IB stress

[baratron]

I am stressed on behalf of one of my students, who took the International Baccalaureate diploma chemistry exam today.

Something went *very* wrong, and they were told they weren't allowed the data booklet or even a periodic table for Paper 1. I've NEVER heard of a public examination where you weren't allowed a periodic table for chemistry. Even my university exams, we got a periodic table!

The IB Paper 1 is an absolutely terrifying exam at the best of times. It's an hour long, multiple choice - but it is the HARDEST multiple choice exam ever. It takes me an hour to do one of the papers, and I'm a graduate chemist who's been teaching chemistry for 3 years. If it's true that they're not allowed a periodic table for Paper 1, I need to know, so I prepare my kids appropriately.

Let's say you get a multiple choice question about the electronic configuration of silicon. Armed with my l33t chemical knowledge, I know that silicon is in group 4, period 3, and can work out within seconds that it thus has the electron configuration 2,8,4, and can attempt to add 2+8+4 to work out the atomic number must be 14. But it takes me maybe 3-5 seconds to do that without a periodic table, compared to instantaneous lookup with.

Now, let's consider krypton. A-level and IB students need to be able to give electron configurations up to krypton. Krypton is a noble gas, ok, group 0, uh... must be the 4th period... 2,8,18,8? I don't actually know if that's right, I'll have to give the detailed breakdown. 1s² 2s² 2p⁶ 3s² 3p⁶ 4s² 3s¹⁰ 4p⁶. OK, so ignoring the time it took to put the html around that - 10-15 seconds to get krypton? again, compared to instantaneous with a periodic table. As for adding 2+2+6+2+6+2+10+6 without a calculator when stressed and upset... I don't even want to figure out how long it would take me.

Let's look at some of the other 4th period nasties. Arsenic? Germanium? Selenium? They don't even study the chemistry of these elements, how are they supposed to just magically know what Group they're in?

Yeah. I'm not at all surprised that the poor kids were in tears when they got given the data book for their Paper 2, and could see how much they'd messed up by not having it for Paper 1 :/

Comments

[fluffymormegil.livejournal.com]

Yeeeowch :( *hugs* *proxyhugs for your student*

[barakta]

Yikes.

Can you contact examination boards and ask these sorts of questions, or are they like CACDP exams where it is a huge secret that they'll only tell examiners?

We had our last sign lesson before our level 2 exam, the tutor who taught us is the excellent guy I had before, he's a level 2 examiner AND moderator so knows is stuff. An awful lot of the stuff our real tutor told us was 'wrong' and she had no sensible way of finding out.

Symapthies for your poor student, I hope her tutors at wherever she is educated had informed them that they weren't allowed the periodic table prior to the exam. I've been in exams where the goalposts have been changed on students. Namely a uni chem exam which we were told was multiple choice and wasn't - the only Q I understood was then removed after errors were found in it. We kicked off bigstyle at the head of dept, and after being told "You are all shit, you all failed" 40% of my year quit the course and changed degrees :(

[baratron.livejournal.com]

No, they found out today in the examination hall that they weren't allowed the data booklet. I'm about 90% sure it's incorrect - I know they're not allowed a calculator for Paper 1, but I really did think they were allowed the data book. But my IB data book mysteriously went missing a few months ago, so I can't check what it says on the cover (if anything). And the syllabus I have is just a photocopy of the teaching specification, not the full thing. And http://www.ibo.org is crap, it makes you pay for everything. (It's the only exam board where you can't download a specification + specimen papers for free.)

[lovingboth]

Which local FE places enter people for it? Ask them...

[ludy]

eeek! (i only did one year of a-level chemistry - it's not very dyslexic freindly - and i'm squirmimg in sympathy) is part of your role as tutor to provide emrgancy post-exam choclate?

[aardvarkoffnord.livejournal.com]

My exam board for my A level Chemistry did not allow us periodic tables or data books. We were told "All information you need is provided on the front of the exam paper", so things like Avagadro's Number were there.

The reason I remember this so clearly is because my memorisation of Tom Lehrer's "Elements" song actually came in useful during the exam :-)

[rhialto.livejournal.com]

Most of my university exams were even "open book" (that is you could bring anything on paper that you wanted). That way, it allows the examiners to test for understanding rather than stupid factual knowledge. Of course it helps if you don't have to look up often-used facts, so studying the books beforehand is useful anyway. The most notorious exception was "philosophy" (which I put between quotes because nobody in their right mind would call that real philosopy), where at least one time I was required to fill in the exact missing words from various papers that we had been given. (How that relates to understanding philosophy I still don't know) Obviously, most students took that exam again and again and again (and again).