Poll
Question:
What do you guess on tests if unsure or out of time?
Option 1: A
votes: 1
Option 2: B
votes: 2
Option 3: C
votes: 3
Option 4: D
votes: 1
Option 5: I choose randomly.
votes: 10
It's Exam time for those of us still in the midst of our education career, YAY!
Ok, so what do you do before/on tests to make sure you do your best? I am taking the AB Calc AP test soon, and based on mock exams based on previous tests, have developed a strategy: If all else fails, GUESS C! I dont know why, but C has a higher percentage of right answers (at least on AP exams), so I just guess C. Also, on most tests, you dont get deducted points if your wrong, but you cant get points on questions you leve blank. So if you are running out of time, guess C on the rest. I did this, and I actually got MORE RIGHT on the questions I guessed, then I got wrong.
As for what I do before the test, I study for a reasonable time, then I take a break for the rest of the night, as I can get SUPER stressed out about tests. I'm not sure if you guys can relate, but that is just what I do best.
What are your thoughts on exams?
I am so glad exams are almost four decades behind me. My last multiple-choice exam was part of my 1981 bar exam. Before then, it was just my law school admissions test in 1977 or 1978. Everything in-between was essays of some kind (most fiendish were the "roll your own and smoke it", where you answered your own question, and were graded on the quality of both question and answer; and a three-hour closed-book take-home in my Philosophy of Ethics class, which favored unethical people who didn't obey either the time limit or the no-looking-things-up rule).
As for multiple-choice exams, my strategy was to try to spot the obviously wrong answer, make my best guess which of the others was the right answer, and if necessary select randomly. Sloppy exam-writers seem to often put the obviously wrong answer at the end of the list, so picking "C" as your probably right answer works only if you're given four or more choices.
To be honest -- and I will try to say this without giving myself too much of a virtual pat on the back -- I never had much trouble with multiple choice exams, even without studying much. You can usually eliminate two options, and as long as you have some content knowledge, it's relatively easy to decipher which one of the remaining two they
want you to pick, and which one is the actual right answer. Except for occasional "stupid mistakes", I usually had a brief but well thought out case for picking the answer I picked, so I could defend it if it turned out to be wrong.
Written questions can get old and frustrating fairly quickly. If one has expansive enough of a vocabulary, it is possible to come across nuanced and well-versed by saying the same thing/making the same point in multiple ways. I attribute much of my success (not that I had a lot of success, but you know :-D) on written exams to doing exactly that.
Quote from: MCRoads on May 06, 2019, 12:00:17 PM
I can get SUPER stressed out about tests.
Honestly, the best thing you can do (at least IMO) is not stress at all. I used to feel genuinely bad for my peers that stressed out about tests, because more often than not, their high stress level negatively impacted their ability to think clearly and logically, and they ended up doing worse than they could have. The thing is that not stressing is only possible if you feel confident in your knowledge of the material. This is much easier said than done for some subjects, depending on what your strengths are.
In High School I managed a 3.0 GPA really without trying or caring, I didn't put much effort into exam study until college when I was paying for things. I would usually do the following every semester:
- Read each chapter that was being covered in the class and highlight sections I thought were important.
- Re-type the highlighted sections in a 1-3 abridged Word format.
- Read my notes ten times a day at breakfast each morning until the class final.
Considering I was 3.95 GPA in college I'd say my method worked pretty well for me. I ended up keeping my notes which amount to about 400 pages of Criminal Justice and Criminal Law stuff.
During the test if I got stuck on a multiple choice question I'd skip it and come back to it at the end. That way I wasn't wasting time getting stuck trying to recall an answer I didn't have immediately at hand.
Multiple choice exams? Had them for school quizzes that had nothing to do with grades, marked ourselves, and were just checking we remembered stuff we did in the past. Everything even slightly important was proper answers, even if it was just a sentence (and then really not necessarily a sentence, though there were a few marks for spelling, punctuation and grammar that could be lost if you didn't) or a value.
Quote from: oscar on May 06, 2019, 12:31:05 PMa three-hour closed-book take-home in my Philosophy of Ethics class, which favored unethical people who didn't obey either the time limit or the no-looking-things-up rule).
Given it was for a Philosophy of Ethics class, maybe the ability to do better skirting the rules was deliberate?
Humanity student friends of mine were often given a take-home assignment in lieu of exams - given something like 48 hours to do the reading/research and write the essay. It was worse than exams they said, because they had life getting in the way, had to meticulously source everything and engage a lot with scholarship (because books, etc are on hand and so you can do it easily, rather than looking at just one or two you've revised and discussing them)
and the question was a lot more in-depth than anything they had to write in a 2-/3- hour exam because you are expected to spend ~10 times that on it.
High school was many years ago for me, and I rather liked multiple-choice exams because they spared me writer's cramp (a problem with essay questions) and even if I didn't know the correct answer for a given question with 100% certainty, I could usually work my way to an educated guess by reverse-engineering the question. Admittedly, there were some exams for which this did not work (AP Chemistry, for example, proved to be an order of magnitude more difficult than Calculus BC, partly because it relied on lab work that simply could not be fitted into seven hours of class each week).
My favored exam strategy was simply to get a good night's sleep in advance and eat a healthy breakfast. The current culture of high-stakes testing was nowhere near as highly developed when I was going through high school, but even for current high-schoolers I think catastrophizing about potential unfortunate consequences gets in the way of good performance in the present.
Quote from: english si on May 06, 2019, 03:15:42 PM
Quote from: oscar on May 06, 2019, 12:31:05 PMa three-hour closed-book take-home in my Philosophy of Ethics class, which favored unethical people who didn't obey either the time limit or the no-looking-things-up rule).
Given it was for a Philosophy of Ethics class, maybe the ability to do better skirting the rules was deliberate?
Whether it was intentional, it was certainly foreseeable. First week of the class was dissecting ethical nihilism ("we don't need no stinkin' ethics!"). Possible some students got stuck on that idea, though since it was a graduate-level course dominated by Ph.D. candidates, I hope that didn't happen.
I suppose that us high (or secondary, if you prefer) schoolers have taken an AP class before, though I'm about to take the APUSH exam.
Unless the teacher is crafty and/or mischievous, there's definitely one wrong answer included that can be easily eliminated. You can eliminate two with a bit more work, but for most multiple choice questions I essentially have it down to a coin flip. Usually I read the question/check the passage once more for a definite/"gut feeling" answer, but if I'm running out of time I just choose a random choice I haven't eliminated. Of course, sometimes I'm not paying attention, and therefore eliminate the correct answer on accident - yes, sometimes I kick myself for that.
TL;DR: Two answers can usually be eliminated; check the question/passage again for a definite answer, if you can't, then pick based on emotion (gut feeling)
For writing, I tend to prepare a mental outline, but I'll probably have to do this for the APUSH exam. Since one of the DBQ* points involves using content to support a claim, an outline will definitely come in handy for that. Same for the LEQ**, but it's easier to prepare an argument for that (no documents to contend with).
