Ofqual […] has decided that practicals will not be included in the reformed science exams because teachers mark them too generously. The science establishment is despairing.
— Guardian editorial, yesterday. Tip of the hat to the Wellcome Trust’s Clare Matterson, via Twitter.
There is a problem that we don’t seem to have worked out a good way of examining practical skills, or possibly examining practical skills cheaply. Though I am not sure that just not bothering is the right answer.
If teachers are being overly generous with their marking this is only a problem if they are inconsistantly generous as it will otherwise come out in the renormalisation at the end.
Speaking as someone who was very academic and deeply impractical at school, and am now earning my living making things, I feel (and remember feeling at school) very sorry for kids who are bright and have lots of useful and valuable practical skills, who are branded as failiures because they are not very good at writing.
Renormalisation doesn’t help if the distribution is pushed off the top end of the scale – ie. if the sampled data is clipped.
I know a heap of work has been done around assessment in recent years, including by our chums at Gatsby who funded the demo films we’re showcasing this week. My impression is that – gnarly problem as it is – progress has been made. But I’m not sufficiently immersed in the education world to know where to look for any outputs from the various projects.