Should Testing Be Used Ineffective And Inefficient Strategies?

One of the main controversial disputes regarding education is if test taking is actually a beneficial form of a learning technique for students. Within the context of Henry L. Roediger III’s article, How Tests Make Us Smarter, Roediger goes into depth upon how giving students “low-stakes quizzes” could help improve their memory as well as consistent and spread out practice. Psychology In Action, written by both Karen Huffman and Katherine Dowdell, also restates similar learning techniques within their first chapter.

Preparations for tests should ideally begin much earlier than shortly before the actual test taking period. Indeed, many students perform dismally in their tests because of their failure to understand this and many other principles of test and exam preparation. In addition to discussing how students should prepare for tests, this text will also identify the various strategies which should be embraced by students during test taking in an attempt to enhance performance.

Retention is one of the key prerequisites for or outcomes of learning that can either be reinforced positively as well as negatively or otherwise optimized with respect to how the study time is to be distributed across sessions. Intuitively, it would appear plausible that, increasing the uninterrupted study duration would map into superior retention and learning outcomes. The present paper critically addresses some empirical findings that could question the unaided intuition along these lines while shedding light on the interaction channels or trade-offs to be defined across a set of additional explanatory variables.

The stress settled in once the word ‘testing’ echoed through the classroom. The students knew what it brought, and they knew how dreadful it would be; sitting in one room, hour after hour and day after day, silent and still, with only the sound of the clock resonating through their heads. Standardized tests are assessments that local and national governments may require their students to take. However, these tests do not properly evaluate their intellect, and only lead to tension and mental strain on a student’s attentiveness. Although many schools believe that these assessments are productive, it is proven that they are not beneficial to students because standardized testing leads to stress and anxiety, it is wasting valuable classroom time,

In classrooms all across America, students sit perched over their desks in the process of taking standardized tests. As the students take the tests, teachers pace nervously up and down the rows of their classroom, hoping and praying that their students can recall the information which they have presented. Some children sit relaxed at their desks, calmly filling in the bubbles and answering essay questions. These children are well prepared and equipped to handle their tests. Other children, however, sit hunched over their desks, pondering over questions, trying to guess an answer. They struggle to recall information that has been covered many times in class, but they can’t.

The more time spent on something the better you are. This is the strategy that is being employed in the education system to improve test scores. The latest education reform aimed at closing the gap of test performance has been extended learning time. This reform limits students’ time outside of the classroom and maintains a focus on test preparation. This approach has not been proven to be 100% effective. 42 studies showed no positive impact from year-round school. Every student learns differently, thus the approach should be different for every student.

Cramming before a test allows you to retain the information on a short-term basis but the days after the test it is like never studying for the test. Nate Kornell, a professor of psychology at Williams College, researches effective learning strategies. He suggests different ways to study for tests. One way to retain information is a distributed practice, which involves spacing out the material. Students can learn the material over a period of time and be able to sort thought the information during the

Cramming is often a studying habit that most college students, as well as high school students, turn to the night before an exam. In Shelby McIntyre and J. Michael Munson’s journal entry “Exploring Cramming Student Behaviors, Beliefs, and Learning Retention in the Principle

This study takes a look at the benefits of frequent quizzing, and how it aids in both memory and attention when studying. The study also looks at the brain’s tendency to wander particularly during long periods of studying or lectures, lowering the amount of material being consumed. The quizzes are defined by the study as low stakes tests that allow students to review material, whether given by a professor or when studying out of class.

Tran suggests that ‘testing is undoubtedly a useful technique for promoting information acquisition’ (Tran, 2015, p.140). Self testing was a vital part of Trans experiment, the participants in the experiment studied and reviewed information by rereading or taking a test, the testing option produced the better results in the participants. The effectiveness of testing as suggested by Tran has been found in the classroom, if the review of subjects was done in a testing method rather than in a restudying of the same topic the students attained better results and had better memory retrieval process (Tran, 2015).Although Tran does support the effectiveness of self testing as a way of improving memory recall when studying, he also suggests that there is still questions as to when and how it does and does not in fact facilitate learning (Tran, 2015).Therefore, Tran is in agreement with Ariel and Karpicke that the practice of self testing is effective on students studying for the PSYC101 final exam, as it does enhance the memory recall process, and does produce better results in the results of the

This study was conducted on a college campus, where students are routinely expected to recall when tested on previous lecture material. As explained by Bartlett (1932), there is a difference in how memories are formed and retrieved. If the student has not committed the information to memory, it can easily be altered if there is pressure placed on the student to recall.

In the results provided in the journal, we see that in the free recall testing, the use of the 3R method was more successful across the board than those who used note taking or rereading as their study strategy. The results of the students who used the note-taking strategy and the rereading strategy were not as significant as students using the 3R strategy.

Briefly, the generation effect assists people to retain better memory and thus improve learning across different circumstances. More importantly, the testing phenomenon serves an educational purpose for students at school, regardless of short answer questions, multiple choice questions, or essay questions where no feedback is necessary (Roediger & Karpicke, 2006). However, repetitive studying will not guarantee better retention rate in terms of delay testing, and retesting will have a greater impact (Roediger & Karpicke, 2006).

Often heavily debated on, specifically in an educational setting, is the technique and style in which students are tested. Whether it be multiple choice, true or false, or short answer responses, test takers may respond differently due to certain correlations between the way they are tested, and the way they learn and take tests in general. Using different types of questions for tests has each of their own benefits, as well as drawbacks. Test format, in addition to a student’s age, major and mood, can lead to inaccurate test results which may correlate with improper test formatting. Multiple choice responses provide the student with several relatable choices, one being correct. Students then have a 25% chance of selecting the right response, along with the ability to narrow down the answers. Providing the answer and other comparably subjected answers presented with the question may stimulate the individual’s memory as well. In terms of short answer responses, the individual is forced to recall all components of the experiment. Conversely, in true/false responses, students have a 50% chance of getting the answer correct and are able to make a more precise decision. We predict that true and false responses will yield a higher result than both short answer and multiple choice results. The Power of Negative of Multiple Choice Testing, performed by Roediger III and Marsh, they found that learning was interfered by using a multiple choice format. Also having the test be multiple

Robert Bjork and fellow PT blogger Nate Kornell have explored some of the study habits of college students in a 2007 paper in Psychonomic Bulletin & Review. Research on memory provides a number of important suggestions about the most effective ways to study. One of the most important tips is that students should study by testing themselves rather than just reading over the material. It is also important to study over a period of days rather waiting until the last minute