Thom Baguley wrote:
>
> Alan McLean wrote:
> > This describes a BAD closed book exam. It also describes a bad open book
> > exam.
>
> Not entirely. I have found that many students still worry about such
> things regardless of the information they have about the exam.
>
> > A good one-hour exam would have
> > > three, or at most four, multi-part PROBLEMS.
> > >
> > > A good exam would be one which someone who has merely
> > > memorized the book would fail, and one who understands
> > > the concepts but has forgotten all the formulas would
> > > do extremely well on.
> >
> > Since to understand the concepts almost always means understanding (and
> > hence knowing) the formulas, I would interpret someone who has
> > 'forgotten all the formulas' as understanding the concepts only in the
> > most superficial manner, and so should do badly!
>
> I don't agree here. As a semi-trivial counterexample, would you
> suggest that I don't understand a concept if I am given an
> unfamiliar formula (e.g., because it is rearranged for some purpose
> such as ease of calculation, or because it uses a notation that I am
> unfamiliar with?). A single concept can give rise to an infinite
> number of formulae or forms of notation.
>
> In the context of evaluating a student if you test memory for a
> formula as a component of a question this leads you to unable to
> distinguish poor performance due to complete lack of understanding
> and a student who has a partial understanding (but can't recall the formula).
>
I was responding to a comment about a student who had 'forgotten ALL the
formulas' - and I consider my comment perfectly accurate. In any
examination you are testing the student's memory, so if you are asking a
student to carry out some activity, you are testing his or her memory of
how to carry out that activity. By all means provide them with a formula
sheet for at least the more complex formulas, or allow them to use their
own resources - but the student has to KNOW the formula at some level in
order to carry out the activity.
Alan
--
Alan McLean ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Department of Econometrics and Business Statistics
Monash University, Caulfield Campus, Melbourne
Tel: +61 03 9903 2102 Fax: +61 03 9903 2007
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