Last night in my adolescent psychology class, one of the other teachers was describing how he prepared his students for an upcoming test. His review covered two full class days, and it basically amounted to him giving his students all of the test questions beforehand. The only uncertainty was that he gave them four essay questions to study, with the intention of choosing two by drawing cards from a deck on test day.
This morning, while I was waiting for the copy machine, one of the other teachers was copying a review assignment for a test. She proudly told me, “What they don’t realize is that these questions are going to be the actual test questions.”
It would seem that the one skill that we’re teaching most effectively and consistently in high schools is how to pass tests—specifically our own tests—without actually mastering the content.
I also spent today helping my students review for a test. “This is how you identify variables in a word problem—any word problem.” “This is how you declare your variables and substitute them back into the equation—any equation.” “This is how you use a number with a compound unit—any number with a compound unit—as a conversion factor.” “This is what you need be able to do in order to pass a test on this topic—any test.”
For a job that has me surrounded by people almost all the time, it can get pretty lonely.
