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Years?
May 8, 2008 19:52:52 GMT
Post by amanda on May 8, 2008 19:52:52 GMT
I did most of my practising-for-the test on a Daimler fluid-flywheel pre-selector box Dear Enigmatic Tone, the game's up. The above could only be uttered by a male of the species. ;D
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Years?
May 8, 2008 20:10:44 GMT
Post by Bertie on May 8, 2008 20:10:44 GMT
The answer has to be "C" because the television set is firmly established in the room where it lives without knowledge of anything outside that sphere. The dog, meanwhile, walks from room to room without any good reason and not even knowing why it has done so. The cat. of course, is ruler of all it surveys.
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Years?
May 8, 2008 20:14:27 GMT
Post by Tone on May 8, 2008 20:14:27 GMT
The original answer was: The cat -- 'cos it doesn't need a licence!
Amanda, The above could only be uttered by a male of the species.
Or a rather clever female who was aiming for misdirection?
Tone
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Years?
May 8, 2008 21:08:48 GMT
Post by Sue M-V on May 8, 2008 21:08:48 GMT
Or a rather clever female who was aiming for misdirection? Even a female wouldn't be that devious! Sue
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Years?
May 9, 2008 7:39:53 GMT
Post by Dave on May 9, 2008 7:39:53 GMT
The cat -- 'cos it doesn't need a licence Neither does a television in the US.
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Years?
May 9, 2008 10:56:57 GMT
Post by Alan Palmer on May 9, 2008 10:56:57 GMT
The cat -- 'cos it doesn't need a licence Neither does a television in the US. They don't have any licences in the US; they have licenses.
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Years?
May 9, 2008 11:23:13 GMT
Post by Barry on May 9, 2008 11:23:13 GMT
When examiners are writing assessment instruments (i.e. exam papers of one sort or another), they are asked to consider two constructs (which can be measured statistically, and by triangulation with other assessment methods): 1) validity: does it test what it's supposed to test? 2) reliability: will it do that the same way with any member of the given population? These are the great pillars on which educational assessment is built, and, alas, they tend to wobble from time to time. What we've largely been discussing here is validity - that is, if someone has spent two years learning a body of knowledge (e.g. a syllabus) about, say, mathematics, do the exams at the end genuinely measure what they have learned during those two years (internal validity), and, furthermore, do the syllabus and its examinations genuinely reflect the knowledge of mathematics that children genuinely need when they leave school (external validity)? If candidates need to/can call on skills in other areas of learning in order to answer an examination question, there is a wobble in validity - the question isn't testing their ability in, say, maths, but their ability in, say English comprehension. Consider the following: If a duo of male homo sapiens replenish, using smaller containers, a previously completely voided bathing-vessel in 10 minutes, what duration of time will need to elapse in order for a sole member of the species to accomplish the same operation? This may be testing some sort of applied mathematical ability, but largely, it's testing English vocabulary and syntax. The same can be true of multiple choice questions - if they are tricksy, or can be completed without the candidate having much knowledge of the subject being tested, then their validity (as assessment instruments for that subject) is suspect.
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Years?
May 9, 2008 12:16:33 GMT
Post by Paul Doherty on May 9, 2008 12:16:33 GMT
I take part in (and have occasionally set) the odd pub quiz. The best pub quiz questions seem to be about knowledge, but are really about the ability to do pub quizzes. My two favourite examples of the genre:
- Where was Leonardo da Vinci born? - Where is the English saint Edmund buried?
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Years?
May 9, 2008 15:39:38 GMT
Post by Barry on May 9, 2008 15:39:38 GMT
Yup, case in point.
The first tests an understanding of Italian (that 'da' means 'of' or 'from'), and of Italian naming conventions of the period.
The second can be deduced (and might involve a knowledge of Geography, mixed with a little history, and some 'white knowledge' of how places are named).
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Years?
May 9, 2008 17:55:47 GMT
Post by Paul Doherty on May 9, 2008 17:55:47 GMT
Or both of them test recognition that pub quizzes don't always expect you to know detailed facts about people's birth or death, and that it's worth wondering whether the answer might be in the question!
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Years?
May 9, 2008 20:38:36 GMT
Post by Tone on May 9, 2008 20:38:36 GMT
A colleague of mine regularly sets "pub-quizzes". He brings them to work. We (mainly I) regularly tear them apart: factuallywize, grammarwize, and punctuationwize. But they seem quite acceptable to his normal audience. Such is life. Sigh. Tone
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Years?
May 10, 2008 0:17:56 GMT
Post by Paul Doherty on May 10, 2008 0:17:56 GMT
The first rule, Tone: "know your audience".
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ianm
New Member
Posts: 20
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Years?
May 10, 2008 11:40:40 GMT
Post by ianm on May 10, 2008 11:40:40 GMT
Which is the odd one out? A -- A cat B -- A dog C -- A television set
My answer: A television set, because if you watch a cat or a dog you're unlikely to ever say "You cow!", but, given the right programme, you might while watching a television set.
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Years?
May 11, 2008 12:01:20 GMT
Post by Verbivore on May 11, 2008 12:01:20 GMT
B - Dog for me, because I'm not allergic to it.
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May 11, 2008 20:37:42 GMT
Post by Tone on May 11, 2008 20:37:42 GMT
B - Dog for me, because I'm not allergic to it.Ah, the attraction to Benzes finally explained. Tone
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