- Oct 2023
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www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
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Barzun, Jacques. “Opinion | Multiple Choice Flunks Out.” The New York Times, October 11, 1988, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/1988/10/11/opinion/multiple-choice-flunks-out.html.
Archived copy at https://web.archive.org/web/20231022192353/https://www.nytimes.com/1988/10/11/opinion/multiple-choice-flunks-out.html. Internet Archive.
Barzun takes standardized multiple-choice tests to task.
A version of this article appears in Barzun's book: Barzun, Jacques. Begin Here: The Forgotten Conditions of Teaching and Learning. University of Chicago Press, 1991. http://archive.org/details/begin-here-the-forgotten-conditions-of-teaching-and-learning.
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He pointed out that these questions penalize the more imaginative and favor those who are content to collect facts. Therefore, multiple-choice test statistics, in all their uses, are misleading.
He = Banesh Hoffman
This is tangentially similar to Malcolm Gladwell's claim that standardized testing for law school privileges certain types of thinkers over others, something which creates thinkers who are good at quick things with respect to time pressures rather than slower and more deliberate thinkers who are needed at higher level functions like the Supreme Court.
See: The Tortoise and the Hare, S4 E2 of Revisionist History https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/revisionist-history/the-tortoise-and-the-hare
testing imagination versus fact memorization/simple recall compared with thinking quickly under pressure or slowly with time and increased ability to reason
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- Jul 2019
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inst-fs-iad-prod.inscloudgate.net inst-fs-iad-prod.inscloudgate.net
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his, too, is false. Indeed, the data from released national tests show conclusively that the students have the most difficulty with those items that require understanding and transfer, not recall or recognition.
interesting...maybe this goes to show that educators as a whole are focusing more on rote memorization and not true application of learning
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This perceived incompatibility is based on a flawed assumption that the only way to raise test scores is to cover those things that are tested and practice the test format.
But is there any real way to get around this?
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- Jul 2017
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inst-fs-iad-prod.inscloudgate.net inst-fs-iad-prod.inscloudgate.net
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Furthermore, the format of the test causes many educators to erroneously believe that the state test or provincial exam only assesses low-level knowledge and skill. This, too, is false. Indeed, the data from released national tests show conclusively that the students have the most difficulty with those items that require understanding and transfer, not recall or recognition.
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