Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Giving Exams Over Mobile Phones?

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2003 11:02:46 -0500

Giving Exams Over Mobile Phones?
Contributed by mmasnick on Tues, Nov 18 2003

This one seems like a bit of a stretch, but some researchers are testing a plan
to give school exams over a mobile phone where a computer reads out questions,
and the student speaks their answers. They point out that many students have
mobile phones, and it lets the students take the exam on their own time. Of
course, the obvious question is why not just run the exam on the web, where
students can type the answer and it's less of a shift from paper-based exams?
The answer, it appears, is that by using a mobile phone they can take prove that
the person is who they are by comparing their voice to a voiceprint. Still, it
is a very different form of test taking, and I could see how students wouldn't
feel comfortable taking their exams that way.

www.techdirt.com

===================================================================

Testing students by mobile phone
As the government announces plans to modernise the exam system, various
experiments are going on with innovative ways of assessing what students
know.

How about using your mobile phone to answer questions read out by a robot,
for example?

Most schools ban them from lessons but almost every teenager now has one,
so why not turn that to advantage?

This is what Ultralab at Anglia Polytechnic University is trying for the
Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA), working with phone company
Orange and CWA New Media in New Zealand.

Dial-up

Pupils enter their coursework "milestones" on a website which can be accessed
and marked by teachers and commented on by fellow students.

At the end of the course they dial a freephone number to answer questions
posed by computer. A voiceprint checks their identity to prevent cheating.

A "robot" asks them questions similar to those they said at the outset of the
project that they would be able to answer by the end of it.

They can re-record the answers as often as they wish, provided they do it in
one sitting.

The answers from thousands of students are stored centrally and can be
marked at any time by examiners - all of which saves having to timetable
numerous face-to-face meetings.

As part of what is known as the eViva project, the idea is being tried at 10
English schools, including Bishop Lovett in the Isle of Wight.

Shifting technology

Fourteen-year-old Charlotte found it somewhat strange, talking to a machine.

"It's a bit nerve-racking because they don't tell you how you've done," she
said.

Ultralab stress that, as it stands, "this is not the future of exams". But it
says it
is a valuable research project that will inform the future of assessment.

The starting point is that currently, assessment does not take sufficient
account
of youngsters' familiarity with various media.

But the technology is changing so rapidly it is difficult to devise reliable
alternative assessment processes before they go out of date.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/education/3278625.stm

Published: 2003/11/17 18:48:03 GMT

------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for your HP, Epson, Canon or Lexmark
Printer at MyInks.com. Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US & Canada.
http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5511
http://us.click.yahoo.com/mOAaAA/3exGAA/qnsNAA/61FxlB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/