“EXAMS” TOPICS

(spoken only): “battery-farmed” children; test-prep factory

'Intelligence cannot be defined by exams'

We lose too many talented people by defining intelligence through exams that are wholly
inadequate and constricting, says headmaster Peter Tait.
Each year at this time, the pressure cranks up in the race for school and university places, as SATS
and A-levels prepare to feed another raft of league tables. As these help determine our standing
on the world stage, through the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), our
obsession with measuring children takes centre stage.
Confident in our system of public examinations, that is broadly designed to separate those more
‘intelligent’ from the less ‘intelligent’, we can feel content that we are filtering out our most able
for higher education and all the opportunities that entails. Sounds simple enough, if it was really
that easy.
The problem lies with the word intelligence. The common definition, that of possessing ‘a
quickness of understanding and an ability to apply knowledge and skills to a high level’ – should
give us pause to ask how well equipped our current examination system is to deliver?
Many ‘intelligent’ students, so identified by the data emanating from various intelligence tests
(which incidentally too often reinforce teacher expectations), are frustrated by papers that trot
out the same questions in a different garb. These allow for little or no original thought and even
actively discourage creative thinking and intelligent responses.
Simply stated, measuring intelligence through examination is, inevitably, as limited as the
examination itself. Whilst it might prove a reasonable sieve – perhaps even the best we can
provide – it will not identify many of those we instinctively know to be intelligent.
There are simple reasons for this, apart from the failure of examinations to measure divergent
thinking and creativity (due in part to the need to keep marking as objective and, therefore, as
inflexible as possible to remove any room for subjective judgment).
The problem of measuring intelligence per se is that it is an inadequate guide to human capability,
and that many of the ways we use to measure working intelligence are woefully inadequate.
Surely those we should be seeking to identify and nurture are students with the capacity of
effective or applied intelligence, those who can do something with what knowledge and skills they
acquire?
Too many ‘intelligent’ children, often bored by conventional learning, slip through the net. Others
just think differently to the straitjacket dictated by ‘one size fits all’ exams. For instance, the list of
those luminaries with learning difficulties who found it difficult to express themselves in
conventional examinations makes for sober reading.
This poses the question as to just how many are badly served by traditional examinations, despite
all the assistance offered through extra time, reader-writers and the use of technology. We only
have to reflect on some of our leading public figures who dropped out of school and have ended
up in prominent positions in public life to know that the traditional system of assessment was not
capable of measuring their particular abilities, their sense of purpose, work ethic and creativity.
There are also many ‘intelligent’ people, as measured by our schools, who have the historic
indicators of intelligence, viz. a quickness of understanding and the ability to perform cognitively
at a higher level but are painfully deficient in other aspects.
These people can lack initiative, the ability to ask difficult questions (and solve them), EQ,
cooperative and communication skills and the organisational discipline crucial to make
intelligence an active, rather than a passive, trait.
Because our perceived definition of intelligence is so closely linked in with an ability to be
measured by exams, many intelligent people are disfranchised.
Our measure of who is intelligent depends more on giving expected and appropriate answers
rather than showing any initiative or creative spark, this is probably the reason for the clutch of
third class degrees accumulated by such luminaries as Michael Morpurgo, W. H. Auden and Carol
Vorderman.
By measuring intelligence this way, we get some of the crop, but not all, and those that fall by the
wayside can be the most important of all. Hence while neurosurgeons, judges and
nanotechnologists emerge from the current system, one only has to look at the vast numbers of
highly successful – and intelligent – people who failed to shine at school to see how random our
measure is. As Winston Churchill aptly demonstrated, it is possible to win the Nobel Prize for
Literature despite a mediocre school career and no tertiary qualifications.
Part of the problem may be how we value and reward intelligence, as identified through
traditional testing. The word ’intelligent’ has a cache that other words, like ‘industrious’ do not.
For instance, we richly reward those whose appointments are based on their academic
qualifications; judges, diplomats, bankers and brokers, financiers, consultants, senior bureaucrats
