It was a take-home exam. I've only heard of such things in myth, but this year I was given my first one. Now that I no longer need to fret about it, I realize that the take-home exam is quite an interesting concept.
It's an exam, but such a quirky one. No need to study frantically for hours on end for that single session of intense exam writing because you are given it well in advance of its due date. Rightly so, they would expect more of you than what you might answer in a typical exam. But it's also not a paper. There is no need to heavily research external papers or information; everything is right inside your class notes and readings. And bonus, no need to cite anything.
But there are some other elements to it that stand out in my mind. Do they really expect us not to discuss it or work on it with other students? I mean, few of us are stupid enough at this stage to hand in carbon copies of work, but general ideas about questions can easily be discussed. This is not to say that one would do this, but the potential is there. Even though it's clearly prohibited, how on Earth are they going to enforce such a thing? The honour system is only so effective.
But maybe there's more here than we think. For instance, I considered this take-home exam to not really be an exam. I finished those awhile ago. And then I flew home immediately after completing them, still without starting the take-home. My ability to go over it and discuss with fellow students was therefore severely inhibited (although still possible...woo internet and telephone). So perhaps the same thing occurs for other students who may go home. They consider the take-home exam to be much easier than the other exams, so they go home (away from the university town) and work on it there. Perhaps the instructors take that into consideration? Or maybe I'm thinking way too far into it. But it's a possibility.
The take-home exam is an interesting thing. Not too hard, but not too easy. And worth enough for one to care enough about it to try to do a good job. But full of so much cheating potential. I wonder why they give out such things?
1 comment:
while i do like the idea of a take home exam, I've done 3 and have found all 3 unpleasant. I did relatively well on them, I just didn't like the "pressure". Sure I got to write them in my pj's while chatting on msn or taking the occasional youtube break, but i found that it only made me more nervous.
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