4 ms·

This entire article is so full of that kind of crap - full of baseless insinuations and twisted meanings - it completely infuriates me. With the influx of rece

by aik 16y ago

This entire article is so full of that kind of crap - full of baseless insinuations and twisted meanings - it completely infuriates me. With the influx of recent NYT articles on education I'm nearly convinced the NYT is purposely trying to sabotage education (or rather they have a clear agenda, which I wish I knew where came from, that they are pushing through by twisting other people's words). As you say, retrieval practice is absolutely fundamental. Every person does it! Studying doesn't comprise of one method - concept mapping or repeated study - it's a combination! What kind of ridiculous study was this? Also, the article makes it seem like all experts purport 'concept mapping' as the "holy grail" of learning, that's it, nothing more. The test obviously assisted by assisting in organizing and structuring the information for them, in addition to highlighting key points from the readings. Also, the article never mentions what type of test they were taking. Multiple-choice? Essay? Short answer? Verbal? None of the above? That information would be the single most important piece of this article. To me this article seems to simply highlight how poor students are at understanding how they themselves learn and think. What NYT seems to want you to think: Test taking is the best way to learn. Forget in depth studying techniques or figuring out how you yourself learn. More of the truth: Tests (depending on how they are set up) are useful in assisting with learning in various ways, and super useful in providing feedback and assessing where a student is and what to focus on in the future.

tygorius 16y ago
What NYT seems to want you to think: Test taking is the best way to learn. Forget in depth studying techniques or figuring out how you yourself learn. I had the opposite reaction. I figured the writer had been so indoctrinated into the view that "teaching to the test" was evil, bad, and wrong, that when a positive result popped related to testing, just that one point alone became the "news" hook of the story. Hmm, in looking at her list of past articles, it appears the author mostly covers the medical beat. Perhaps it's a case of a "helpful" editor spicing up the story with a more controversial headline.
- aik 16y ago
  Interesting. Wow, she's written over 1000 articles. The problem I have with it is exactly what you're saying. Perhaps she is indoctrinated with the view that "tests are bad". Regardless, it is a popular view and a spicy topic. What bothers me is that this article seems to have a blanket "no, apparently tests are good" tint. Do you agree? The study seems to have absolutely nothing to do with that in particular, and the findings really don't either. I do definitely agree that the writer sounds indoctrinated. The first sentence of the article shows signs: "Taking a test is not just a passive mechanism for assessing how much people know, according to new research." This sentence makes me think that the purpose and end of tests is assessing, rather than a means to gather information to enable better learning in the future.
Jach 16y ago
Here's some lines from the article going over the types of tests... > A week later all four groups were given a short-answer test that assessed their ability to recall facts and draw logical conclusions based on the facts. > But when they were evaluated a week later, the students in the testing group did much better than the concept mappers. They even did better when they were evaluated not with a short-answer test but with a test requiring them to draw a concept map from memory. > The final group took a “retrieval practice” test. Without the passage in front of them, they wrote what they remembered in a free-form essay for 10 minutes. Then they reread the passage and took another retrieval practice test. Another issue with the overall study is a lack of blindness of the researchers, as well as people making up questions about the material in a disconnected way from the study to test the students on those.

by aik 16y ago

tygorius 16y ago

What NYT seems to want you to think: Test taking is the best way to learn. Forget in depth studying techniques or figuring out how you yourself learn. I had the opposite reaction. I figured the writer had been so indoctrinated into the view that "teaching to the test" was evil, bad, and wrong, that when a positive result popped related to testing, just that one point alone became the "news" hook of the story. Hmm, in looking at her list of past articles, it appears the author mostly covers the medical beat. Perhaps it's a case of a "helpful" editor spicing up the story with a more controversial headline.

aik 16y ago
Interesting. Wow, she's written over 1000 articles. The problem I have with it is exactly what you're saying. Perhaps she is indoctrinated with the view that "tests are bad". Regardless, it is a popular view and a spicy topic. What bothers me is that this article seems to have a blanket "no, apparently tests are good" tint. Do you agree? The study seems to have absolutely nothing to do with that in particular, and the findings really don't either. I do definitely agree that the writer sounds indoctrinated. The first sentence of the article shows signs: "Taking a test is not just a passive mechanism for assessing how much people know, according to new research." This sentence makes me think that the purpose and end of tests is assessing, rather than a means to gather information to enable better learning in the future.

Jach 16y ago

Here's some lines from the article going over the types of tests... > A week later all four groups were given a short-answer test that assessed their ability to recall facts and draw logical conclusions based on the facts. > But when they were evaluated a week later, the students in the testing group did much better than the concept mappers. They even did better when they were evaluated not with a short-answer test but with a test requiring them to draw a concept map from memory. > The final group took a “retrieval practice” test. Without the passage in front of them, they wrote what they remembered in a free-form essay for 10 minutes. Then they reread the passage and took another retrieval practice test. Another issue with the overall study is a lack of blindness of the researchers, as well as people making up questions about the material in a disconnected way from the study to test the students on those.