Uses for the Daily Quiz

Quizzes have been used for centuries as one of the most popular forms of formative evaluation of students’ progress in the educational program. As such, the quiz has often been relegated to a minor role in the educational experience. You take a quiz, you get a score, you move on.

However, there is much more that the lowly quiz can do for you and your class.

Exposure to Multiple Questions

First, the class never arrives without a quiz or test as they come in the door. The routine expectation of a quiz tends to keep both the student and the instructor honest. This also gives us the advantage of exposing the student to a large number of potential questions. The more questions they see, the less they will be intimidated by tests—especially those tests based on “test bank” questions. Therefore, a mix of original, class-based quizzes gradually moving to the “test bank” questions will be of great potential benefit to the student.

On-Time Performance

Working with college students, the world tends not to exist before 10 a.m. Motivating them to get to class on time can be challenging. The carrot and stick approach says if the student arrives prior to class, they get five points (not five questions) on the quiz. If they arrive within 15 minutes of class start, they get to take the quiz. If they are more than 15 minutes late without a reasonable excuse, they zero the exam. We find that this is a strong motivator. Students quickly discover that these five points can make a significant difference in scores. They really do look at the clock (and for their points) as they arrive.

Review of the Quiz in Class

We believe a significant amount of the actual learning that takes place is the review of the quiz. A student is never more focused on the topic than while taking a test on the material. Therefore, finding out what went right and not so right is high on the student’s agenda. So, the quiz needs to be reviewed as soon as it is taken. The downside is it takes a great amount of time and verbal abilities to review the quiz. This is not just giving the students the correct answer. It necessitates addressing both why the correct answer works and, perhaps more importantly, why the wrong answers are wrong. This can, and does, lead to some “spirited” discussions. Most of these discussions are not about the actual answer, but more about the question construction and its language. Occasionally, this leads to a “Test Interpretation 101” class. This is how correction and clarification of ideas occur. It may also be where most of the actual learning takes place. However, a definitive time limit must be established.

Reducing the Threat (and Improving Results)

One method that we are trying out is having the student presented with the regular quiz of 20 (test bank) questions, but they select only the ten (or 11) that they choose to answer. Therefore, these are the questions they feel most confident answering.

This results in a number of potential educational benefits:

• In order to choose which questions to answer, the student must examine all of them. The evaluation process that this involves is very complex and may give as much educational benefit as actually answering each question.
• When the instructor looks at the answer sheets, it is quickly apparent which questions intimidated students. Either the question topic is not well understood, they don’t see the answer they expect or the question is poorly written. In any case, if no one in the class chooses to answer the question, an extensive review of the question and the related topics needs to be accomplished.
• What may be more expository is questions the students choose to answer that they then get wrong. If they chose to answer the question, they must have been confident that they knew the answer; yet they were wrong. We now have an opportunity to correct an erroneous assumption prior to it becoming a lasting problem.
• The last benefit is that student scores go up. Even though each question counts for a higher portion of the final grade, students tend to do better. Successful students become more successful. Since its inception, it has been very popular. Students were given the opportunity to revert back to the old way several times and have declined.

Conclusion

Integrating the daily quiz into the curriculum allows the instructor to get a fast insight into the class’ didactic progress, motivate them to be on time, allows their students to have a choice and have greater success in the classroom. All in all, a positive educational outcome!

Mark Forgues, MEd, EMT-P, has more than 30 years of EMS experience in municipal, hospital-based, volunteer, private, fixed-wing, collegiate and fire-based EMS agencies. He is director of Medical Resources Group, LLC, an education and consulting firm; technical director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Emergency Medical Services; and is a per diem paramedic with Wayland (MA) Fire Department Advanced Life Support. He is also a national and internationally known speaker. Contact him at mforgues@mit.edu.