Teachers advised not to use multiple choice test format

Teachers advised not to use multiple choice test format

JAKARTA (JP): Teachers should keep the use of multiple choice tests to a minimum because of their inability to develop responsibility, competency and personality, a senior government official said yesterday.

"I propose this not because multiple choice tests are not good enough but rather because it is not easy to make questions which can really measure a student's competence," said Soedijarto, the Ministry of Education and Culture's Director General for Informal Education, Youth and Sports, at the graduation ceremony of the Jakarta Teacher Training and Education Institute (IKIP).

Soedijarto, in his oration on The role of teachers in improving human resources quality in Indonesia towards the free market in the 21st century, pointed out that multiple choice tests are unable to measure the various capabilities that students are supposed to master.

Presently, a large proportion of mid-term and final examinations given to elementary, junior and senior high school students are multiple choice, on which a student only needs to pick one answer out of the four or five provided.

Very few of the answers require writing short essays or even filling in empty spaces.

Except for mass enrollment tests for universities, which have to be very selective academically, Soedijarto said the use of multiple choice tests should be strictly limited and given together with other tests.

"I am asking prospective teachers to please, please refrain from making multiple choice tests for their students," he said in front of 1,396 graduates of the teacher training and education institute.

Over 590 students graduated from IKIP's diploma course, 779 from the four-year degree (S1) program and 26 from postgraduate (S2 and S3) programs.

Soedijarto said that studies have shown that students only study what they feel will be emphasized on an evaluation or test.

"Therefore, I think it will be very difficult to achieve the goal of education itself unless the evaluation system which is applied in schools is relevant to that goal," he said.

The standard national evaluation (or final) examinations also need revision, he said, "for the sake of the quality of national education".

National evaluation exams, locally known as Ebtanas, only make up a small percentage of a student's overall grade, which will determine whether or not a student passes his or her last year of elementary, junior or senior high school. (pwn)