Logic or Pure Parrotry

David Chemaly

Each year, from the age of seven, you take formal assessments with varying degrees of difficulty in a wide range of ways. Listening comprehensions, essays, orals, and formal exams are but a few ways in which your supposed understanding is tested. During certain years, these can be exceptionally important – such as the ever-nearing end-of-year exams for us matrics. The supposed purpose of these examinations is to test your understanding of a subject. The theory goes that, if you are able to perform optimally in these tests, then you understand the content, and may even consider pursuing a career therein. The problem, however, is in the rigid structure.

A system of schooling has been in place for over two millennia, but the way that people have learned has remained stubbornly simple. You memorise and excel. If exams are supposed to test your understanding of a subject, then why is it that they take into account how many hours you have spent memorising obscure definitions and phrases? When information is so readily available, why is it not enough to only understand what it is being taught?

The average person living in the 21st century has access to more information than any library in the past could ever hope to offer. Now, you can even choose between using traditional search engines (such as Google) or chatbots (such as ChatGPT) to answer your questions. Yet, school systems insist on learners memorising definitions that can easily be found with a quick search.

I believe exams and tests should still be offered, but that they should be altered so as to provide accurate preparation for the future. Exams should be open book, as it would replicate students using available information later in their lives, whilst still testing that they understand what is being asked. One should not need to memorise anything before being able to do well in school, it should be sufficient to understand all that a subject is, not memorising every intricacy thereof.