Beth, I've thought about copying Scantrons, but don't look forward to copying 40-50 Scantrons for each of the 4-5 exams in each of my courses. I can imagine the nightmare of copying in huge (200+) sections, as well as the paper used and space required to store those copies (how long would you keep them...a semester? A year?
But I think it's an excellent idea to have 'insurance' of what students actually did put on their test. After I run the Scantrons through the machine, I then take a felt-tip, roller ball, or other 'bigger' pen to put a hack mark through students' incorrect answers. Sometimes, I have students mark more than one bubble per answer, so I mark through those as well. Interestingly, once I started marking the Scantrons, the number of 'scantron machine errors' were reduced to zero. Another benefit of this method is that I can catch the true machine errors (those machines can be pretty sensitive) and sometimes wind up giving the student a few more points that I otherwise would have missed. Julie Julie A. Penley, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Psychology Special Projects Assistant to the Dean (ESL, Reading, and Social Sciences) El Paso Community College PO Box 20500 El Paso, TX 79998-0500 Office phone: (915) 831-3210 Department fax: (915) 831-2324 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Beth Benoit Sent: Friday, April 04, 2008 8:02 AM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) Subject: [tips] Scantron tip I often use Scantrons (those bubble sheets) for part of tests (and use Scantrons and Blue Books as an example of something that might engender a classically conditioned reponse in people who are especially anxious about test-taking). Recently, I saw the Dean of our department making copies of each student's Scantrons, in order to have a copy in case a student makes a change on it after it's returned and claims that he/she had the correct answer. I thought it was a good idea, though hoped it wouldn't be necessary. (Our Scantron machine doesn't put a mark beside an incorrect answer as some do.) So that is why, when a student brought her Scantron to me, claiming that it must have been incorrectly graded, I was able to pull out the original, finding that she had indeed changed an answer after it was handed back to her. I'm not looking forward to confronting her about her academic dishonesty, but I will do it. I'd used Scantrons for years, and it never occurred to me to make copies before I hand the originals back to the students, so thought I'd pass the advice on to others. Of course, one way to insure that students don't change their answers is to hand them the copy of their answers, but frankly, perhaps there's a little bit of tempter in me, and I want to see who will actually cheat if they think they can get away with it. Beth Benoit --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