*: Document Based Question. Essentially, seven documents are provided (speeches, photos, ads, letters, etc.) and three out of seven points involve using the documents. One of them is using content from six documents, usually by citing key words, mentioning the spirit of the document (e.g. this is a speech, so how would it influence the author's words?), or summarizing the document and expounding on the values or language of it. I could never quite understand this point, but that's because I confused this with another point, which is using the context/audience/purpose/point of view of a document to support your claim.
**: Long Essay Question. Similar to the DBQ, except no documents are provided, instead a prompt is given and you must support your claim with historical events or trends.
The APUSH exam is definitely nothing I've taken before, as there's a pretty strict time limit placed on the exam (55 minutes multiple choice - 55 questions, 60 minutes on the DBQ (15 reading, 45 writing), 40 minutes on the LEQ, and 40 minutes on nine short answer questions). Of course, I tend to prevent undue stress on myself by not thinking about it too much, and now have to adopt a more liberal sleeping routine (sleeping at 9 or 10 PM versus midnight as I've done recently - I'm a teenager, what do you expect?).
And yes, I gladly admit to using obscure/nuanced vocabulary to BS my way through written assignments in class. After all, repetition is bad, and you do want to sound smart in those essays...
I've only had to do this once, and it was on the ACT. The instructor said not to do this, yet we would be counted off for unanswered questions. Yeah, right! I answered A for all remaining questions.
Quote from: kphoger on May 06, 2019, 04:19:33 PM
I've only had to do this once, and it was on the ACT. The instructor said not to do this, yet we would be counted off for unanswered questions. Yeah, right! I answered A for all remaining questions.
At least you didn't have to take the SAT, which penalizes you for wrong answers verses leaving it blank.
Quote from: Big John on May 06, 2019, 04:26:46 PM
Quote from: kphoger on May 06, 2019, 04:19:33 PM
I've only had to do this once, and it was on the ACT. The instructor said not to do this, yet we would be counted off for unanswered questions. Yeah, right! I answered A for all remaining questions.
At least you didn't have to take the SAT, which penalizes you for wrong answers verses leaving it blank.
Not anymore.
Quote from: noelbotevera on May 06, 2019, 04:09:42 PM
For writing, I tend to prepare a mental outline, but I'll probably have to do this for the APUSH exam. Since one of the DBQ* points involves using content to support a claim, an outline will definitely come in handy for that. Same for the LEQ**, but it's easier to prepare an argument for that (no documents to contend with).
*: Document Based Question. Essentially, seven documents are provided (speeches, photos, ads, letters, etc.) and three out of seven points involve using the documents. One of them is using content from six documents, usually by citing key words, mentioning the spirit of the document (e.g. this is a speech, so how would it influence the author's words?), or summarizing the document and expounding on the values or language of it. I could never quite understand this point, but that's because I confused this with another point, which is using the context/audience/purpose/point of view of a document to support your claim.
**: Long Essay Question. Similar to the DBQ, except no documents are provided, instead a prompt is given and you must support your claim with historical events or trends.
The APUSH exam is definitely nothing I've taken before, as there's a pretty strict time limit placed on the exam (55 minutes multiple choice - 55 questions, 60 minutes on the DBQ (15 reading, 45 writing), 40 minutes on the LEQ, and 40 minutes on nine short answer questions). Of course, I tend to prevent undue stress on myself by not thinking about it too much, and now have to adopt a more liberal sleeping routine (sleeping at 9 or 10 PM versus midnight as I've done recently - I'm a teenager, what do you expect?).
When I took APUSH, the long-time teacher for that class had just retired, and the new teacher didn't actually know the material or how to teach a class. As a result, almost everyone got an A in the class but very few people scored higher than a 3 on the AP test. I forget exactly what our LEQ was, but it was on something we had never covered. I wound up drawing a big American flag in the LEQ answering space and still got a 3 on the exam.
I just took a final where one problem had in its given information that US 93 northbound in Boston has 45K±10K vehicles per hour. (It was a statistics problem, and it was not multiple choice.)
Hate multiple-choice tests unless I'm 100% confident that I've memorized the entire extent of the material. Otherwise, explaining my thoughts allows partial credit, something every professor I've had has given (especially in classes that are largely subjective). It's even nice on math tests (something I've not taken in years), where they ask you to show the work. At least you can get some credit up to the point where you F'ed up!
My general study strategy is to spend a good deal of time the day before going over any study materials, reading over homework and previous tests, preferably with a fellow classmate. Having another classmate to study with is quite helpful in subjective courses, so you can compare/contrast prior responses, see who got the most credit, bounce ideas of one another, etc.
Alternatively, take courses with profs that allow open-book tests! :-D Just make sure to note where the key points are prior to testing, as these profs usually allow a very limited amount of time for testing.
Personally, I think process of elimination is a lot better strategy than picking at random. Even if you know very little of the material, you can at least eliminate one, often two, and then your chances are 33% or 50%, respectively. That's a lot better than 25%, and the effect snowballs over the course of many questions.
Is random guessing on an AP exam really worth it? They deduct 0.2 points for incorrect answers specifically to neutralize random guessing (educated guessing where you can eliminate some choices is still worth it, though).
Not that I ever really did much random guessing on tests. I'm the type of person who could easily maintain a B average even without studying at all. The only reason I bothered was because I wanted a 4.0. There were even classes where my average was above 100% because of extra credit.
Quote from: noelbotevera on May 06, 2019, 04:09:42 PM
I suppose that us high (or secondary, if you prefer) schoolers have taken an AP class before, though I'm about to take the APUSH exam.
Oddly enough, my classmates always referred to that class as "AP American", but the class the following year started calling it APUSH (pronounced "a push") for some reason.
Quote
Unless the teacher is crafty and/or mischievous, there's definitely one wrong answer included that can be easily eliminated. You can eliminate two with a bit more work, but for most multiple choice questions I essentially have it down to a coin flip. Usually I read the question/check the passage once more for a definite/"gut feeling" answer, but if I'm running out of time I just choose a random choice I haven't eliminated. Of course, sometimes I'm not paying attention, and therefore eliminate the correct answer on accident - yes, sometimes I kick myself for that.
Or, if you're lucky, one of the answers is humorous. 7th grade history tests in particular were a lot of fun for this reason. I remember one question where the correct answer was the Green Mountain Boys, but one of the incorrect answers was the Backstreet Boys.
Quote
*: Document Based Question. Essentially, seven documents are provided (speeches, photos, ads, letters, etc.) and three out of seven points involve using the documents. One of them is using content from six documents, usually by citing key words, mentioning the spirit of the document (e.g. this is a speech, so how would it influence the author's words?), or summarizing the document and expounding on the values or language of it. I could never quite understand this point, but that's because I confused this with another point, which is using the context/audience/purpose/point of view of a document to support your claim.
New York also puts these on their social studies standardized tests. The idea is to teach people how to work with and cite scholarly documents to support arguments.
Quote from: jakeroot on May 06, 2019, 07:01:53 PM
Alternatively, take courses with profs that allow open-book tests! :-D Just make sure to note where the key points are prior to testing, as these profs usually allow a very limited amount of time for testing.
