It’s been a quiet news weekend.
Two items on public art pieces: a new mural was created at Jean-Talon and 9e Avenue by artists Bosny and Myshel Sicre. Somewhat annoyingly, there’s no image of the finished piece here, although Googling finds many pieces done by the artists individually.
An epidemiologist and an artist have collaborated on a tile piece visualizing the first 50 days of the Covid outbreak in Montreal. It’s outside CEGEP du Vieux-Montréal.
The Journal looks at how the Chinese community in Montreal has been the target of racist acts since Covid. The decline of Chinatown is only part of the fallout.
I don’t doubt that the Chinese community has been a target from ignorant fools the past few months but the decline of Chinatown has more to do with the fact that it has so many restaurants which have been closed for a good chunk of the pandemic. It’s a destination area just like Old Montreal which along with a bunch of other sections of the city have seen a decline. I was in Old Montreal in the summer and I had never seen it so quiet for a sunny summer day.
It’s true that Chinatown is part of downtown, and with few office workers and students around, people are not stopping off in Chinatown for a quick bite or takeout, as they once would’ve done. But there’s bound to be an element of people also shunning the area out of an association with Covid.
Remember during SARS, some businesses in our Chinatown had signs out saying there was no SARS here, which was true. But there was so much reportage about the SARS outbreaks in Toronto and elsewhere that they needed to emphasize it, because people were staying away.
The tent city on Notre-Dame East is preparing for winter.
Several schools are holding in-person exams after a term of remote learning, to circumvent “cheating”, and students are not happy about it.
I’m wondering about the concept of cheating in the 21st century. Does it really mean anything now to force students to memorize and disgorge material for exams?
When I was briefly teaching in the graphic design program at the EMSB, I gave tests and allowed the students to use the internet because that is how their lives will be lived. I remember telling a crabby older teacher that these students would not be looking for work in the 20th century, because she seemed to think that was the norm. It isn’t now and it won’t be again.
Everyone in a real job consults Google if they run up against something they don’t know, or don’t remember, or if they need instructions for a technique they haven’t used before. Exams on the old basis are a 20th-century idea that should be waved off.
Update: Anglo media are reporting that 2000 Dawson students are demanding online exams.
It’s very important to be able to memorize study material, even with Google around. Google or internet resources are not around all the time, and can’t always be trusted. When mastering a language or medical and engineering skills, students need to be able they have the knowledge on hand. I agree that an exam at Polytechnique during a pandemic is not the right place to prove that point though.
I agree in part, and the school where I teach will be giving exams online, often open book and “open Internet”. But here’s the thing: it’s not just Google or Wikipedia. There are websites that allow you to upload a math or science question and have someone else work out a solution for you in less than an hour. This brings cheating to an entirely new level. We know some students have used this during midterms, and we don’t have a good way to selectively stop this. So many teachers would prefer to go to in-person exams if they could be held safely.
“Nurse, please take a picture of this, this uh thing right here, inside there, see? Wait lemme just.. there. Lemme see… okay good. Now google image search it. I’m pretty sure it’s either some kind of fistular abcess, but it kinda also looks like a thrombosed hemorrhoid, no?”
Are we testing their understanding of the material or their ability to memorize it? A pilot still has access to a manual while flying the airplane.
Honestly, there are some fundamentals at the primary, secondary, cegep, and university levels that simply need to be memorized and known. Having a certain baseline memorized then allows you to problem solve and be creative…if you’re going to be “Googling” the basics, you’re wasting time.
As a medical writer/editor, there are certain things I just know. Yes, some of it is experience, but a lot of it is due to the fact that I had to do spelling tests, vocabulary tests, and all sorts of tests throughout school, in addition to all of the biology and biochemistry classes, which involved memorizing material, If I’m constantly having to look up grammar rules and medical terminology, I’m not being efficient. I’m grateful for having experienced what I consider to be a decent public school education.
All that to say, not all subjects require rote memorization and not everyone needs to be an expert in everything (we’re not all going to become mathematicians or editors), but fair, adequate testing is important. Perhaps, there can and should be some exceptions during Covid but I don’t blame schools for wanting in-house examination. I observed cheating at school by other students…it would be difficult to get rid of it altogether but there are ways to reduce it.
Testing is generally evaluating a person for minimum competence in a subject matter. Grades provide a rough approximation of a given person’s level of subject mastery. If a person feels the need to google something on an exam, it means that person doesn’t have the requisite level of subject mastery to successfully respond – if this is a basic question, it means they’re not minimally competent; if it’s an obscure question, it means they haven’t achieved the highest level of mastery.
If we move into some new pedagogical phase where evaluation of a person’s subject mastery is no longer an important part of awarding a degree or whatever, it’s just inevitable that some percentage of people will turn in projects they did not complete, obtain degrees they did not deserve, and get jobs for which they’re not qualified.
To me, that seems like an inferior system.
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