<p>rodney, good point! It’s obviously an English test, not a math test!</p>
<p>In answering my question, yes, 30 ft was the correct answer. It was the only correct answer because of the phrase "sold only in 10 foot long sections. With that condition in the question, one sees he can not purchase one at 35’ with $35k. The question tells us he cannot purchase a 5’ section at half price; therefore the maximum length he can afford is 30’, and he’d have $5k left over. So the only right answer is 30 feet. We could change the question to say he could afford 35’ if they were sold in different lengths, or if it had had said they were sold at $1000 a foot- but it is given to us they are only sold in 10’. Often times those that missed that question overlooked the “only 10’” part and thought 35k could buy 3 1/2 sections, or 35 feet. A person cannot buy a product if it doesn’t exist. This question specified conditions that excluded fractions.
The actual question was considered a math question.</p>
<p>Though no one publicly here asked, the reason given in the article on why it was deemed unfair to black testtakers- blacks don’t have enough money to buy a yacht so they could not fairly understand the question.
Like it or not, fair or not, agree with the reason or not, but that was the reason given.</p>
<p>^^^ It would have been easy enough to change the question to $10 for 10 feet of rope.</p>
<p>makes sense, very happy. </p>
<p>We often think of the common math question- If a train left Chicago going West traveling at…
Yet I personally never got on a train and left Chicago… to many it just seems an example for a math question, and not a personal experience.</p>
<p>Younghoss, I don’t question that you were told that, but I doubt that it is true.</p>
<p>Very few people of any skin color have “enough money to buy a yacht.”</p>
<p>That sounds like an urban myth.</p>
<p>“The dog was high.”</p>
<p>Anybody remember this answer choice on an exam administered to high school seniors eons ago?</p>
<p>I kid you not.</p>
<p>Unless I’ve gone daft, but it’s the kind of thing that sticks with you…</p>
<p>When I was in elementary school, we had to take the religious part of standardized tests. They asked us specific questions about specific Bible stories. Want to talk about ridiculous… haha </p>
<p>I remember what was irritating about the ACT science is that you don’t need to know a darn thing about science in order to do well. Seriously, once I realized that ALL of the information was in the given information, my ACT science score shot from a 26 to a 35. </p>
<p>Fwiw, I don’t buy the yacht thing. However, I do remember there being a question about a farm animal on a very early standardized test that I took that most of the class didn’t understand. They didn’t know what the animal was so they couldn’t answer the question. I only knew because I had spent quite a lot of time on a farm when I was young. </p>
<p>Standardized testing as it stands right now is just ridiculous on so many levels.</p>
<p>My son took the test in question. He came home flabbergasted by it. I’m glad the questions about the pineapple are going to be discounted.</p>
<p>Even worse was the 4th grade test this year which contained significant passages about sounds. Hearing impaired students were at a huge disadvantage and now that is going to have to be dealt with.</p>
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<p>I agree. But, it’s a very useful myth, as it effectively provokes conservative condescension toward what they see as the PC demands of liberals. :p</p>
<p>The only two people I have ever met who owned an actual yacht (not just a big boat) were both black.</p>
<p>I don’t envy test makers. I remember coming up with a survey as part of an assignment for a college class I took and being very dismayed when it turned out one of the questions I thought was perfectly clear and could not possibly be misunderstood came back with answers indicating otherwise and had to be scratched. Not so easy.</p>
<p>Right. It’s not so easy. Having said that some of it is just common sense for goodness sake. An example being in my last post about the pencil that can somehow, miraculously satand on it’s sharpened tip and cast a shadow.</p>
<p>Other issues might be more subtle. Whenever anyone communicates, whether through the written language, the spoken language, through art or music or whatever, the one doing the communicating is always convinced that they are making themselves perfectly clear; that there is no room for misinterpretation.</p>
<p>Try this experiment. When you are with another person, think of a song that is easy to recognize (for example: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star or Happy Birthday). Without making any other sound, tape the song out with your finger on a table and ask the other person to name the song. </p>
<p>It is an interesting experiment that demonstrates our bias as to how we believe and expect others will perceive stimulus. As you tap out the song, you will be hearing the song in your head. It will seem absolutely impossible that anyone could NOT guess the tune. But chances are they won’t! Because they are not privy to what is going on inside your head. </p>
<p>When we communicate, especially when the stakes are high and their is genuine investment in the clarity of the information being offered, we need to be sure that we are “hearing” the information in the way that the receiver is going to hear it. Anything less is useless and even dangerous.</p>
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<p>Just tried this because I was curious. I tapped out Twinkle Twinkle and asked my boyfriend what it was. He said that cheerleader thing “We got spirit! Yes we do! We got spirit! How bout you?” -.- He repeated it back to me and I guessed all the songs right. He was a drum major in high school though so I would hope he’s better with things like that haha. </p>
<p>Anyway, is there a solution to any of this? Why don’t we just get rid of the nonsensical questions and ask about realistic things? Why is it so important that the pencil stand on its point? Can’t it just be a can of tomato soup? I guess I just don’t understand. -.-</p>
<p>I don’t envy test takers…but I turned my many, many pages over the years. Who can race the fastest, jump the highest, our values. Then some just go home and putter around in a garage and make things that change us all, test or no test. It is creativity, always creativity that trumps all. Hard to test that; hard to test resilience; hard to test perseverance.</p>
<p>This article describes the FCAT to a T. I remember thinking throughout the entire test that certain questions made no sense, and some didn’t have correct answers. For the science portion, they mailed everyone a long form response to us with our score that we answered, with the scoring included. I had answered a simple science question perfectly and even had my microbiology and physics professor grandfather check my answer to make sure I wasn’t missing something. I received a 0/4 on that question for inexplicable reasons.</p>
<p>Romani, I agree with your assessment of the ACT science. The first time I took it, I worried too much about reading every passage. I got a 28 I think. On the second try, I skipped ahead to the questions and just looked for the answers in the passage. An easy 35 that go around.</p>
<p>my youngest got the pineapple/hare thing ‘correct,’ so was pretty annoyed when she heard it was going to be cut.</p>
<p>I liked Pinkwater’s quote at the end of the article:</p>
<p>“Well give me a break,” he said. “It’s a nonsense story and there isn’t an option for a nonsense answer.”</p>
<p>Nice article about testing and teaching: <a href=“Opinion | Teach the Books, Touch the Heart - The New York Times”>Opinion | Teach the Books, Touch the Heart - The New York Times;
<p>I don’t remember any particular oddities about standardized testing when I was in elementary school. I do remember actually enjoying the SAT tests because they used actual reading material from novels and science books. I always thought the passages were interesting and I learned something new from them. </p>
<p>I may have been an unusual child…</p>
<p>^^^
I liked it too. Especially the analogies. I guess I was a bit of a geek.</p>
<p>I see nothing wrong with the Pinkwater story. There’s nothing in it that’s too difficult to understand. I find it troubling that 8th-graders didn’t seem to get it. I suppose it’s possible that they hadn’t heard the fable of the tortoise and the hare, or hadn’t heard the expression of having something up your sleeve. But how can you make a test so simple that it includes nothing that somebody might not have heard of? A couple of the questions, on the other hand, were stupid–but most of them were fine, too. Even the question about which animal was wisest could have been fixed with a “none of the above” response.</p>