That or they make the test harder to compensate.
Quote from: webny99 on May 06, 2019, 09:57:05 PM
Personally, I think process of elimination is a lot better strategy than picking at random. Even if you know very little of the material, you can at least eliminate one, often two, and then your chances are 33% or 50%, respectively. That's a lot better than 25%, and the effect snowballs over the course of many questions.
Exactly, and this is particularly true of AP exams. With correct answers worth 1 point and incorrect answers subtracting 0.2 points, and 5 choices for each question, random guessing will statistically cancel itself out, while educated guessing is a net positive.
Quote from: vdeane on May 06, 2019, 10:49:02 PM
Quote from: jakeroot on May 06, 2019, 07:01:53 PM
Alternatively, take courses with profs that allow open-book tests! :-D Just make sure to note where the key points are prior to testing, as these profs usually allow a very limited amount of time for testing.
That or they make the test harder to compensate.
Yes, I would say that's accurate. But if you know where the answers are, it's just a matter of finding the answer and copying it over (maybe verbatim, maybe not). For the open-book tests I've taken, the professor has given us a huge study sheet of about 50-70 questions. Our job before the test is to find the answer
location for each question. We then bring that sheet to the test, along with all relevant material, and then proceed to compare our study guide to the actual test. The actual test almost always has about 15-20 questions, copied verbatim from the study guide. This rewards the student who familiarised themselves with the material, and penalises those who thought they could do it the day-of, despite having only three minutes per question.
Quote from: vdeane on May 06, 2019, 10:49:02 PM
Is random guessing on an AP exam really worth it? They deduct 0.2 points for incorrect answers specifically to neutralize random guessing (educated guessing where you can eliminate some choices is still worth it, though).
Not that I ever really did much random guessing on tests. I'm the type of person who could easily maintain a B average even without studying at all. The only reason I bothered was because I wanted a 4.0. There were even classes where my average was above 100% because of extra credit.
Quote from: noelbotevera on May 06, 2019, 04:09:42 PM
I suppose that us high (or secondary, if you prefer) schoolers have taken an AP class before, though I'm about to take the APUSH exam.
Oddly enough, my classmates always referred to that class as "AP American", but the class the following year started calling it APUSH (pronounced "a push") for some reason.
Quote
*: Document Based Question. Essentially, seven documents are provided (speeches, photos, ads, letters, etc.) and three out of seven points involve using the documents. One of them is using content from six documents, usually by citing key words, mentioning the spirit of the document (e.g. this is a speech, so how would it influence the author's words?), or summarizing the document and expounding on the values or language of it. I could never quite understand this point, but that's because I confused this with another point, which is using the context/audience/purpose/point of view of a document to support your claim.
New York also puts these on their social studies standardized tests. The idea is to teach people how to work with and cite scholarly documents to support arguments.
Replying to a few points you've made:
I believe the APUSH exam is standardized worldwide, so I think the point penalty you're referring to no longer applies to the current format (they revamped it in 2016; for example, the multiple choice was decreased from 80 to 55 questions, but all 55 questions refer to a stimulus (i.e. speech, chart, map, graph, etc.)). I suppose New York had to be the Mongols.
I suppose there was a name change in your school somewhere along the line, because the class and the exam has been called APUSH as far back as 1996.
I'm also surprised New York does a form of the DBQ; by any chance, are they similar? The other four DBQ points are a claim, context (describe the time period prior to/during/after the time period listed on the prompt), outside evidence (name a historical event not mentioned in the documents & support your claim), and complexity (provide nuance; either by undermining an opposing viewpoint or linking the prompt to another APUSH theme or time period)
When I took the AP US History exam in high school, that was what it was called (we didn't shorten it to "APUSH"), and it was in substantially the same format as it is today--multiple-choice followed by essays.
If I had my high school career to do over again, one of the key things I would change is the loading of AP courses. If memory serves, I took one AP exam as a sophomore (Calculus BC), two AP exams (one of which was US History) as a junior, and then six AP exams as a senior. Six in one year was too many and I think all of the scores I received that were not 5 were from exams taken that year. I would sequence the exams with an eye to how lumpy they and the underlying coursework are. AP Chemistry is much more difficult than AP US History, for example, largely because the lab component can't really be accommodated in one hour each day adding up to five hours per week over a school year. Our instructor did his best by talking the school into one hour on Tuesdays and Thursdays before the usual start time, but even that was not enough. On the other hand, AP Psychology proved to be quite an easy exam, and I got a 5 on it with a modest amount of independent study.
I would also canvass the testing-out policies of the universities I was considering applying to. One of the AP exams I took, Physics B, was useless for testing out of Engineering Physics (required for physics majors, though others could take easier classes to satisfy distribution requirements); I ended up taking two semesters of Engineering Physics (and testing out of a third by special arrangement) just to clear the requirement after I had already been taking upper-division courses for a year. Meanwhile, testing-out options at many universities are not limited to AP or even a combination of AP or IB. My math major came with a statistics requirement that I knocked off by acing a DOD aptitude test that is given to service personnel.
I think I entered KSU with around 40 hours of test-out credit. I think one of my high-school classmates entered with a similar number of hours, but from a different combination of courses (e.g., she did AP European History through independent study). The then standing record-holder in terms of test-out credit was a woman with (if memory serves) between 60 and 70 hours who later went to Oxford on a Marshall scholarship.
Thanks for your thoughts on testing! It's really I interesting to see all the responses.
Just to add a few points, they don't count off for wrong answers on AP Calc 1 (at least) anymore, and thank god, cause I would be screwed if it did. I also choose C because according to my 6th grade math teacher, it was the most likely, and it just kind of stuck.
Apperently a lot of you took A PUSH, and you should be proud of that. My history teacher is scared of teaching AP due to him not liking how difficult the tests are lol.
Also, J N Winkler, I'm sorry about having to take SIX(!) AP exams in one year. I can barely handle 1!
APUSH was a fun test. I had the exact opposite experience of US 89...Taught by a 30+ year teacher in his Penultimate year before retirement...
He was so familiar with the test format he correctly guessed the DBQ topic by the time we started the year, my junior year. So extra class time was spent on that subject when we got to that point on the timeline (I believe it was Post-WWII and the formation of the Truman Doctrine and Containment of Communism, but I have slept since Jr year of HS, only ~18 years ago). But historically to that point the teacher typically did not get beyond WWII into the Cold War until after the AP Test date...so some shuffling was done to make sure we got to the beginning of the Cold War...Also had the benefit of being one of the most recent units that had been closely studied, before a quick year-long summary and a run or two of practice tests
That said, that familiarity was also a bit of a cost, as the non-DBQ essay was on the Womens Rights Movement...which the teacher skimmed over, since he pretty much explicitly knew it would NOT be the DBQ, at it had been the year before. But if memory serves, the DBQ was a bigger part of the overall score than the other essay - no idea if that is still the case
Basically, he taught the class for taking the test
The two AP tests that got me were the English ones...don't remember which was which, but I took 2 separate ones Jr and Sr years...it felt like turning in a test, hoping for a C, and thats about accurate
Quote from: vdeane on May 06, 2019, 10:49:02 PM
Not that I ever really did much random guessing on tests. I'm the type of person who could easily maintain a B average even without studying at all. The only reason I bothered was because I wanted a 4.0. There were even classes where my average was above 100% because of extra credit.
