinking and analytical skills, rather than redundant memorization of facts, and it encourages lazy examining bodies to produce better tests.
I might also point out that Scandinavian countries have some the highest standards of education in the world, whereas America and Britain are less than satisfactory.
most students these days using internet don't know how to analyze information. their analysis is either read from somewhere on the internet, and they just repeat what others say.
Scientists and scholars decades and hundreds years ago didn't have internet. and I do not find today's people or students are smarter than them because today we have internet.
The big issue is, the schools and societies still haven't found a way on how to use the internet properly for kids and students in school. (so does mobile phones) students in school nowadays copy so much information to whatever they write. as a teacher, you'll be disappointed. These technologies develop so fast, and we don't adapt as fast on how to properly use them. when a students is asked a question, his first instinct now is to search it on the internet.
they no longer first think using their brains.
Last edited by warr on 06 Nov 2009 - 02:29
I can only imagine that its far more used now and this is natural step.
You have to remember that it isnt standard exams, the exams are written in a way that its very important to use several sources and discussing the bias etc.
I like this line in particular:
Greve, says: "If we're going to be a modern school and teach them things that are relevant for them in modern life, we have to teach them how to use the internet."
It's not "teaching", it's allowing them to cheat... :?
In real life in real company nobody gives a s**t which methods you will use to do the job until they are legal and job is done. Employee would win if he can do better job by using Google as his memory "extension" than employee who is using his own memory only. This is the reason why Danish are right. I agree that any trivial test question on such exams that can be answered by a quick google must not be on the list. I think such problem solving is very important for medics today, because they would learn to refresh their skills about new treatments constantly.
However, I think it's been used as a psycology and interpretive test rather than anything else.
I wish those than are the powers that be would quit using people as Guniea Pigs and stick to the basics.
Also, the whole point of a foreign language class is to learn how to master (up to a certain level) the art of a foreign language. It's not to test students on their Internet researching skills, where there are no barriers as to IMing someone to give you the answer to a question.
Commenting has either been disabled on this article or you are not logged in. Click here to login or register, its free!
Note: Anonymous commenting is disabled in order to keep the quality of responses to a high standard.