We are going through a set of questions, perhaps SAT questions, and we look at a particularly difficult one. The kid took a random guess on the question and … got it right.
“Yeeahhh! I knew it! I KNEW it. Yeah!”
Of course, two seconds earlier, he didn’t know it. But now, he wants to move on because the magical feeling of power that comes from a lucky guess trumps almost anything.
Another conversation:
“I thought it might be D, and when I did the work, I got D, but there were a lot of D’s in the answer choices and so… I picked C.”
Slightly better than the magical thinking above are when the students use the answer choices to help them figure out the question. In fact, a good amount of SAT prep is just teaching students how to use the answer choices to their advantage.
In the best-case scenario, multiple choice questions test recall, but it really is a shallow, recognition type recall, and not a deeper, more confident mastery of a subject.
The attempts to make difficult multiple-choice questions, in an English or History class, are almost always unfair, because the second-best answers have very valid points to them. And so it becomes an exercise in nit-picking.
So Why Use Multiple Choice At All?
I would love to ban multiple choice questions, but it won’t happen.
Tests around the world use multiple choice, because it is easy to grade in large numbers. Standardized tests are almost universally multiple choice.
They are not going away, but perhaps they can be improved.
My Solution
I call it a wager exam. Tell the students that they are given five points a problem (for example). And then, allow them to distribute the points among the answer choices as they see fit. If they are sure of an answer, they can “wager” all five points on choice C.
If they are torn between a few answers, they can distribute the answers among their favorites. (3 points on choice B, and 2 points on choice D, for example).
If they have “no idea” they can distribute the points evenly among the five answer choices.
Here is what a typical question will look like:
On the above question, the student would receive partial credit. The teacher would understand his exact confidence in the material, and understand precisely how he is misunderstanding the material (by looking at the wrong answers). You can make the questions feel fun and competitive by calling the points dollars, or “history bucks” or whatever.
Why are wager exams superior to traditional multiple-choice exams?
a) They retain the simplicity of grading traditional multiple-choice exams.
b) They resemble decision-making in the real world.
c) They give teachers a much richer amount of information; particularly, choices they are tempted by and the exact confidence level they had in the right answer.
d) They pre-empt much of the magical thinking. (They don’t guess.)
e) Tells you something about the student’s personality. Are they risk takers?
f) All of the above.