Yeah, I could basically say the exact same thing. Stuff like history and English I could usually ace thanks to memory alone. Math was similar, except it was the process that you had to remember, not a snapshot of the textbook page. I had a string of not-so-good science teachers, so that was far and away the class in which I made up the most answers as I went.
Re: extra credit, the only difference with me is that I was usually too lazy to do it unless I actually needed it - which was fairly rare by my own standards :)
Quote from: vdeane on May 06, 2019, 10:49:02 PM
Or, if you're lucky, one of the answers is humorous.
Yes! I enjoyed it when one of the choices was funny, because it created a sense of equality with the teacher. There were also times when I felt like I was the only one that got the joke - also rewarding.
Quote from: MCRoads on May 07, 2019, 01:24:38 AMAlso, J N Winkler, I'm sorry about having to take SIX(!) AP exams in one year. I can barely handle 1!
Be glad you aren't in England!
I did 11 GCSEs in my sophomore year-equivalent (Well 10, as I'd done maths early and was getting an odd bonus qualification). The typical amount is more like 8 or 9 - still a lot of exams though. OK, it wasn't crammed into 10 days of exams like AP (instead spread out over 4-5 weeks). Nor was it AP level (well, other than the bonus maths qualification I got) - though you obviously rarely see someone in the US take a load of AP exams aged 16 as they aren't at that level yet! Arguably the requirements to get a top grade then were close to getting a decent grade on a higher level. My GCSE maths coursework was basically to go from first principles to coming up with the formula for differentiating polynomials (because we were given the hardest task, as the mark needed was lower for getting the top grade, due to that higher level), which meant the calculus stuff that was AP Calc AB-equivalent in that bonus qualification (which was more broad than just calc) was a doddle, as we knew the principles and concepts, and had the formula!
There were two weeks where I did 6 or 7 exams that week (pretty much all subjects had two or three exams each) covering a broad array of subjects (which was the issue I felt the most that year - just being spread so thin covering so many different topics). There might have been one day where I sat exams in three different subjects - certainly I remember there being a clash (which is quite common), meaning we had to remain siloed from the outside world between the time we were meant to take the exam and the time we did take the exam - we basically did them back-to-back with a 15 minute break, but you do get stories about people having to spend the night under supervision (not exam conditions, but the inability to have any remote chance of communicating with anyone who might tell you what's on the exam you are sitting time-delayed).
And obviously, having done the equivalent of graduating High School at 16 (5 GCSEs grade C or above), plus a bit more, above average students move on to only taking higher-level classes (unless they don't have maths or english at GCSE C-or-above equivalent level - they are compulsory for 16-18s until they get it).
So, junior year-equivalent, I did the first half of my A levels (college entry looked at the grades from these exams, your GCSEs, and your predicted grades for senior year for academic skill. Offers of acceptance are usually conditional on final A-level grades which come out mid-August for starting college in late-September, though they might lower those conditions if you just miss out). 4 subjects (OK most do 3), 2 exams at roughly AP-standard each (typically back to back) if not a little higher in level and broader in scope, and a month to have the exams in. The second Tuesday I had Chemistry (x2) in the morning and Electronics (x2) in the afternoon. Maths was one each on Thursday and Friday, and Physics (x2) the Monday. 8 exams in 5 days! Senior year was less bunched, thankfully (though now all the exams are then, but there are fewer, longer, ones).
I know I've got overkill qualifications from that time of my life, but even the average High Schooler in the UK takes a ton of hard exams, and this isn't counting ones schools might choose to create, set and mark themselves to give grades that count for nothing beyond internal measurement. There's a reason JK Rowling called her A-level equivalents NEWTs (Nasty Exhausting Wizarding Tests)!
Quote from: english si on May 07, 2019, 09:42:56 AM
Quote from: MCRoads on May 07, 2019, 01:24:38 AMAlso, J N Winkler, I'm sorry about having to take SIX(!) AP exams in one year. I can barely handle 1!
Be glad you aren't in England!
I did 11 GCSEs in my sophomore year-equivalent (Well 10, as I'd done maths early and was getting an odd bonus qualification). The typical amount is more like 8 or 9 - still a lot of exams though. OK, it wasn't crammed into 10 days of exams like AP (instead spread out over 4-5 weeks). Nor was it AP level (well, other than the bonus maths qualification I got) - though you obviously rarely see someone in the US take a load of AP exams aged 16 as they aren't at that level yet! Arguably the requirements to get a top grade then were close to getting a decent grade on a higher level. My GCSE maths coursework was basically to go from first principles to coming up with the formula for differentiating polynomials (because we were given the hardest task, as the mark needed was lower for getting the top grade, due to that higher level), which meant the calculus stuff that was AP Calc AB-equivalent in that bonus qualification (which was more broad than just calc) was a doddle, as we knew the principles and concepts, and had the formula!
There were two weeks where I did 6 or 7 exams that week (pretty much all subjects had two or three exams each) covering a broad array of subjects (which was the issue I felt the most that year - just being spread so thin covering so many different topics). There might have been one day where I sat exams in three different subjects - certainly I remember there being a clash (which is quite common), meaning we had to remain siloed from the outside world between the time we were meant to take the exam and the time we did take the exam - we basically did them back-to-back with a 15 minute break, but you do get stories about people having to spend the night under supervision (not exam conditions, but the inability to have any remote chance of communicating with anyone who might tell you what's on the exam you are sitting time-delayed).
I went to a private school and we did quite a bit of UK curriculum, thus I too have been through many GCSE and CIE exams. I believe I had 16 exams in my sophomore year and almost as many in my junior and senior years. I really enjoyed reading your post - it brought back many memories!
Quote from: MCRoads on May 06, 2019, 12:00:17 PM
It's Exam time for those of us still in the midst of our education career, YAY!
Ok, so what do you do before/on tests to make sure you do your best? I am taking the AB Calc AP test soon, and based on mock exams based on previous tests, have developed a strategy: If all else fails, GUESS C! I dont know why, but C has a higher percentage of right answers (at least on AP exams), so I just guess C. Also, on most tests, you dont get deducted points if your wrong, but you cant get points on questions you leve blank. So if you are running out of time, guess C on the rest. I did this, and I actually got MORE RIGHT on the questions I guessed, then I got wrong.
As for what I do before the test, I study for a reasonable time, then I take a break for the rest of the night, as I can get SUPER stressed out about tests. I'm not sure if you guys can relate, but that is just what I do best.
What are your thoughts on exams?
I have specific experience on this exam. The thing to recognize is that, for some multiple choice answers, it may be easier to verify the provided answers than to arrive at the correct answer on your own. Also, the exam creators do their best to make common mistakes in order to arrive at the wrong answers.
