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Setting Good Exam Papers
Introduction
What exam papers are set?
In most schools, there are topic tests, tests after short intervals, for example monthly tests, and tests after longer intervals, for example term (semester) tests, mid - year, end of year tests. Then there are external exams, or externally moderated ones.
Why are exam papers set?
The main reasons are, for the teacher, to see if the students have learnt something, and for the students (eventually), to come away with a piece of paper which says they have reached a certain level of competency in that particular subject.
How useful has the learning been?
This depends on both the teacher and student working together in partnership (with parental encouragement). The teacher must be clear in his teaching, and the student must show a willingness to learn. After a while there is some sort of assessment.
How can the teacher effectively assess using written tests? 
Easy Exam Papers Within any class, whether its set (streamed) or not, there is a range of abilities. What happens if an exam paper with easy questions is set?
Well, everyone passes. The very able students will probably get perfect marks. The able students will get good marks. The weaker students will also get good marks. So it will be hard to distinguish between the range of abilities. In other words there will be a bunching of marks towards the top end.
Invigilating this exam will be difficult as everyone finishes early!
Both the students and teacher will be happy, everyone passes, everyone looks good. However, when external assessment comes along, everyone may fail. Everyone then doesn't look so good, and all eyes turn towards the teacher.
Hard Exam Papers
What happens if a difficult exam paper is set? Most likely everyone fails, or if lucky, the most able will scrape a pass. This time there will be a bunching of marks towards the bottom end. Again it won't be possible to distinguish between the range of abilities.
Invigilating this exam will be difficult as everyone finishes early!
Both the students and teacher will be sad. The teacher will probably blame the students for being lazy. The students will blame the teacher for being ineffective. When the external assessment comes along, everyone may fail, fait accompli.
Just Right Exam Papers
Like Goldilocks, setting the Just Right paper is a sense of achievement, which may or may not make you sleepy! Being able to set the Just Right paper requires a mixture of skill and experience. Some teachers may never be able to achieve setting the Just Right paper.
The Just Right paper starts with a few easy questions, to settle the students' nerves.
The middle set of questions become a little more difficult. The weaker students will be able to gain a few marks, and average students should be able to do fairly well.
Towards the end of the paper, the questions will be harder. They may be longer questions, where there are some marks available for the weaker and average students. However the most able students will also be challenged by the latter part of these types of questions.
Invigilating this exam will be better as most students will still be working near the end.
Most students pass. The marks are spread out more, so its easier to see individual achievements. Remedial action can be taken for those who fail, or are borderline pass/ fail. When external assessment comes along, hopefully everyone will pass, at the very least, most will pass.
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