Thatcher. The Iron Lady Page 8

Quote: Griff @ June 20 2008, 2:47 PM BST

Now if only you sat in an exam room to answer the question "Write an essay about some aspect of history in your local area giving findings from your personal research and showing how you researched those topics" that would really separate the doers from the cheats and reduce all questions of plagiarism.

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There's the same scope for cheating there, you just have to word your notes correctly. Except there isn't a teacher to check your notes against those of others in your class, so there's more chance to collude before the exam.

Quote: Griff @ June 20 2008, 2:47 PM BST

I don't think you understand maths and science if you think they are subjects that can't be researched, or that there is only ever one answer.

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At GCSE level there is only ever one answer. You can't ask GCSE students to conduct any meaningful investigations and therefore they end up just following instructions for an experiment and then writing down the results. Not entirely useful really.

Quote: Griff @ June 20 2008, 2:56 PM BST

What notes ? I don't understand. I'm just mentally comparing the essay that would be written by a student who hadn't done the research themselves (which would be shit) and the esay that would be written by a student who had (which wouldn't).

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I assumed the student would take notes into the exam. Conducting the exam in the style of a synoptic paper. A page of notes - research - which would be used as an aid to answer the question.

Quote: Griff @ June 20 2008, 2:56 PM BST

You could ask a GCSE student to research three different techniques of measuring temperature in some hypothetical environment such as a furnace or underwater or in space or something, and compare the feasibility of each. That would be a nice piece of coursework, from which the students would learn a lot.

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In space? Overestimating the budgets a bit aren't you?

Without conducting the experiment how do you propose the research would be carried out?

Quote: Griff @ June 20 2008, 3:03 PM BST

And it would hopefully be marked in a way that understands that you don't have any notes with you, so they are more interested in your anecdotal evidence (which shows your understanding of the research process you went through) than you being able to remember statistics accurately.

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Anecdotal evidence? So in this exam you'd have to write about the research process as well as answering a history based question?

Or are you advocating the use of anecdotal evidence about the war? As far as I'm aware anecdotal evidence was marginalised for our coursework because it was fairly irrelevant to the 'big picture.'

Quote: PhQnix @ June 20 2008, 3:10 PM BST

So in this exam you'd have to write about the research process as well as answering a history based question?

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Did you not have to do that in your exams?

Quote: Griff @ June 20 2008, 3:12 PM BST

[Yes, exactly. This is the exam that proves you have done research yourself and benefitted from the experience. There will be other questions, or papers, testing you on your historical knowledge.

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That seems like a bit of a convoluted way to assess whether someone has conducted their own research. I don't see why you couldn't use coursework to do this.

I can't really argue this point because it's quite clear that you think this is the best solution whilst I think coursework is a better solution. There is no correct answer here, really. Both offer benefits and disadvantages.

So, Thatcher, eh? You know what bugs me. I can't discuss Thatcher with anyone here at all, I know very little about her time in office. We've never covered her in any of our history lessons but we have covered the same period of American history. The mind boggles as to why this is. Thatcher was obviously a huge influence on our lives, really her government should be compulsory history.

Quote: Aaron @ June 20 2008, 3:17 PM BST

Did you not have to do that in your exams?

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No. I've never had to do anything like that. Did you?

Quote: Griff @ June 20 2008, 3:24 PM BST

BTW you do seem like a smart articulate guy from your posts, a world away from some of the ones that come on here saying

I HAV GOT 2 RITE AN SA ABOUT SITCOMM 2MORO WOT SHUD I SA ?!?!?!

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They all take Media Studies, so they're the dregs of the education system.

Plus I check everything three or four times because I'm sick of Aaron correcting all my mistakes

Quote: PhQnix @ June 20 2008, 3:30 PM BST

They all take Media Studies, so they're the dregs of the education system.

Plus I check everything three or four times because I'm sick of Aaron correcting all my mistakes

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You missed a full stop at the end of that last sentence, Ell.

Quote: PhQnix @ June 20 2008, 3:19 PM BST

No. I've never had to do anything like that. Did you?

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Yes. We always had to discuss our research. This proves the constant accusations of the dumbing down of exams and the education system.

[quote name="Griff" post="186996" date="June 20 2008, 3:12 PM BST"]

]

Yes, exactly. This is the exam that proves you have done research yourself and benefitted from the experience. There will be other questions, or papers, testing you on your historical knowledge.

If it goes back further than yesterday I'd be lost.

Quote: Graham Bandage @ June 20 2008, 3:38 PM BST

You missed a full stop at the end of that last sentence, Ell.

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I believe that in certain informal situations an emoticon can replace a full stop.

This just looks weird to me .

Quote: Aaron @ June 20 2008, 3:39 PM BST

Yes. We always had to discuss our research. This proves the constant accusations of the dumbing down of exams and the education system.

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It proves a shift in what we learn. We have to discuss our sources but we don't have to provide an in depth account of how we collected our research. We just had to use the sources to answer a question.

The full stop should have gone before the emoticon.

Quote: Aaron @ June 20 2008, 3:42 PM BST

The full stop should have gone before the emoticon.

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But then he's separated, he looks all odd.

The emoticon is sad because he is lonely without his sentence.

No, it looks normal. Do you smile whilst you're talking? Does it not hinder the words escaping your mouth?

Quote: Aaron @ June 20 2008, 3:47 PM BST

No, it looks normal. Do you smile whilst you're talking? Does it not hinder the words escaping your mouth?

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Yes. No.