One test strategy, especially for the AB is to be able quickly recognize "zero" and "infinity" as answers. 15*pi*sqrt(3) could be a right answer, but it is much easier to rule zero and infinity (and sometimes one, pi, and e) in or out.
You also should check the "conditions of contest" on the exam. I believe that the AP exam in 1977 deducted the expected value of a guess for each wrong multiple choice answer. So, if there were 5 answers, a right answer scored +4 and a wrong answer scored -1. So, with random guesses on 50 questions, you would get 10 right and 40 wrong for a net of 0. If there is a penalty such as this, my advice would DON'T GUESS.
I also considered the multiple choice portion of the test more difficult than the long answer portion. The reasons is that there are simply more questions to answer on the multiple choice portion.
Quote from: ilpt4u on May 07, 2019, 03:13:20 AM
The two AP tests that got me were the English ones...don't remember which was which, but I took 2 separate ones Jr and Sr years...it felt like turning in a test, hoping for a C, and thats about accurate
I felt the exact same way when I took AP Lit junior year and AP Lang senior year. Don't remember much from Lang, but the third essay question on Lit was very memorable. That's the one where they give you a topic and then a list of suggested books, from which you pick one to relate to the essay topic. Well, turns out our class hadn't read any of the suggested books. I wound up writing the essay about Moby-Dick because our teacher had spent the most time on it. (Looking back, I think she had an unhealthy obsession with that book.)
Did anyone else just straight-up take college courses in high school? My 11th and 12th grades were at a community college, earning college credit. I would have graduated with an AA but I didn't get credit in all of my classes. Turns out, college requires a bit more discipline than getting on a school bus to go to high school.
I actually found my first semester of college to be not that much different from high school, at least regarding how classes were taught. (Surprisingly, I had no lectures my first semester.)
Quote from: jakeroot on May 07, 2019, 10:55:13 AM
Did anyone else just straight-up take college courses in high school? My 11th and 12th grades were at a community college, earning college credit. I would have graduated with an AA but I didn't get credit in all of my classes. Turns out, college requires a bit more discipline than getting on a school bus to go to high school.
I am taking a collage level corse,just not in collage though. At my old school (before I moved), I would be concurrently enrolled tho, as they only go to precancerous in their math dept.
Quote from: jakeroot on May 07, 2019, 10:55:13 AMDid anyone else just straight-up take college courses in high school? My 11th and 12th grades were at a community college, earning college credit. I would have graduated with an AA but I didn't get credit in all of my classes. Turns out, college requires a bit more discipline than getting on a school bus to go to high school.
I never did--it was not an attractive option because it would have added another attendance center I had to visit at least once a week, and my high school was already on the opposite side of a medium-sized city--but I've heard of former high school classmates whose children now do that. I also talk occasionally with a parent who home-schools and pushes her children to get their associate's degrees by the time they reach high school graduation age.
College is not unlike high school in that lower-division courses are about seat time. Moreover, you are also staking your GPA, which is a big deal if you plan graduate study as a traditional student because many scholarship programs have GPA cutoffs. If you have the self-discipline and the intellectual capacity, testing out for credit after a period of self-directed independent study is more time-efficient and the stakes involved are lower since failure to meet the test score cutoff for credit will not affect your GPA.
Entry-level college does teach soft skills, such as accommodating unreasonable professors, that are useful in workplaces with layered management structures. But as a general rule, your success or otherwise in any intellectual endeavor will hinge on your ability to teach yourself things when there is no external taskmaster to motivate you.
Quote from: J N Winkler on May 07, 2019, 12:02:02 PM
Entry-level college does teach soft skills, such as accommodating unreasonable professors, that are useful in workplaces with layered management structures. But as a general rule, your success or otherwise in any intellectual endeavor will hinge on your ability to teach yourself things when there is no external taskmaster to motivate you.
Part of me thinks the program I did was a bad idea, but in the end, I graduated high school fully understanding all the complexities of college. Plus, I had 80 credits all of which would likely transfer to another local college. My GPA went down over time, but has since gone way back up. That's one of the tougher things, as you're affecting your college GPA when you may not be able to handle the pressure. If you can, and readily seek assistance when required, it's awesome how much money it can save you. But it's not always worth it, if you lack the drive (as you'll end up digging yourself a hole).
You also have to be really social, as you'll leave a lot of friends behind. Along with clubs, sports, etc. You can still participate in them, but it's harder with such strange schedules.
The last exam I took was the MPRE as part of the bar exam in 1998, but plumbing the depths of memory, I recall there were almost always throwaway answers intended to entice stupid people. For example, tests like the SAT with fill-in-the-blank questions would include obviously incorrect choices like "would have" or "should have," which anyone taking the SAT should presumably be educated enough to recognize as nonsensical. The multiple-choice part of the bar exam always has constitutional law questions where "General Welfare Clause" is an option, and it's obviously false because there is no "General Welfare Clause" in the US Constitution.
Things like that are easy. I used to get irrationally worried if there were too many of the same letter response in a row (five "D" answers, say), even if I knew they were all correct. If I genuinely didn't know, I'd usually skip the question and come back to it because sometimes a later answer might make me think of something. Or I'd do as Oscar describes, narrowing it down and then making an educated guess. If I were about to run out of time I'd just guess if needed.
I can't say I really remember AP exams in any detail. I took them, of course; I took five of them my senior year (English, European history, US government, comparative government, and Latin lyric poetry) and three my junior year (US history, Latin Vergil, and Calculus BC), but I'll be damned if I can remember what all of them were. I did OK on them because I started college with a full year's worth of credit from those AP exams, 29 hours of credit, but I also recall my junior year I got a "1" on the Calculus BC exam. I told my parents it was a waste of money for me to take that exam based on my bad grades in math classes, but they insisted.
When I was doing my doctoral classwork in the early '90's, there was a comprehensive exam at the end of the first year that one had to pass before the second phase of classes -- and then another after all one's classes were completed and prior to even discussing your dissertation. Since those who started at the same time as myself were grouped into a "cohort" -- 16 strong -- we spent much of the summer having strategy meetings before the initial test, held the last week of August just prior to the beginning of classes. Rather than pour over all the material from all the common classes (the first if not feasible prospect), we decided (and apparently were the first cohort to do so) to ascertain common threads permeating those classes, some of which clearly indicated common biases among the faculty. From that we synthesized "themes" that repeatedly popped up (this was a public policy program). The prior pass rate (according to the program's dean) was about 65-70% -- but 15 out of 16 passed; the only one who didn't had missed a substantial number of classes because of personal/family issues. Seeing as how the questions posed on the test actually did reflect a composite set of faculty preferences as to both subject matter and POV, it was a decidedly sound strategy.
Since the 2nd test was tailored by those faculty you'd selected for your dissertation committee -- after the 2nd year classes in your chosen area of interest, we were individually on our own. That one was tough -- a written exam followed by an oral defense. I scraped by OK -- but it definitely gave me ideas about where my dissertation should & shouldn't tread!
