Comments on: Designing the Final Exam

By: fran

fran — Fri, 28 Apr 2006 22:04:43 +0000

I have IDs and essays too in my survey course finals. IDs for grasp of concepts and basic facts, essays for some interpretation. I hand out possible essay topics and a larger list of IDs in advance so there’s no surprise. I’d rather make sure they’ve all done the readings and encountered these terms and concepts than go for unpredictability. Having tried both, handing out a review sheet doesn’t really improve their performance! It does calm them down and focuses their reading, though.

Am looking forward to a post from you about student evaluations.

By: bbenzon

bbenzon — Fri, 28 Apr 2006 00:53:35 +0000

I’d think that students who are really prepared to deal with any 8-10 terms from a specified set of 40-50 items probably have learned something. Doesn’t seem like cherry picking to me.

By: Endie

Endie — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 23:53:02 +0000

In law we had both approaches: some lecturers took your approach, and let us know that the questions would be from a certain range of possibilities. Others didn’t. Everyone studied past papers, so the net result was the same in any case.

By: texter

texter — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 22:50:04 +0000

I taught postcolonial literature for the first time last semester, and I handed out a study guide for the final that included potential terms for identification and potential essay questions.

I even spent some time over two class periods answering questions based on the study guide.
I admit that like your colleague, at first I was hesitant to give out a study guide thinking that they should have “applied themselves” all semester long. However, this was a class with no prerequisites and I had plenty of non-majors, and I had to rethink my goals for the class.

The Final Exam ended up being 1.) Quote identification from literary text (who said it, which text/context); 2.) Term Identification (theoretical terms where they had to write a paragraph explaining significance and example from readings) 3.) Long essay

They appreciated the study guide, and after I got over my initial reservations, I was pleased to see them absorb this new material. I knew it would stick with them long after they left the class, and that was success for me!

By: meg

meg — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 20:49:11 +0000

To play D’s A for a moment, in some classes understanding which terms are key and which are tangential is part of the course material. We all have our ways of making sure the class stays focused on core concepts, but I don’t think it is always wrong to test that level of understanding.

That’s not to say that I don’t join you in your puzzlement regarding that specific case, but the principle that appears to underlie it doesn’t strike me as mad, bad, and dangerous.

By: Timothy Burke

Timothy Burke — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 19:49:14 +0000

I think it’s a relatively common format. I’m more puzzled by my colleague’s insistence that it’s dirty pool to hand out a list of 50 or so terms as a study guide, that somehow this keeps students from “knowing” the whole of the course material.

By: Jonathan Dresner

Jonathan Dresner — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 19:27:56 +0000

That is almost identical to the format I’ve used the last year or two in my World History classes: Terms for short-term testing; essays for comprehensive integration. I must be on the right track….

By: Timothy Burke

Timothy Burke — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 15:34:32 +0000

Well, I figure that every other class I teach beside my survey, I prize critical thinking, high-order processing of knowledge, and so on. So I'm not too worried about having a single type of class that demands being able to rattle off identification of concrete terms alongside an analytic essay. I do insist that the identification answers explain the significance of the term: it's not enough to just memorize a definition, you need to tell me why it matters.

By: meg

meg — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 15:08:04 +0000

I wrestle with it, to be sure. My worry isn’t “unfair advantages” but the rewarding of memory rather than learning (which is why I’ve been a bit gun-shy about identify-the-passage questions). But in general I fret about crafting finals that focus on the right things.