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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 th

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.