4 ms·

I used to have students who would write answers like that on in-class exams. Every answer was at least one full, complete sentence, even for yes/no or true/fal

I used to have students who would write answers like that on in-class exams. Every answer was at least one full, complete sentence, even for yes/no or true/false. And the “short answer” responses filled all available space when one sentence would do. My only conclusion is that some undergraduate institutions around the world must be intentionally drilling it into their students to do this.

gizmo686 4y ago
Its possible. I've had proffesors who always gave true/false questions with instructions to either "justify your answer", or "if false, justify your answer". Practically speaking, there is fairly little downside to putting in extra in your answer, as tests are normally scored by how many points in the grading rubric you hit.
ALittleLight 4y ago
I think students also believe they can hedge. If they just put down "yes" or "no" then their answer might be completely wrong, but if they drop a bunch of things in the answer then some of those things might be true and you might give partial credit, or, at least, they can argue about it later.
ElevenLathe 4y ago
I was told by multiple teachers/professors that its never acceptable to write anything other than a full sentence on a test (unless it's a scantron, obviously). Not sure how common this is, but they could have been trained by other instructors.
sudosysgen 4y ago
In the entirety of my K12 education any answer that wasn't a full complete sentence was a zero.
akiselev 4y ago
I suspect it starts in high school. A lot of AP subjects with written portions like AP biology or history are really hard to grade at scale so they have a relatively naive scoring system. The answer can be a total rambling mess but as long as the answer is self consistent (it doesn’t contradict itself) it gets points for any relevant information it gets right. For example, if the question is about respiration a rambling answer that mentions “oxygen transport chain”, “Krebs cycle”, and “ATP” might get 3/5 points even if it doesn’t make much sense otherwise as long as the answer doesn’t confuse the Calvin and Krebs cycle or otherwise contradict like saying that glucose is a byproduct.

gizmo686 4y ago

Its possible. I've had proffesors who always gave true/false questions with instructions to either "justify your answer", or "if false, justify your answer". Practically speaking, there is fairly little downside to putting in extra in your answer, as tests are normally scored by how many points in the grading rubric you hit.

ALittleLight 4y ago

I think students also believe they can hedge. If they just put down "yes" or "no" then their answer might be completely wrong, but if they drop a bunch of things in the answer then some of those things might be true and you might give partial credit, or, at least, they can argue about it later.

ElevenLathe 4y ago

I was told by multiple teachers/professors that its never acceptable to write anything other than a full sentence on a test (unless it's a scantron, obviously). Not sure how common this is, but they could have been trained by other instructors.

sudosysgen 4y ago

In the entirety of my K12 education any answer that wasn't a full complete sentence was a zero.

akiselev 4y ago

I suspect it starts in high school. A lot of AP subjects with written portions like AP biology or history are really hard to grade at scale so they have a relatively naive scoring system. The answer can be a total rambling mess but as long as the answer is self consistent (it doesn’t contradict itself) it gets points for any relevant information it gets right. For example, if the question is about respiration a rambling answer that mentions “oxygen transport chain”, “Krebs cycle”, and “ATP” might get 3/5 points even if it doesn’t make much sense otherwise as long as the answer doesn’t confuse the Calvin and Krebs cycle or otherwise contradict like saying that glucose is a byproduct.