Do you think there should be time limits for exams?

RomanNose · 16 May 2012 at 17:37

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.

LeJosh · 16 May 2012 at 17:39

Probably down to money.

RomanNose · 16 May 2012 at 17:41

LeJosh said:
Probably down to money.

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

rogan · 16 May 2012 at 17:44

i don't understand why we dont have the long as you need type system (reasonable limit) if you dont know when you went in, you won't know later...

Raumarik · 16 May 2012 at 17:46

You could argue that if you cannot complete it within a reasonable amount of time you're never going to complete it, the papers are written to be done within a specific time frame. It wasn't the time which created stress for me at exam time, it was purely because I was having to do them at all!

Art · 16 May 2012 at 17:50

Halfmad said:
You could argue that if you cannot complete it within a reasonable amount of time you're never going to complete it

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.

RomanNose · 16 May 2012 at 17:52

Art said:
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.

kilohawk · 16 May 2012 at 17:53

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.

estebanrey · 16 May 2012 at 17:54

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".

RomanNose · 16 May 2012 at 17:55

estebanrey said:
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.

kilohawk said:
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.

estebanrey · 16 May 2012 at 18:00

RomanNose said:
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.

My point is we already do too much that creates a false sense of entitlement in our kids, we don't need anymore. Giving medals to everyone who takes part in sports day instead of just the winners for example

Learning to deal with stress and pressure should be part of growing up and yet every year we seem to bring more and more things in to limit it.

PermaBanned · 16 May 2012 at 18:01

Not just that, but i don't think it's fair just how much the same paper can differ in difficulty year after year. Sure, they'll adjust the grade boundaries, but that doesn't matter when you're actually doing it. Instead of the people who know the subject the best getting the best marks it's the people who deal well under stress. And i mean they're both desirable qualities, but it happens in the same exam. So if someone got an A in one year and another person got an A three years later they're judged equally, even if they have completely different skill sets.

Trifid · 16 May 2012 at 18:03

estebanrey said:
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".

I don't know about anyone else but my job doesn't involve hand writing 6 or so several page answers to random questions from a couple of books that I don't have access to but are only a walkable distance away from within a 90 minute time period... Also when my boss gives me a document to go through and comment on or implement he would only want a rough outline of my thoughts (spoken) if given such a restrictive time frame.

*The point of this post is I don't believe the education system is as good as it can be and should be more job focused...

PermaBanned · 16 May 2012 at 18:03

estebanrey said:
My point is we already do too much that creates a false sense of entitlement in our kids, we don't need anymore. Giving medals to everyone who takes part in sports day instead of just the winners for example

Learning to deal with stress and pressure should be part of growing up and yet every year we seem to bring more and more things in to limit it.

That's not the point you made at all. Stress isn't healthy. Why should one person who knows the subject just as well as the next be punished because they panicked a bit for a single hour?

Nitefly · 16 May 2012 at 18:04

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.

panyan · 16 May 2012 at 18:04

everytime a friend of mine has said theyve been rushed in an exam, its because they havent read the rubric properly and answered a lot more questions than they needed to

(i also did this once

)

RomanNose · 16 May 2012 at 18:09

Nitefly said:
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.

Nitefly · 16 May 2012 at 18:15

RomanNose said:
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.

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.

PermaBanned · 16 May 2012 at 18:17

Nitefly said:
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.

I don't think it's a case of "if you understand the subject you will be able to do well in the exam". It should be, but it varies wildly. Often in some subjects is as much a case of knowing what they're after than knowing the answer to a question.

RomanNose · 16 May 2012 at 18:21

Nitefly said:
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.