The Current Education System Should Replace Exams with Continuous Assessments

The current education system should replace exams by substituting the approach with continuous assessment to combat the idea of testing memory and promote a concept that evaluates all learning processes that are unattainable when using the examination method.

Introduction

The current education system in most universities assess students’ knowledge in different topics and subjects using Exams as opposed to continuous assessments. The outcome of both strategies indicate that students perform better in continuous assessments compared to final examinations since the latter overwhelm the learner and they focus on testing student memory. However, I believe that continuous assessments improve student performance, promote critical thinking, and tests students’ oral presentation, reading, and writing regularly whereas, the examinations focus on testing memory and promotes cramming as opposed to understanding.

Evaluation

Exams may overwhelm students as they prepare for the final testing. However, the pressure prepares them for demanding tasks in the job market where companies compete against each other, which could overwhelm an employee (Hunt and Chalmers 2013). Equally, exams assess students’ performance by testing what the learners have understood throughout the semester or if they can remember previous concepts that link to the topics discussed in the current semester (Srivastava, 2010). Another reason to keep the examination system is that the approach only tests what people have studied during the semester and the students will know what to read and increase their chances of excelling.

The rationale behind supporting the use of examination as a way of testing students follows that students need to learn how to prepare themselves prior to taking any tests (Srivastava, 2010). Students feel overwhelmed due to lack of preparation, which shows that they lack excellent organization skills that remain an integral habit of success not only at school but also in other aspects of life such as attending workplace meetings or preparing for interviews amidst other urgent tasks (Ishiyama, Miller, & Simon, 2015). If an educator issues a take-away assignment, some students may wait for their peers to do the assignment and they copy from their friends, which makes the assessment approach unsuitable. In such a case, students fail to realize that they need to study and understand the concept but prepare themselves for the sake of passing exams most likely through cramming information. Eventually, the learners fail to retain the information for future use that could help them in other aspects of their lives.

I disagree that continuous assessments are better replacements for test examination because they can overwhelm students if every educator gives a project for with non-extensive deadline (Hunt and Chalmers 2013). Moreover, assessments prompt extra learning costs such as visiting a museum to study an item and write a report on the issue. The additional fees may negatively affect the student’s life if the learner relied on that amount to meet personal needs (Morgan, 2013).

Learning should include more than reading books by incorporating other extra-curricular activities (Ishiyama, Miller, & Simon, 2015). Some students may experience challenges trying to balance doing assignments and participating in sports or music that can boost their overall life. In such a case, some students consider dropping the extra-curriculum activities to concentrate on the cumbersome workload as a means of attaining the required the minimum marks to graduate and avoid repeating a unit. The extra costs incurred by continuous assessment tasks and negatively influence the students’ performance. For example, if the teacher requires the students to participate in a group work that will involve spending money, a student who cannot afford the field work may miss out on the learning experience, and it could negatively impact the journal writing because of lack of content (Morgan, 2013).

The logic that continuous assessment tests overwhelm students can be debatable (Hunt and Chalmers 2013). Instead, I believe that regular assessment trains learners to become better time managers and organize their schedule and meet the demands of the evaluation and have time to carry out other personal activities. Students need to realize that they are responsible for their lives and they cannot blame their teachers for providing them with several urgent tasks as part of their learning requirements. According to Ishiyama, Miller, & Simon (2015), continuous assessment tests train learners how they can handle different pressures of life once they finalize their studies and join the workforce. In some cases, persons who become married and work at the same time must establish a system to balance their work and private lives if they want to succeed in life. In such a case, the continuous assessment should replace examinations because it encourages active learning whereby students can work in groups to discuss the problem and handle the project first based on teamwork efforts (Ishiyama, Miller, & Simon, 2015). Therefore, students should view continuous assessments as a platform to help them organize and manage time appropriately (Dunn, 2012). If done the proper way, it fosters performance increase in learning and other aspects of life.

The issue of relying on exams as a method of testing students’ level of understanding may be overrated because some learners take advantage of the situation to cram information. Additionally, such students reproduce what they have learned not because they understood the concept but because of their ability to remember the examples and points discussed in class while answering the questions (Srivastava, 2010). The challenge with relying on such a technique for assessing if students have understood a topic is that one exam is used as a determining factor. Contrarily, continuous assessments encourage students to read and understand a subject and foster critical thinking especially when the educator requires students to present their findings to the class verbally. Therefore, it shows that the use of exams as a strategy to measure if a student has understood a topic may not provide substantial results as compared to students who read and understand and explain the information in a descriptive way rather than cramming (Ishiyama, Miller, & Simon, 2015).

Conclusion

Exams may overwhelm students but still assess student performance. However, such an argument does not justify its relevance since some apprentices may opt to cram information for the sake of passing an exam but lack the understanding of the course. Equally, continuous assessments may overwhelm students following the burden of take-away assignments with non-extendable deadlines. Nevertheless, even if the tasks overwhelm the students, it trains them how to organize and manage their time appropriately such that they can finish the work successfully and also engage in other social activities to boost their social well-being. I support the education industry and other stakeholders to replace the examination system with continuous assessment because it reduces cases of cramming information and teaches the importance of reading and understanding subjects. Eventually, the students can remember the information in the future and apply the knowledge to real-life situations.

References

Dunn, D 2012, Assessing teaching and learning in psychology: current and future perspectives, Cengage Learning, Boston, MA

Hunt, L. & Chalmers, D 2013, University teaching in focus: a learning-centred approach,

Routledge, London , UK.

Ishiyama, J., Miller, J. W & Simon, E 2015, Handbook on teaching and learning in political science and international relations,

Edward Elgar Publishing, Northampton, MA.

Morgan, M 2013, Improving the student experience: A practical guide for universities and colleges, Routledge, London, UK.

Srivastava, H. S 2010, Conducting and examinations tests. S. Chand, New Delhi India