Quote from: noelbotevera on May 06, 2019, 11:13:13 PM
I suppose there was a name change in your school somewhere along the line, because the class and the exam has been called APUSH as far back as 1996.
Maybe. It was always "AP United States History" since I started; shortening it to "AP American" might just be because many people would later take AP European History (shortened to simply "Euro"). We might not have had as developed a culture for AP classes as was typical; I don't think I ever heard of someone taking six AP classes in one year, for example (which would actually be an AP for every single class, if they kept a free period for lunch). There were a few anomalies in terms of corresponding classes to exams; we didn't have an AP World History class, but the exam was offered to everyone in 10th grade social studies (it was meant for the enriched section students, but everyone was offered the chance to take it) because NY's curriculum is similar. The AP Comparative and US Government exams are also combined into a single AP Government and Politics course (AKA "AP Gov/Pol").
Quote
I'm also surprised New York does a form of the DBQ; by any chance, are they similar? The other four DBQ points are a claim, context (describe the time period prior to/during/after the time period listed on the prompt), outside evidence (name a historical event not mentioned in the documents & support your claim), and complexity (provide nuance; either by undermining an opposing viewpoint or linking the prompt to another APUSH theme or time period)
It's reasonably similar. Same basic format, at least. It's been 10-11 years since I've dealt with one, though.
^^^^^
I recall when I was in high school, the AP Government class was a single class with two AP exams. The US portion was one of the easiest classes I ever took at any level of school. I recall the European history course's full name as being AP Modern European History because the teacher usually abbreviated it as "APMEH"; most of us called it "AP European." (The teacher noted how it was "the ultimate high school elective class" because it was not required for anything, and indeed one guy took it pass/fail. I didn't do that because I wanted the extra .5 of a point on my GPA to help make up for my math grades. I should have taken calculus pass/fail.)
Man, I hadn't thought much about high school in many years. I'm not so sure I like that this thread is prompting me to think about it. On the whole it's not prompting bad memories, but thoughts of those years sometimes take me to a very dark place in my memories.
Nothing remotely similar to "Modern European History" was even taught in my school. Hell, we couldn't even get modern American history–every history class just rehashed the same period from 1776 to about 1870 or so.
Quote from: sparker on May 08, 2019, 03:20:49 AM
When I was doing my doctoral classwork in the early '90's, there was a comprehensive exam at the end of the first year that one had to pass before the second phase of classes -- and then another after all one's classes were completed and prior to even discussing your dissertation. Since those who started at the same time as myself were grouped into a "cohort" -- 16 strong -- we spent much of the summer having strategy meetings before the initial test, held the last week of August just prior to the beginning of classes. Rather than pour over all the material from all the common classes (the first if not feasible prospect), we decided (and apparently were the first cohort to do so) to ascertain common threads permeating those classes, some of which clearly indicated common biases among the faculty. From that we synthesized "themes" that repeatedly popped up (this was a public policy program). The prior pass rate (according to the program's dean) was about 65-70% -- but 15 out of 16 passed; the only one who didn't had missed a substantial number of classes because of personal/family issues. Seeing as how the questions posed on the test actually did reflect a composite set of faculty preferences as to both subject matter and POV, it was a decidedly sound strategy.
Since the 2nd test was tailored by those faculty you'd selected for your dissertation committee -- after the 2nd year classes in your chosen area of interest, we were individually on our own. That one was tough -- a written exam followed by an oral defense. I scraped by OK -- but it definitely gave me ideas about where my dissertation should & shouldn't tread!
This sort of underscores my belief that I've expressed in previous threads that American education is broken by focusing too much on tests and not on whether anyone has actually learned the material–you got a good grade by focusing effort on learning the quirks of the staff rather than what they were trying to teach you!
Quote from: Scott5114 on May 09, 2019, 02:43:32 AMNothing remotely similar to "Modern European History" was even taught in my school. Hell, we couldn't even get modern American history–every history class just rehashed the same period from 1776 to about 1870 or so.
In my high school, the college preparatory curriculum (I am not sure about the requirements for others) called for one year of World History and two years of US History with the year break being placed at around 1865 and the second year doubling as preparation for the AP US History exam. I felt I was idling in World History, which did not tell me much that I did not already know, and I wonder if my time would not have been better spent doing AP European History as an independent study.
Quote from: Scott5114 on May 09, 2019, 02:43:32 AMThis sort of underscores my belief that I've expressed in previous threads that American education is broken by focusing too much on tests and not on whether anyone has actually learned the material–you got a good grade by focusing effort on learning the quirks of the staff rather than what they were trying to teach you!
One criticism I often hear--and I believe there is some truth to it--is that formal K-12 education in the US is generally about preparing students to take direction from hierarchical superiors in occupational settings.
Quote from: Scott5114 on May 09, 2019, 02:43:32 AM
Nothing remotely similar to "Modern European History" was even taught in my school. Hell, we couldn't even get modern American history–every history class just rehashed the same period from 1776 to about 1870 or so.
Quote from: sparker on May 08, 2019, 03:20:49 AM
When I was doing my doctoral classwork in the early '90's, there was a comprehensive exam at the end of the first year that one had to pass before the second phase of classes -- and then another after all one's classes were completed and prior to even discussing your dissertation. Since those who started at the same time as myself were grouped into a "cohort" -- 16 strong -- we spent much of the summer having strategy meetings before the initial test, held the last week of August just prior to the beginning of classes. Rather than pour over all the material from all the common classes (the first if not feasible prospect), we decided (and apparently were the first cohort to do so) to ascertain common threads permeating those classes, some of which clearly indicated common biases among the faculty. From that we synthesized "themes" that repeatedly popped up (this was a public policy program). The prior pass rate (according to the program's dean) was about 65-70% -- but 15 out of 16 passed; the only one who didn't had missed a substantial number of classes because of personal/family issues. Seeing as how the questions posed on the test actually did reflect a composite set of faculty preferences as to both subject matter and POV, it was a decidedly sound strategy.
Since the 2nd test was tailored by those faculty you'd selected for your dissertation committee -- after the 2nd year classes in your chosen area of interest, we were individually on our own. That one was tough -- a written exam followed by an oral defense. I scraped by OK -- but it definitely gave me ideas about where my dissertation should & shouldn't tread!
This sort of underscores my belief that I've expressed in previous threads that American education is broken by focusing too much on tests and not on whether anyone has actually learned the material–you got a good grade by focusing effort on learning the quirks of the staff rather than what they were trying to teach you!
In this case, we had to comprehend and analyze the material that had been presented to us during core coursework -- I should have prefaced this with the notation that the first year concentrated on
core subjects rather than independent studies -- although the core constituted 2/3 of the classes taken the first year and could be augmented by initial electives. What the concentration of our summer study group regarding
themes common to the core classes as presented by the professors actually accomplished was not to bypass the actual learning of the material but rather to anticipate the questions asked and how they would be phrased (these were all essay exams rather than simple choices). Trust me on this -- once we determined
what was going to be asked, we doubled down on that material -- which constituted a high percentage of the actual nine months' worth of classwork -- but with the advantage that we determined
how it would be asked -- and the basic direction of the responses that the exam graders would prefer.
