Dr. V.K.Maheshwari, M.A(Socio, Phil) B.Sc. M. Ed, Ph.D
Former Principal, K.L.D.A.V.(P.G) College, Roorkee, India
An “open book examination” is one in which examinees are allowed to consult their class notes, textbooks, and other approved material while answering questions. The conventional memory testing examinations must give way to examinations that test the intellectual skills of the student. This is where open book examinations come in. An open book question provides the candidates with the theory the question is examining and then asks them to demonstrate their ability to apply the theory to a scenario. Radical and puzzling though the idea may sound to those who are used to conventional examinations, it is ideally suited to teaching programmes that especially aim at developing the skills of critical and creative thinking.
An “open book exam” is a test that allows to bring the text or material one has been studying. This may sound at first that all one will need to do is look up the answer the day of the test–and thus a very easy type of test to take. However, this is not how this sort of test typically works. In fact, these are often quite difficult, as an open book exam requires a genuine understanding of the material and be able to interpret, think critically, and present an organized and well written answer. But with a bit of preparation, note taking skills, and test taking strategies, one can succeed your next open book exam.
In order to justify the use of open book examination and to appreciate its merits it is first of all necessary to understand the nature of teaching programmed in general. Majority of people think of the central objective of teaching as the “dissemination of knowledge”. This approach to education treats the information content of a subject to be the most essential. The teacher’s role is viewed as facilitating the transfer of information from the textbook to the students’ minds and the student is expected to do is to understand this information, retain it, and retrieve it during the final examination.
Based on the above approach, most conventional examinations test, students memorise the information in class notes and textbooks, and transfer it to answer books during the examination. In this type of examination, success depends on the quantity of information memorised, and the efficiency with which it is reproduced .
An alternative view regarding teaching programme is that teaching should not be transferring information from the library or textbooks to the students’ minds. Rather, in this teaching approach students are expected to learn. That is, teaching should equip students with the ability to acquire knowledge, to modify existing knowledge on the basis of new experience, to build new knowledge, and to apply available knowledge to solve problems and make intelligent decisions.
If this view of education is accepted, then the main focus of teaching will be on the skills of acquiring, modifying and creating knowledge, that is, on processing information, rather than on the information content itself. In other words, the focus shifts from rote learning to the development of certain mental faculties
This can be done by activating learning through questions, exercises, projects, assignments, and so on, and sustaining and guiding it by providing comments, criticisms, and other forms of feedback.
In order to achieve this goal, conventional memory testing examinations must give way to examinations that test the intellectual skills of the student. This is where open book examinations come in.
If the purpose of an examination is to test the information that students have memorised, open book examinations are inappropriate, since students can easily transfer the information in the textbook or lecture notes to the examination paper.
On the other hand, if the examination tests the skills of problem solving and critical thinking, then there is no harm in students consulting their text books and class notes. If students have to evaluate a conclusion that crucially involves their understanding of the concept, reproducing what the text book says would be pointless
In an open book examination, it is meaningless to ask memory oriented questions ,since all that the student has to do is copy the relevant information from the textbook directly into the answer book. In a closed book examination, the student first copies the information from the textbook to his memory, and then copies it into the answer book. This intermediate stage of memorization is what open book examinations attempt to eliminate.
The basic difference between closed book examinations and open book examinations is that the former can still be used to evaluate how much the students have memorised, while the latter cannot.
Understand the rationale behind an open book exam. Open book exams do not rely on learn-and-regurgitate learning. Instead, you will have the information in front of you, but what you will be asked is typically quite involved. Open exams are meant to teach students how to take information and apply it in a thoughtful, deep manner. In an open book exam, the focus is not on memorizing information but applying that information. What this means for you is that you will not simply be summarizing material from a textbook. You will be interpreting it in the context of specific questions and scenarios.
Types of open book exams:
There are generally two types of open book exams:
1- Restricted type
2- Unrestricted type.
In a restricted exam material is limited to specific documents, such as a single set of notes or single textbook.In the restricted type of open book examinations, students are permitted to bring into the examination room one or more specific documents approved by the course instructor.
In the restricted open book examination, students may be permitted to consult printed documents but no handwritten material or printed documents which have not had prior approval. The printed documents that students bring do not contain any scribbles on the margin. In this type of examination, the approved documents function more or less as appendices to the question paper itself. These examinations are not radically different from closed book examinations.
In an unrestricted exam, there is no limit on what can be brought into the exam room or take-home test. In the unrestricted type of open book examinations, students are free to bring whatever they like. There are no restrictions on what the students can bring in an unrestricted open book examination. They may bring any books (with or without scribbles on the margin), lecture handouts, or hand written notes. The use of such examinations demands that the course focuses on a set of intellectual skills, rather than on the information content , and that no content based questions be asked in the examination. When used properly, it will be pointless for students taking the unrestricted open book examinations to consult any material they have brought, because the questions will be designed in such a way the answers will not be found in the textbooks, handouts or class notes.
Preparing for exam
• As memorization is largely unnecessary for an open book exam. Focus is shifted to comprehending the material rather than simply being able to memorize and recite it. Locate and mark key information beforehand. Organize your textbook beforehand to locate key information quickly .