and the like. However, those people who make create, who tinker and take intellectual risks, are
scantily rewarded in comparison.
We might well ask, are our schools guilty of promoting a passive form of intelligence, asking ‘what
do you know’ rather than ‘what can you do’ simply because of the limitations of assessment? We
might also pause to recognise that many ‘intelligent’ people may lack the very qualities we need
from our leaders, be it emotional intelligence, wisdom or even common sense. Ability, talent,
intelligence on their own are lumps of coal – they need setting alight to have any value.
Of course we need our most able to fly; we need an intelligentsia to keep challenging us and
leading us forward. And they will probably still come from the traditional route until we widen our
criteria and improve our tools for identifying talent, although when I read that 7 per cent of
Oxford’s student population are receiving counselling along with 728 postgraduate students, I
wonder how too much focus on academia can stunt emotional and social development. As a
society, we benefit most from those with effective intelligence, who are able to channel their
intelligence and use it, rather than merely parade it in the safety of institutions and selected
professions.
We lose too many talented and intelligent people by defining intelligence through tests that are
wholly inadequate and constricting. We need to look wider and encourage the entrepreneur, the
inquisitive, the creative and the downright cussed in our schools to make the most of who we are
and to bring out the richness and diversity of thought and ideas in our society.
Most adults feel exams failed to gauge real ability
Study finds only one-third feel pride in test results
Caroline Davies
The overwhelming majority of adults believe school exams do not reflect their true abilities or
predict their future success, according to a new report published today. As many as 77 per cent
feel that formal testing fails to measure their real intelligence, yet the exam results are used to
scrutinise them through their academic careers and when applying for jobs.
The study, by the Chartered Institute of Educational Assessors (CIEA), found that for a majority of
people (62 per cent) the feeling they most associated with taking an exam was 'butterflies in the
stomach'. More extreme reactions to exam situations included headaches, insomnia and vomiting.
Just three out of 10 people associated exams with 'a sense of pride', according to the study based
on responses from 2,000 adults.
 Pupils in England sit an average of 70 formal examinations. According to a recent report from
Cambridge University, English primary school children are now subjected to more tests than their
international counterparts. Yet, claims the CIEA, 60 per cent of teachers who responded to a
separate online poll said they did not think exams were necessarily the best indicators of a pupil's
ability and were not reflective of their future success in a job. Amid reports accusing schools of
'teaching to test', the CIEA said the survey pointed to the need for a more well-rounded form of
assessment.
'Exams don't suit everybody. They don't tell the full picture. Most adults agree that their
performance in exams does not reflect their true abilities,' said Graham Herbert, deputy head of
the CIEA, a body dedicated to improving the skills levels of senior examiners, moderators and
markers. 'That is not to say we should get rid of exams. What we need is a supplement to the
exam system, a supplement that can be relied upon. And that supplement could be teacher
assessment.'
The CIEA is training qualified assessors through its Chartered Educational Assessor (CEA) initiative
and aims to place 3,000 of them in schools across England by 2011. Already 33 are in place, with a
further 70 in training.
The problem, said Herbert, was that teachers were ill-equipped to assess properly. Reliance on
exams as a benchmark of performance meant many schools concentrated on teaching for testing.
'On average, teaching courses spend just five hours on assessment. Then teachers are expected to
go into schools and start marking,' he said.
Educationalists had to ask themselves what exams' main purpose was. 'If you say the purpose is to
put a school in a rank order, then it becomes a high-stakes test. People get really nervous about it
because their reputation is at risk, so they tend to teach to the test. That means that their learners
jump through the hoops put there by the exam, rather than testing their ability and their
knowledge.'
He added that those who failed to perform in exams could feel failures, when in fact they were
not. 'Take Richard Branson and Winston Churchill. They are two very famous, highly skilled
individuals who were both poor exam performers. So exams don't necessarily on their own bring
out the best in individuals. And they become stigmatised by that. A lot of adults feel that. From
our survey, the majority, it seems.'

Speaking & Writing:

Topic: Most education systems rely on examination to encourage
students to study, but as a result children suffer from too much stress
and never learn to be creative. Therefore, examination should be
abolished. Do you agree or disagree?