Education Shortform
X is for Exams…
In a nutshell
In my education alphabet, X is for…(e)xams (well, close enough — there aren’t that many Xs in the English language!)
Despite the changes that have occurred throughout the education system and frequent calls to reduce formal assessment (e.g. this recent report here in Scotland), the role of the exam seems to be pretty much as strong as ever.
As I would define it, the difference between an exam and other types of test is that the former is set by someone other than the classroom teacher, typically a state or national exam board. It is higher stakes than a quiz.
Exams also tend to be done in the later years of high school or at university, whereas tests might be done in class at any stage.
X, of course, is also the traditional symbol used to indicate an incorrect answer — although in the spirit of formative assessment, it is more helpful to provide a comment so that learners know why they got an answer wrong and can learn from the feedback. As learners often ignore comments and focus just on their score, verbal feedback could be provided first.
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