One thought on “Boost Critical Thinking: Let Students Use Google on Exams

  1. My reply:

    Duh, the advent of the Internet, Google, and Wikipedia have given everybody the basic tools to boost their brain power and build a huge working knowledge base bigger than ever before possible. Of course at exam time this will be embedded both in their brains as essential info. and as mental notes as to where to find deeper info. on the Net quickly, i.e., the Internet becomes part of their brain. If the Luddite school system wants to get out of the horse and buggy era, the teachers should be leaders in this approach, imparting it to their students and letting them use it during tests. If asked to write an essay on the U.S. Open Door Policy in 30 minutes, a student who didn’t do his homework, when given Internet access will produce a rudimentary baby-level report based only on what he can read in one Wiki article at that time, but somebody who was studying hard throughout the class for many hours will use that and many other articles to achieve a quality report, using the access just to remember and check small facts like the names of the officials involved, the dates, the date that the term Open Door Policy changed to reflect Red China’s economic modernization, etc., making all the exams easy to grade. The best type of test will be online, allowing students to embed hyperlinks to their answers to justify each fact cited. A smart teacher will put all the questions and answers on a blog along with grades and let the world chime in with feedback, maybe using it to change grades during some time period. Really great answers should be copyrighted by the students and displayed on their personal blogs to help launch their careers in academia, and cited on admission and scholarship applications, how wonderful crazy healthy, I’ve been fired by every company I ever worked with.

    In sum, tell the legion of Luddite teachers out there to GET WITH IT, YOUR JOBS ARE ON THE LINE. While they dither, my Historyscoping Revolution is producing a new generation of Internet-powered supergeneralist history experts that will blow them away if they fall too far behind. My advice to students who don’t want to get in debt just to spend years on a party campus is to stay home with their parents and join my online school free by visiting my Historyscoper Web site and chucking the whole obsolescent academic system, which is no longer needed for history and many other purely cerebral subjects, just an Internet terminal, dedication, discipline, and plenty of study time free of distractions. The Internet has made universal education a reality, and now it’s a horserace.

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