The first weeks are testing are complete! The past couple of weeks have been filled with catching cheaters, proctoring tests, and finding humor, excitement, and disappointment in grading. Sometimes you just need to take a load off with a nice cup of tea, look at the exams, and pathetically chuckle, as you know these tests are not going to go well.
My first big test was held this past week. After test review, in class study sessions, and homework to prepare, my students were ready; well, they should have been ready. Fast-forward to day one of testing. Since cheating is such a prominent part of testing in Mozambique, I know I had to come prepared.
Perfect Recipe For Test Day
As I walk into the classroom, many eyes stare back at me – some confident and some unsure. Some of these eyes belonged to students that had, up until that point, not stepped foot into the classroom. So, word had got around; there was a test today. However, the question still remained if the students had studied.
As I was getting everything ready in the front, the class was getting ready too: sitting on notebooks, putting backpacks into a place with perfect access to notes, or sitting next to the smarter kids. They weren’t ready for what was about to hit them. I spread out a tarp across the front of the class and told the students to discard all of their belongings on the tarp. Students looked up, mouths open, and whispered to their neighbors, “What did he say”. They knew what was said but couldn’t believe their ears. Gasps and laughter were blurted from the students. Slowly students collected their belongings and carried them to the front. As the pile grew larger, things trickled in more slowly; the students turned on their neighbors. “João has his notebook under his chair.” “Maria has her phone in her pocket.” They had joined the other side and were turning on their fellow students. The singled out students were reluctant to giving up their things but still managed to. After all was arranged, I passed out their tests and let the games begin.
Keeping a close eye for cheaters
There was an immediate indication if someone studied; they would burry their heads in the test and get going or look around the room as if someone had been playing a cruel joke on them. The joke was only beginning. With people sitting at least 3 a desk, it is hard to keep eyes from wondering; therefore, it is only logical to make three different tests to ensure that they were the one supplying the answers and not copying their neighbor’s answers. However, not everyone learned.
When grading the tests, I discovered a major learning discrepancy. Some received perfect scores, others got 2/15, and everyone else was somewhere in between. The grades didn’t bother me as much as the writing did; the short answer was decoding “words” that were supposed to form a sentence. However, what I had not realized was a first test without zeros, no (obvious) cheating, and a test taken correctly was a blessing.
For the Grassroots Soccer Conference for the North this week (future post about this), I am traveling up to Nampula and staying with friends along the way; we swapped teaching war stories, and stories of testing came up. My buddy’s, Colin’s, story blew mine away.
After telling him my story, he pulled out the tests with a sad laugh. “That’s nothing. Apparently they don’t know how to do multiple choice.” Between the depressed laughter he told of his thorough explanation of the directions. As he handed over the tests, I couldn’t believe what was before my eyes: a word search without a word bank. At least the word bank wasn’t clear to us. If you can figure it out, feel free to let us know.
So as I wait for a ride to the conference, Colin is going to have one last lesson with his class about how to take a multiple choice test. Next time should be better; maybe they won’t circle parts of the questions.
Thomas’ Travels 