Exam-oriented education 應(yīng)試教育

We might marvel at the progress made in every field of study, but the methods of testing a person’s knowledge and ability remain as primitive as ever they were. It really is extraordinary that after all these years, educationists have still failed to devise anything more efficient and reliable than examinations. For all the pious claim that examinations test what you know, it is common knowledge that they more often do the exact opposite.They may be a good means of testing memory, or the knack of working rapidly under extreme pressure, but they can tell nothing about a person’s true ability and aptitude.

As anxiety-makers, examinations are second to none. That is because so much depends on them. They are the mark of success or failure in our society. Your whole future may be decided in one fateful day. It doesn’t matter that you weren’t feeling very well, or that your mother dies. Little things like that don’t count: the exam goes on. No one can give of his best when he is in mortal terror, or after sleepless night, yet this is precisely what the examination system expects him to do. The moment a child begins school, he enters a world of vicious competition where success and failure are clearly defined and measured. Can we wonder at the increasing number of ‘drop-outs’: young people who are written off as utter failures before they have even embarked on a career? Can we be surprised at the suicide rate among students?A good education should, among other things, train you to think for yourself. The examination system does anything but that. What has to be learnt is rigidly laid down by a syllabus, so the student is encouraged to memories. Examinations do not motivate a student to read widely, but to restrict his reading; they do not enable him to seek more and more knowledge, but induce cramming. They lower the standards of teaching, for they deprive the teacher of all freedom. Teachers themselves are often judged by examination results and instead of teaching their subjects, they are reduced to training their students in exam techniques which they despise. The most successful candidates are not always the best educated; they are the best trained in the technique of working under duress.

The results on which so much depends are often nothing more than a subjective assessment by some anonymous examiner. Examiners are only human. They get tired and hungry; they make mistakes. Yet they have to mark stacks of hastily scrawled scripts in a limited amount of time. They work under the same sort of pressure as the candidates. And their word carries weight. After a judge’s decision on you have the right of appeal, but not after an examiner’s. There must surely be many simpler and more effective ways of assessing a person’s true abilities. It is cynical to suggest that examinations are merely a profitable business for the institutions that run them? This is what it boils down to in the last analysis. The best comment on the system is this illiterate message recently scrawled on a wall: ‘I were a teenage drop-out and now I are a teenage millionaire.’

在各個(gè)領(lǐng)域取得的進(jìn)步我們或許會(huì)感到吃驚,但是測(cè)試一個(gè)人的知識(shí)和能力的方法依然原始如初。這真的是非同尋常的,畢竟這些年來(lái),教育者們?nèi)詻](méi)能創(chuàng)立出一種比考試更有效、更可靠。所有這些虔誠(chéng)的說(shuō)法,考試測(cè)試你所知道的,這是常識(shí),往往適得其反。他們可能是檢測(cè)記憶的好方法,或者在極端壓力下快速工作的訣竅,但他們可以告訴任何一個(gè)人的真正能力和資質(zhì)。

作為制造焦慮者,考試是首屈一指的。這是因?yàn)槿绱硕嗟娜Q于他們。他們成功或失敗的標(biāo)志在我們的社會(huì)。你的整個(gè)未來(lái)可能決定在那致命的一天。沒(méi)關(guān)系,你不感覺(jué)很好,或者你的母親去世。這樣的小事情不要計(jì)數(shù):考試。沒(méi)有人可以給他最好的,當(dāng)他在致命的恐怖,或不眠之夜后,不過(guò)這正是考試制度期望他做。一個(gè)孩子步入學(xué)校大門(mén)那一刻起,他便步入了一個(gè)惡性競(jìng)爭(zhēng)的世界。在那里,成功和失敗是明確定義和測(cè)量。我們會(huì)對(duì)越來(lái)越多的“輟學(xué)生”:年輕人是徹底的失敗之前就開(kāi)始了職業(yè)生涯?學(xué)生的自殺率我們能感到吃驚嗎?一種好的教育應(yīng)當(dāng)包括培養(yǎng)你獨(dú)立的自己。做任何事,但考試系統(tǒng)。學(xué)生必須學(xué)些什么教學(xué)大綱生硬地規(guī)定,因此鼓勵(lì)學(xué)生記憶。考試不能激勵(lì)學(xué)生去廣泛閱讀,而是限制他閱讀;他們不讓他尋求更多的知識(shí),反而引起了死記硬背。他們降低教學(xué)標(biāo)準(zhǔn),因?yàn)樗麄儎儕Z了老師的一切自由。教師本身教學(xué)經(jīng)常根據(jù)考試成績(jī),而是自己的臣民,他們減少了訓(xùn)練學(xué)生考試技巧,他們鄙視。最成功的應(yīng)試者往往不是最好的教育,他們是最好的訓(xùn)練技術(shù)在脅迫下工作。

這么多的結(jié)果往往取決于只不過(guò)是某個(gè)匿名主考者的主觀評(píng)價(jià)?？脊僖彩侨恕Ｋ麄儠?huì)變累,會(huì)饑餓,他們犯錯(cuò)誤。然而,他們必須馬克匆匆草書(shū)的在有限的時(shí)間內(nèi)。他們?cè)谕瑯拥膲毫ο鹿ぷ鞯暮蜻x人。和他們的話很有分量。經(jīng)過(guò)法官的決定你有上訴的權(quán)利,但不經(jīng)過(guò)檢查?？隙ㄓ泻芏喔?jiǎn)單和跟有效的方法評(píng)估一個(gè)人的真實(shí)能力。憤世嫉俗的建議,考試僅僅是一個(gè)有利可圖的業(yè)務(wù)運(yùn)行它們的機(jī)構(gòu)?這就是它可以歸結(jié)為在過(guò)去的分析。最好的評(píng)論系統(tǒng)這是文盲消息最近在墻上潦草地寫(xiě)著:“我是一個(gè)十幾歲的輟學(xué),現(xiàn)在我是一個(gè)十幾歲的百萬(wàn)富翁。”