Five Surprises: The Key To Re Engineering The Traditional Quizzes

Most professors use quizzes as a method of keeping students focused on their responsibility to learn the course content. With the potential of a quiz looming, the consequences of coming to class unprepared serves as motivation to students to do their homework and the assigned readings. This method is negative rather than positive reinforcement, and is not as effective as it could possibly be for student learning. In previous research, working alone and quizzing were ranked lowest in terms of preferred classroom learning. 1 Part of the problem lies in the fact that traditional quizzing methods are neither collaborative nor active in nature. Students literally have no input into when quizzes are administered or to the actual content of the quiz. For classes in which teamwork and active learning techniques are stressed, alternative quizzing methods are more consistent with the instruction and potentially more beneficial to the students in developing team skills and working under pressure. Students are more interested and engaged when a variety of techniques are used to test their knowledge and analytical abilities, just as active learning techniques are more effective when a diverse sampling of methods are employed. When given a voice into the quizzing process, the students invest more in their own learning. This serves as positive reinforcement and truly motivates the students to become active learners. This paper examines a wide variety of alternative quizzing techniques. The title of the paper, “Five Surprises” reflects the quantity of quizzes given per semester and the unannounced nature of the quizzes. Some are formulated by faculty and others recommended by students. Some have been employed in the classroom; others are being evaluated by faculty for possible implementation in the current and future semesters. This paper will highlight some of the best ideas which have been given specific names suggestive of the type of quiz. Overall, nine alternative quiz types have been identified and include names such as “Dante’s Quiz”, “Jumping Beans”, “Who Wants to be an Engine-aire”, and “The Relay”.