Do you think there should be time limits for exams?

[RomanNose]

A bit of talk going on about this, some of my exams are really tight and it would make me so much more relaxed if I had 3 hours to do the exam instead of 1.5.
The idea is that it means slow writers don't get penalized and it reduces exam stress. Yes it's going to make exams easier but they shouldn't be a race in the first place.

 

[RomanNose]

Probably down to money.

Yeah it could be and also they cause damage to the school timetable.

 

[RomanNose]

The other thing is that if you cannot complete the question within the time given for it then you're probably doing it wrong. Examiners don't want a 5 page essay for a 10 minute question which is why they budget 10 minutes and maybe a bit extra for planning and mistakes.

That's the problem with it, they should just have a length limit then for these types of questions and ignore anything above a word count.
All my subjects are problem solving ones, difficult to do well under timed conditions. It takes me a while to figure out what equations to use to derive one, I can do it but it takes me much longer than most. It doesn't mean I lack understanding though.

 

[RomanNose]

No, kids should be prepared for the real world. If your boss gave you a job an expected it done in an hour you'd get a negative response if you said "Can I take 2 hours only I'm a bit slow at that".

An exam is supposed to test understanding, not how quickly you can do something. You can increase in speed on the job anyway, much less difficult to improve speed than understanding.

I agree, if you don't know how to do it...you don't know how to do it.

I would love an extra hour in my exams, because it gives you more time to think about what it is you're doing. For instance, I have a 'short' electronics exam tomorrow with 75 short answer questions, doing this in 2 hours just feels rushed.
The time limit is biased toward those who think faster than others.

Yep and I have previously flunked an electronics exam before due to time limits which induce pressure decreasing my performance.

 

[RomanNose]

Exam skills - quick thinking and problem solving in a pressured environment, demonstrating the ability to apply learned knowledge efficiently and appropriately.

Coursework skills - the ability to form a intelligent and convincing end product, an avenue for creativity and originality, a demonstration of potential relatively free from time constraints.

Different and equally useful skill sets.

I think it's much more important to test understanding than speed though and really the time limits should be very lenient so a full test of understanding can be done.

 

[RomanNose]

Let me guess, you're better at coursework...?

Could you not argue that the ability to demonstrate knowledge in a restricted environment is a much better test, because only those who truly understand the material will be able to handle it so quickly? Anyone can refer to a book over time. Poorly worded, but you get the jist.

They are just different.

Generally I am actually better at exams, though I have messed up on exams purely because of time.
Most of my exams include questions where you cannot follow an obvious algorithm and are pretty much 100% problem solving. People complete these questions at completely different speeds, it doesn't mean they don't understand the topic, it just means they are slow.
With English & Humanities it's the same but worse, where you have a lot of writing and writing speed has a huge impact on exam results.

 

[RomanNose]

NO NO NO.
Well, yes. There should be time limits or you could be there all day, but the current time limits on examinations are just too short and should be increased by atleast a half.

I had a mathematics exam in Semester 1. I was 90% sure I was going to get 90% on that exam since I practiced all questions and aced them all.
Come to the exam, it was only 1 hour and I'm pretty slow when it comes to maths but atleast I get it right.
12 questions, 4th question in and the time was half gone. Because I was rushing so much , not checking answers let alone what I'd written my only guess was I was making stupid mistakes due to going too fast.

I don't think exams are a measure of your intelligence but more of a measure of how much you remember on the day and how quickly you can do it.

It's interesting with maths, If I had no time limits then I would derive all of the identities on the spot when needed as it would be so much easier for me to do it from the basic rules.
It's probably better for an employer who understands the concepts behind things than ones who just rote learn everything.

Stress isn't healthy but it's a part of life and protecting kids from it only makes the shock bigger when they do have to go out in the real world and they'll be less likely to deal with it well.

I would suspect that the exam boards would say they do allow enough reasonable time for any given exam to be done. I get the feeling from the OP that he isn't saying only the quickest few percent of people ever get the exam done, he is saying we should make exceptions for the few people who are bit slower than the majority.

If you feel exams are too short in general, that is another topic.

They are unnecessarily stressful at the moment though, they will still be stressful regardless what you do though.
A lot of people don't understand how to answer a question, get stressed out and then become slower meaning they don't finish the paper.

 

[RomanNose]

I agree and was going to make the same point. It is not true that every exam question that requires a definitive answer (like maths) is a case of "you know it or you don't", some answers you can work out given time and logical thought.

So if the exam is testing whether you know something or not, you should be able to give the answer instantly. If you want to test how someone thinks that is another matter.

I don't think it particularly matters how a student gets an answer too much though, just if he actually gets it. It's probably harder to derive them than learn them though and I think the exam should really cater for whatever people do to get the answer.

I write at a reasonable pace and I find that I have plenty more than enough time to complete exams. I think that the timings are extremely generous for maths and science, but I found it a bit tight for essay subjects like History and English at GCSE.

Plus if you are really slow at writing can't you get 25% extra time?

I am not that slow, maybe 10% slower than most and I have had tests in the past and I am not eligible. Most of the time it doesn't effect me but I really don't see why we have to do exams in timed conditions when it would be much less stressful for students to take their time.

 

[RomanNose]

The time limits are fine. There's enough time for people to write answers which are good enough to achieve a good grade.
.

Some subjects have a very wide band of how long it takes to complete the subject while others don't, in an English exam you are really writing continuously so just a 10% difference will have a large effect.
Imo what really matters is quality of content, what could be done is have exams designed for 2/3 of the allocated time, where you are allowed to leave after 2/3 and you can carry on until the end of the allocated time.
It would reduce stress massively imo, yes the majority of people finish in the time that you are given but it would be so much easier on the students.

Most of my University exams have far too much time imo. Either you know something or you don't, any extra time is useless. If I sat there all day I wouldn't have gained any more marks in Theoretical Computing.

That's how it should be, pretty much every English exam I have sat, I continued writing till the end.

 

[RomanNose]

It's just the easiest way of testing lots of people. In an ideal world, they'd just have everyone write big dissertations on everything, and/or have vivas with the academics... but that's not practical, so we go with exams.

It doesn't mean it can't be improved. As I suggested, just because you don't have a time limit it doesn't mean you can't have a word limit. Which is far better as it allows everyone to play at the same level as it takes time out of the equation.

 

[RomanNose]

So you've substituted one arbitrary limit for another. Why does a word limit equal fairness when a time limit does not? Is it fairer because you think it would suit you better or fairer because it's somehow a better measure?

My apologies to Winston Churchill for the paraphrase but "exams are the worst type of measurement except for all those others that have been tried from time to time". I think in many ways exams are daft and many don't really test what they're supposed to be letting you demonstrate proficiency in but there's got to be some way of measuring and they do that up to a point - of all my gripes with exams the time limit is one of the lesser ones normally.

No because people write at different speeds and think at different speeds, not usually much you can do about it.

 

[RomanNose]

That's not an argument why a word limit is fairer, at most it's an argument why a time limit is unfair to people who complete exams more slowly. Even then it's somewhat specious because there has to be some limits on exams and you could easily argue that with a word limit you're penalising the people who can't express themselves succinctly.

The idea of the word limit is that it's high enough that anyone who knows their stuff will have reached full marks before they reach it. But it then stops people who don't know their stuff, trying to waffle on and gain marks through quantity.