• Highlight key terms, historical dates, equations, and other difficult to remember material that you might need to draw from for questions. For this flip through your book to easily spot the highlighted sections.
• Majority of people dog-ear important pages, but simple folding can be easy to miss. Try investing in multi-colored sticky notes. Color coordinate any passages you’re marking, using different colors to indicate different areas of focus.
• As you’ll be tested primarily on interpretation, write down your own commentary and insight in your notes. This helps hone your critical thinking skills.
• Team up with other students. While study groups are great for any type of exam, they can be especially helpful for an open book. This helps you learn how to apply the information you learned.
• Use a system of enumerating and indenting your notes. Many people use roman numerals, using capital letters for headings and lower case for subheadings. Keep your class notes separate. Use a three-ring binder or notebook to separate one class’s notes from another or use a different notebook for each class.
• Write legibly. If you know your handwriting is sloppy.Focus on the important things. We’re sometimes tempted to transcribe more or less entire books or entire lectures when prepping for open book exams. However, this method is not only incredibly time consuming it’s ineffective. You’ll end up scrambling through pages and pages of notes and run down the clock during exam time.
Taking the Exam
• Know the time and place of the exam and give yourself extra time to get there. Getting lost or running late can increase anxiety and affect performance.
• Get a good night’s sleep before the exam. Anything that affects you physically can affect you mentally, so make sure you’re rested and refreshed before entering the exam room. Stop studying an hour before the exam and use this time to take care of yourself. Take a walk or eat something light.
• If you start to feel nervous during the exam, take a moment to stop. Do not hesitate to stop, close your eyes, and take several deep breaths to calm yourself before continuing. Stay calm. Exam anxiety can affect performance, so make sure you know good strategies to keep your nerves in check in the exam room.
• Answer any questions you can without notes first. This will save you time by allowing you to get through certain questions without fumbling with your notes. This also gives you more time with the questions where you might have difficulty and need to consult your notes.[23]
• If you’re really struggling with a question, treat it like you would on any other exam. Simply leave it and come back at the end of the test when you’ve had time to calm down and gather your thoughts. Review your answers, if there’s time. If you have time left at the end of the exam, go through the questions one more time using your notes to your advantage.
• Don’t transcribe too many notes as this can make it difficult to locate information during the exam.
• You can’t simply copy information word-for-word from your textbooks: this is plagiarism, and could make you fail the exam or even the course, as well as incur disciplinary action or penalties. Make good use of time .Quickly review the number of questions and note how much time each could take. First answer the questions that you are confident of and/or for which you will not need much time checking out the resources .Leave more complex and difficult questions for later. Don’t over-answer. Aim for concise, accurate, thoughtful answers that are based in evidence.
Impact on teaching and learning
Advanced countries are restructuring their educational systems and preparing to make changes in the human to intellectual capital for meeting the demands of the 21st century. Educationalist considers it necessary to build a young community who are able to think independently and creatively and able to process the information analytically. Scholars opined that in order to develop creative and independent thinkers, more open-ended tasks that reflect real-life situations should be incorporated in examinations. It is generally accepted that open book examinations create an enriched environment, offering the student an opportunity to better understand and respond to a particular question.
The Central Board of Secondary Education’s (CBSE) proposal for an open-book exam from 2013 within its class X and XII board assessments is appreciated. It makes a better option than the present one which reflects a fresh, borne in mind innovative spirit, reshape education in India.
Open book examinations have a tremendous impact on promoting the right mental sets in both learning and teaching. The open book examinations can restore the true meaning of the word education for both teachers and students.When combined with the mode of teaching that focuses on thinking skills,they will make education an exciting and enjoyable intellectual adventure, the beginning of a lifelong quest for knowledge.
Most students used to think of “studying” as the mechanical memorization of information in textbooks and class notes in order to reproduce it in examinations. Open book examinations will effect a fundamental change in this attitude. . The most immediate result on students will be that they will stop “mugging” or rote learning. It implies that studying should not be equated with memorizing; instead, it should be understanding concepts, and using these concepts (along with available information) to practise the skills of modifying and building knowledge, thinking critically, and solving problems. In acquiring the right strategies of studying, nothing is as effective as the shocking realization that mugging is of no use in the examinations. Given open book examinations, there will be no more mugging. Once the burden of mugging is taken away, education can be a pleasurable activity, not a painful drudgery.
The effects of open book exams on teaching strategies will be profound. The nature of the examination questions will change. Questions will have to be designed carefully and intelligently to test the students’ understanding, and the skills of applying that understanding. If the nature of the examination questions changes, strategies for preparing students to take those examinations will also have to change. It will no longer be enough to simplify the content of the text books in the classroom. Teachers will have to design tasks that will provide exercises for the appropriate mental skills required in each subject. Instead of the teacher talking all the time and students taking down notes, classes will have discussions, questions, and other active processes. In other words, teaching will no longer be the transfer of information from the teacher to student: it will be the training of the mind in certain intellectual skills.