Opinion Yet another exam that won’t solve the real problems

The idea that assessment should be an integral part of the teaching-learning process is nothing new. Constructive assessment should actually constitute an input to the curricular objectives, syllabus design, and pedagogical practices. Given the kind of policing that needs to be done and the number of times examinations have to be cancelled for one reason or another, any healthy change in assessment should be welcome. We have created a world of assessment that is built on mistrust: In general, employers do not trust institutions of higher learning which, in turn, treat school boards with suspicion. Teachers and students are the final victims in this ecosystem of mistrust. Getting out of this rut requires assessment strategies that are centred on students without compromising on the need to provide them a solid grounding in the basics of subjects.

It is the community of teachers alone that can assess the abilities of their students reliably and contribute towards breaking the homogeneity, anxiety and boredom of existing testing mechanisms. One way out of the impasse is to switch to open book assignments and the projects mode that has a more relaxed time frame. In the process, students will be tested on their comprehension and writing skills, the ability to synthesise information, critical and rational thinking capacities, and their potential to arrive at imaginative conclusions. This calls for the professionalisation of teacher education including honing their digital skills and their immediate withdrawal from non-academic engagements such as the mid-day meal programmes, election duties, and census work. There is no substitute for face-to-face teaching-learning but online access to different kinds of materials and audio and video resources does add additional value to learning.

Scholars of education have traditionally made a distinction between achievement tests and proficiency tests. The former focus on what has been taught according to a prescribed syllabus while the latter focus on what has actually been acquired in the domain of knowledge through classroom transactions. The achievement test scores normally indicate the extent to which the learner has mastered the prescribed textbooks. Even after she has passed the Class XII examination with distinction, a student may not be equipped to critically examine the claims made by a scholar, propose alternative hypotheses and initiate a new line of rational enquiry.

The focus on achievement-oriented tests is one reason for the failure of the education system. There is indeed a rather unjustified, cold rationale behind this exercise: If students have been taught X, there must be evidence to show that they have learnt that in the time frame we decide. We know that acquisition of knowledge does not happen in such a linear and additive way — the human mind cuts across several trajectories in the process of acquiring a given concept. However, conceptual clarity and critical enquiry is not the focus of such achievement tests.

The annual examinations, including for Classes X and XII, are achievement-oriented. So are all competitive examinations including the JEE, NEET and IISER, except they require a student to answer MCQs at reckless speed. The CUET will be no different. Tuition centres call the shots in the board examinations and coaching institutes play a big role in a student’s success in the competitive examinations. The focus here is again on practice and speed. They have neither the capacity nor the time for conceptual clarity or proficiency enhancement.

The focus of proficiency exercises should be on tasks that draw out the learner’s imaginative and creative potential. She should be able to build fresh hypotheses in response to the issues being raised, examine the validity of alternative proposals through a process of rational enquiry and articulate a coherent response to the issue at hand. Policy and curricular documents do use these words but they never unpack them.

The foundations of any significant level of proficiency in any domain of knowledge can only be conceptual clarity. It can be built by students and teachers jointly engaging in a process of enquiry, constantly questioning what is written in textbooks. Indeed, the focus of teacher intervention must be to enable her students to question what she herself says. Students working under such a plan of action would undertake assignments and projects that would be exploratory in nature demanding higher levels of cognitive engagement. Students may build grade-appropriate portfolios of assignments and projects that would be evaluated by the community of teachers at school.

The evaluation conducted in collaboration with students should be available in the public domain. Such an assessment should constitute the basis for admission to any institution of higher learning. Based on this, the community of teachers at each institute of higher learning could hold interviews to admit the required number of students.

This column first appeared in the print edition on April 16, 2022 under the title ‘Same old test’. The author retired from Delhi University and is currently Professor Emeritus, Vidya Bhawan Society, Udaipur