Schools are to be given advice on how to disable a glitch that allows pupils sitting online spelling tests to right-click their mouse and find the answer.
[...] A spokesman said the issue was not with the Scottish National Standardised Assessments (SNSA) but with browser or device settings on some machines.
Former head teacher George Gilchrist tweeted about the issue after it emerged primary seven pupils were using the online spellchecker on the test.
He wrote: "SNSA P7 spelling. Pupils asked to correct spelling of words. P7 pupils worked out if you right click on your answer, the computer tells you if it is correct! Brilliant! 😂"
Introduced in 2017, the spelling test asks children to identify misspelt words.
However, on some school computers the words were highlighted with a red line. Pupils who right-clicked on the words were then able to access the correct spelling.
(Score: 2) by mrpg on Tuesday May 22 2018, @06:10AM
Hack the planet!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drJWxMLrpE0 [youtube.com]
(Score: 5, Touché) by maxwell demon on Tuesday May 22 2018, @06:10AM (8 children)
The real solution is for the teachers to stop being lazy and do what they are paid to do, instead of offloading their work to online services.
Otherwise, they cannot rightfully complain if the pupils also offload their work to the computer.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by MostCynical on Tuesday May 22 2018, @06:27AM (7 children)
You know it isn't the teachers, don't you?
These tests are foisted on the system by the government.
Politicians don't care about teachers (check out the US teacher's strikes, or the pay of teachers in most countries, compared to, say, lawyers, politicians or doctors)
It is all about "metrics" in education.
You can compare metrics, so prove stuff (although what you you usually show is the curriculum gets dumbed-down, and teachers now are compelled to teach to the test)
Teachers want to teach. These tests get in the way. School funding gets linked to the test outcomes, and teacher performance reviews, and head teacher performance reviews.. And so it goes, politicians are seen to be Doing Something About Education, but damaging it in the process.
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday May 22 2018, @07:03AM (3 children)
No, I didn't know that.
Of course, if school funding is dependent on the outcomes, schools have an incentive to actually configure their computers to allow cheating …
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday May 23 2018, @03:37AM (2 children)
FTFY (without money, the school can't deliver skills/education)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Wednesday May 23 2018, @02:36PM (1 child)
Meanwhile in the real world, there is an approximately inverse relationship between spending per pupil and the actual results.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday May 23 2018, @02:45PM
Tell that to the Finns [smithsonianmag.com], I reckon in a climate like theirs they don't have enough occasions to laugh.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Tuesday May 22 2018, @09:18AM (2 children)
School funding gets linked to the test outcomes
Presumably the lower the score, the more funding that is needed -- right?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 22 2018, @10:45AM (1 child)
More funding is needed but
lower performing schools get less funding as punishmenthigher performing schools get more funding as incentive.(Score: 3, Informative) by bob_super on Tuesday May 22 2018, @04:43PM
I found the American.
The Scots have a less twisted view on the need to educate kids.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by BsAtHome on Tuesday May 22 2018, @06:48AM (1 child)
The whole premise of doing a test on a computer assumes that the pupils are computer illiterate for those areas other than which are required for the test. (Un)fortunately, pupils do know how to operate a computer and most know better than the teachers or testers.
Blaming the pupils for being smart is just so wrong! They should be commended and the people who made the test, and all others who are complaining, should be punished for being stupid and for being idiots.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 22 2018, @08:36AM
Even worse, it requires the students to be less computer literate than the teacher.
In every school I know of, the exact opposite is the case, except maybe for programming teachers (where any such teachers exist).
(Score: 3, Funny) by nobu_the_bard on Tuesday May 22 2018, @02:54PM (1 child)
I remember Words Per Minute typing tests I did in the early 90s. Me and some other students were graded on our WPM, which had typos subtracted from our score. We realized if you just banged on the keyboard as fast as possible, you could get a WPM score in the 300-500 range even AFTER deductions for making nearly every possible mistake.
This ended up raising the required WPM for later tests to pass, until this was the effectively required strategy, but by then the teachers caught on and stopped bothering with it.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday May 22 2018, @03:55PM
My teacher would have made us redo the entire thing. Though, that's what you get with small schools and small classrooms. Small classes == More Teacher Time per pupil.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"