Mar 03 2010
Science is No Fill-in-the-Blank
What is the identity of the above image? The correct answer to that question could be considered scientific: a precise location (name for it).
As a former psychology professor, I have seen how many students prefer fill-in-the-blank type questions vs. true/false or multiple choice.
What?! There is one correct answer?! Don’t I get credit for thinking, period?
True, simply parroting “the answer” is not indicative or a deeper type of learning. But to simply string words together in a longer answer that seems familiar to the instructor (resembling his/her own word strings) . . . ? Is that a higher learning, or just clever?
Hmm.
[photo of Devil's Tower thanks to NASA]