The rationale for doing so was quite simple and straightforward: we were all going for our PhD's; if we couldn't realistically analyze the test process itself, we probably didn't belong at that level. Clearly, 93+% of us did!
I think part of the issue with US history is that a lot of teachers overestimate how much time they have and dawdle too much on the colonial era.
It's not totally unique to that sort of thing, though: In college I took Julian Bond's course on the Civil Rights Movement and he freely admitted that he spent too much time on the Montgomery Bus Boycott (in his inimitable fashion, he said, "The one thing that I did wrong, I focused on Montgomery for far too long," in a sendup of the lyrics to "Eyes on the Prize" ).
Quote from: Scott5114 on May 09, 2019, 02:43:32 AM
This sort of underscores my belief that I've expressed in previous threads that American education is broken by focusing too much on tests and not on whether anyone has actually learned the material–you got a good grade by focusing effort on learning the quirks of the staff rather than what they were trying to teach you!
To be fair, I think a lot of developed countries suffer from this issue. I've noticed that Britain seems like a testaholic, considering the amount of GSCE's that other forum members took (seriously, 16 exams almost on par with the AP tests?). China (and I believe Japan) have less tests, but they are difficult - it's rumored that even the elderly, who have studied for decades, still fail at exams like the civil service exams. Can't say about Canada, though I do know for a fact that you have to study French, which is a difficult language. Other European countries I'd imagine would also have some kind of rigorous standardized test in some form or another, that an alumni would have to take somewhere down the line.
Quote from: J N Winkler on May 09, 2019, 11:34:15 AM
Quote from: Scott5114 on May 09, 2019, 02:43:32 AM
This sort of underscores my belief that I've expressed in previous threads that American education is broken by focusing too much on tests and not on whether anyone has actually learned the material–you got a good grade by focusing effort on learning the quirks of the staff rather than what they were trying to teach you!
One criticism I often hear--and I believe there is some truth to it--is that formal K-12 education in the US is generally about preparing students to take direction from hierarchical superiors in occupational settings.
I don't know how you could structure school any other way.
I have a great relationship with pretty much every professor that I've met, but in the end, there's still some form of a test: written, oral, presentation, film, etc. There has to be some way for a superior to decide if you're worthy of both receiving credit for, and succeeding beyond, said course.
I do have one professor who, fortunately for me, is also the director of my department. He has admitted, straight up, that he does
not believe in memorisation; remember the material for reference during the test, and you're good. Still though, there's a test, and he's ultimately a superior to me, and makes the call whether I pass or fail. If there's one thing Boeing's taught us, it's that self-certification may not always be a good thing!
Quote from: jakeroot on May 09, 2019, 03:44:45 PM
Quote from: J N Winkler on May 09, 2019, 11:34:15 AM
Quote from: Scott5114 on May 09, 2019, 02:43:32 AM
This sort of underscores my belief that I've expressed in previous threads that American education is broken by focusing too much on tests and not on whether anyone has actually learned the material–you got a good grade by focusing effort on learning the quirks of the staff rather than what they were trying to teach you!
One criticism I often hear--and I believe there is some truth to it--is that formal K-12 education in the US is generally about preparing students to take direction from hierarchical superiors in occupational settings.
I don't know how you could structure school any other way.
I have a great relationship with pretty much every professor that I've met, but in the end, there's still some form of a test: written, oral, presentation, film, etc. There has to be some way for a superior to decide if you're worthy of both receiving credit for, and succeeding beyond, said course.
I had one English teacher who did book reports in an unorthodox way. The day they were due, she would sequester each student in a storage closet and conduct a short interview about the book. As she allowed us to select nearly any book (within reason), most of the books we were reading she hadn't read herself. However, she conducted the interview much like a prosecutor would, allowing the student to state a summary of the book and interjecting with follow-up questions, when appropriate, to try to test the student's familiarity with the book. She was, on more than one occasion, able to catch a student in enough inconsistencies that she could determine that they had not actually read the book and were trying to BS it.
I feel like a similar approach, with a small panel of subject-matter experts, ideally provided by an authority independent of the school district (to reduce favoritism toward whoever's on the football team, or against a student that annoys the teachers), would be most likely to be able to actually ascertain whether a student knew the material or not as a final exam. And it would allow some humanity into the equation. A well-trained interviewer should be able to determine that while a student may allow some of the details of a historical event like dates and names of minor players to slip, they do have a knowledge of the key narrative of the event (what happened, causes leading up to it, effects going forward). Or they may forget minor scenes in a work of fiction but still grasp the overall plot and themes. That kind of insight is practically impossible to distill down into a numerical score, but it is what we're really after when we educate students.
But paying a guy at the state board of education $30,000/year to run Scantrons through the machine is cheaper and easier, and don't we all just want to go home and have a beer?
Quote from: Scott5114 on May 09, 2019, 07:23:16 PM
I had one English teacher who did book reports in an unorthodox way.
In seminary, my dad had a professor who was known to throw the stack of papers down a stairwell and then grade them based on where they landed. It became a known strategy for students to write a decent number of pages, then simply photocopy those several of those pages and attach them to the end a few times–in order to make their paper heavier and thus more likely to go far down the stairs, while still being difficult to detect if the prof chose to thumb through them briefly before "grading".
Quote from: kphoger on May 10, 2019, 12:56:42 PMIn seminary, my dad had a professor who was known to throw the stack of papers down a stairwell and then grade them based on where they landed. It became a known strategy for students to write a decent number of pages, then simply photocopy those several of those pages and attach them to the end a few times–in order to make their paper heavier and thus more likely to go far down the stairs, while still being difficult to detect if the prof chose to thumb through them briefly before "grading".
My mother remembered a professor she had (not sure whether as an undergraduate or a graduate student) who lectured by reading notes that were so old the paper was yellowed.
One side effect of the current focus on research that is somewhat beneficial to students looking to maintain a good GPA is that some professors see grading as time taken away from research and thus consider that you have an A unless you provide them with a compelling reason not to give you one.
During the course of that same doctoral program there was a 3-class progression covering statistical analysis. To pass the series one had to average a 3.33 GPA or have to retake the lowest-graded section. The instructor for the first section was a particular piece of work -- a combination of OCD with a disdain for those taking the class; none of our cohort came out with anything higher than a B+! But the instructor for the remaining two courses, who had been a Census Bureau statistical hotshot for most of his life, took us aside individually and asked us what we needed as a grade for his two sections to get through the curriculum. As for me, I simply said a B+ for one and an A- for the other would suffice (leaving a little room for unforeseen disaster); he jotted that down and said that would be fine -- but just don't tank the final (he and the first instructor didn't get along particularly well). As it ended up, I got A- for both of his sections, so I got through OK. Bought a stat program soon afterwards; never had to do the raw math for regression analysis again (but I still have the textbooks in case something crashes!). It's always nice when instructors and students do not become classified as adversaries!
