Different ways to Quiz

  As we all know, providing chances to review the material in the form of quizzing is important but we also know students do not always want to do the same thing every times, especially if they are being quizzed at least once a week.

I'm looking at different ways of quizzing students so they have the opportunity to try a few different ways and perhaps not get bored.

One method is where students solve the problems on a short quiz individually.  Then match students up in pairs so they can check each other's work.  Next, put them in groups of four to check the work, then into groups of eight and continue till you have one huge classroom sized group.  Once everyone has had a chance to check each other's work, students turn in the quiz.  The whole class receives the lowest grade.  This method encourages collaboration, self-checking, and students learn to be a bit more careful with their work.

The next choice is to create groups of four students.  Give the group a short four question quiz for them to work out all the problems.  The next day, take a 4 question quiz cut into strips so each person in the group has a question to complete.  They turn in the completed questions and the group gets the grade from the combined problems.

Another possibility is to provide individual students with the quiz to complete on their own.  Then students divide into groups of two.  Each student gets a new, clean copy of the quiz they work on together in their groups of two.  Once completed, they turn the pairs quiz in for the grade.  As a teacher, you can choose to grade both the individual tests and the pairs tests separately or weighted so one is worth more than the other.

A variation on the above ideas is to create two separate short quizzes passed out two partners.  Each student takes their own quiz.  When done, they compare answers so if the answers are the same, they know their problems are correct.  If the answers are not the same, they know they need to check each other's work to see if they can find the mistakes.

Frequent quizzing provides students with retrieval practice which helps them move the information from short term to long term learning.  In addition, it allows them a chance to become more proficient.

Sorry its so short but I just flew back from Germany and I am exhausted.  I did not get a chance to get much done while visiting relatives and attending a wedding.  I should be back to normal on Monday. 

Let me know what you think about these ideas on providing quizzes to students.  I'd love to hear.  Have a great weekend.