Essay Exams - Pros and Cons
I have always liked essay exams for higher level college courses. In my opinion, essays give a student a better opportunity to demonstrate his/her mastery of the material and the ability to apply what has been learned (as opposed to multiple choice and/or true/false exams).
However, my grading is overwhelming! Grading essays and term papers seem to take over my life!
I love the points made in this module...having students highlight or underline the key points of each answer. This technique seems to streamline the grading process, and also serves to reinforce the key concepts to the students, as well. Can't beat that!
Cheryl
Whole heartily agree with your statements about Essay Exams. I started looking for key bullets that reflect if the students have gotten a grasp of the issue. Also, look for support facts to collaborate their arguments. This is a great pro, but a major con is some of the students cannot put their thoughts down succinctly to get a concise answer.
Yes, do go ahead and break questions down in your test formats. This method will continue to think critical thinking skills but allow for much faster grading.
Hi. I like short answer or essay questions because I'm usually trying to develop the students' thinking skills. I cannot assess thinking skills in other formats. Grading papers takes me a long time, but grading tests is faster because I break down the questions into sub-questions and I know exactly how I want to evaluate the answers. I have a so-called rubric (academics mis-use that word) in my head.
I do wish that I could grade papers faster. I should try breaking those questions down too.
Rubrics do make essay test grading far more objective. This makes grading easier but also makes us more fair to our students.
I feel that a grading rubic would be appropriate here. The rubic should contain the important points that should be addressed. Essay tests are more subject than objective and thus can be harder to grade. Without some guidelins for grading, this can be an awesome task consuming much time. The process of having the student underline or highlight important parts can make the task a bit easier. Essay test also give the student an opportunity to express themselves via writen form that multiple choice or T/F tests cannot do and can measure or indicate to some extent how a student can communicated via the written word - an important skill in today's world