Quote from: webny99 on May 06, 2019, 09:57:05 PM
Personally, I think process of elimination is a lot better strategy than picking at random. Even if you know very little of the material, you can at least eliminate one, often two, and then your chances are 33% or 50%, respectively. That's a lot better than 25%, and the effect snowballs over the course of many questions.
I agree. I can do very well on most exams because I can do this very well. The worst exam I have ever taken is a professional one on Muni bonds. It's about 1 percent of my job and the material is bone dry. I've failed this twice.
Quote from: 1 on May 06, 2019, 05:58:37 PM
I just took a final where one problem had in its given information that US 93 northbound in Boston has 45K±10K vehicles per hour. (It was a statistics problem, and it was not multiple choice.)
Nice to see my alma mater has no better grasp on road geography than it had 20 years ago.
Quote from: jon daly on May 10, 2019, 11:01:47 PM
Quote from: webny99 on May 06, 2019, 09:57:05 PM
Personally, I think process of elimination is a lot better strategy than picking at random. Even if you know very little of the material, you can at least eliminate one, often two, and then your chances are 33% or 50%, respectively. That's a lot better than 25%, and the effect snowballs over the course of many questions.
I agree. I can do very well on most exams because I can do this very well.
When I took the ACT, that wasn't an option. It was more a case of the proctor saying there was one minute remaining, then I marked 'A' for all the questions I hadn't gotten to yet. (I only had to do that for one section, as I completed all the others on time.)
When my dad took the ACT, he had just finished moving the day before and didn't feel like spending the energy on the test that was required. So he didn't read the questions–only the answers, then picked which answer sounded good to him. He placed into advanced physics and remedial English. He had never before taken a single physics class, and he was enrolling with an English literature concentration. (bad strategy)
Quote from: jakeroot on May 07, 2019, 10:55:13 AM
Did anyone else just straight-up take college courses in high school? My 11th and 12th grades were at a community college, earning college credit. I would have graduated with an AA but I didn't get credit in all of my classes. Turns out, college requires a bit more discipline than getting on a school bus to go to high school.
Yep. After finishing the AP Calculus exam in my junior year. Besides, the state university was closer to my house than my high school.
Quote from: jakeroot on May 07, 2019, 10:55:13 AM
Did anyone else just straight-up take college courses in high school? My 11th and 12th grades were at a community college, earning college credit. I would have graduated with an AA but I didn't get credit in all of my classes. Turns out, college requires a bit more discipline than getting on a school bus to go to high school.
Back in 1967, my school district allowed any senior who had completed the core curriculum and who had already been accepted to a 4-year college to take one or two classes their final (spring) semester at the local JC. I did so, selecting an economics class (the first of many) and a class in musical theory -- the latter having been taught by the conductor of the local (Glendale, CA) symphony. Fortunately, the classes were accepted by UC as lower-division credits. Since it was only a 15-minute drive to the college, it was a hell of a lot better than sticking around my HS (which was being rebuilt at the time and was a full-on construction zone, complete with dust & noise). All in all, a good experience.
Quote from: noelbotevera on December 08, 1974, 08:57:05 AM(seriously, 16 exams almost on par with the AP tests?).
I don't know where you got 16 from, though that's an average number (mostly two exams per subject) and the age you take them. None multiple choice. Not quite almost on a par with AP level if you getting that top grade (but starting on it, for sure), and a passing grade is quite a bit lower in difficulty.
And, of course, the default for most (and typically a requirement is to take the equivalent of 6 AP levels in the next two years. But I think it's more like 9, especially when you factor in that A levels go further because an AP course is (generously) worth half the UCAS points of an A level and the second half is a step up. A levels are also broader as well as deeper. It's AP Calc - just one branch of Pure maths while I did modules in Pure maths (and Mechanics and Statistics and nearly did Decision Maths until I saw that D1 was all wordy stuff, and Boolean Algebra didn't start until D2, so M3 it was!) that had trig, vectors, etc in it too.
Worth noting too is to read the question carefully to understand exactly what is being asked. I teach a payroll course every summer, and on my practice exams I always include a couple "which of the following is not true"-type multiple-choice questions. I always catch at least a few people who automatically select the first true statement they recognize. I don't do it to be a jerk, but to emphasize the point of comprehension.
RTQ (read the question) was something they hammered into us as part of exam prep at 16 (and 17 and 18 and beyond). We took practise exams in the January, not really having seen a paper before, and the amount of feedback I got that was "you know the stuff, but you aren't turning that into marks". It took quite a lot of old papers to get rid of certain teachers writing RTQ at least once ony paper.
It was worth at least a grade in subjects I was good at to learn to write answers that ticked the boxes of what the markers were after. 5 marks means you need to give 5 points. Make sure you explicitly answer the question as asked*. Don't get bogged down writing in full sentences (English exams excepted) unless you get all your points in - the extra mark or two overall isn't worth losing a mark or two on each question...
*At level 6 (last year of uni) I shared courses with people who had degrees in other subjects taking the post-grad diploma course. For some of them RTQ was still a problem despite them having Bachelors Degrees and the lecturers making a point of spending a couple of minutes on each essay question about what sort of thing they wanted as well as offering to go through any essay outline or answer any questions about the assignments.
For years, placement on registers for Kentucky merit system (civil service) jobs was dependent on multiple-choice (with some true-false questions) test scores. You had to be in the top five to be on a register and thus eligible for employment. When I first interviewed for a job in state government, I know the supervisor was desperate to fill the position. However, I blew the interview out of the water and she told me that she was going to hire me, and all I had to do was get on the register. I took the test, and most of the questions were fairly easy, but it was obvious that for a few of the questions, there were two correct answers and one was more right than the other. I took the test several times and came up one point short each time. I had to go back and try to figure out which answer of the two was the one they were looking for, and probably changed as many from right to wrong as I did from wrong to right. I finally got the score I needed to make the register and got hired shortly thereafter.
That process has since been changed. Tests are no longer required, which is good because back then, if you couldn't test in Frankfort on a weekday, you had to register for a Saturday test that was held only periodically in certain places in the state. (I ended up successfully getting the score I needed at a test in Bowling Green). Now, it's based solely on experience and education, and they give your resume or job application a serious going-over to determine eligibility.
Every multiple choice test tests two things:
1) How well you know the material
2) How good you are at taking multiple choice tests
Item number two, really, is the greatest flaw in the system. Some people's brains are wired in such a way that they're naturally good at eliminating wrong answers and finding the right one quickly, and these people will be able to do well on multiple choice tests even if their knowledge of the material is so-so. Other people's brains are wired such that they have trouble picking between four choices without second guessing themselves, and these people will struggle on multiple choice tests even if they know the material very well.
Personally, I love multiple choice exams because I find it a lot easier to identify the correct answer out of four choices than to have to come up with the correct answer completely on my own - regardless of the subject.
On the other hand, I absolutely hate multiple choice poll questions, since my opinions are nuanced and often do not well match one of the choices given.
(this is also, by the way, why poll results are bullshit - you can make them say anything you want depending on how you ask the question and what choices you provide)