Damn, Lab#3 Exam Done

There are good tests and bad tests, as defined by the testing experts. There are good questions and bad questions as well. When you merge good tests with good questions there is magic, and learning reinforcement. But it seems that all exams fall short in some way, mostly related to their construction of questions in a reactive manner to what has been presented and the dynamics of a given class. Exams should be proactively designed to the learning goals as established with the end in sight. If you want to train good doctors, the goals should address good doctoring skills. Then "test" what you need for students to know about those goals and skills.

I know how difficult it is to design good exams. I've tried and failed many times. I think overall this anatomy lab exam that I just oozed out of was a good one..challenging, educational, insightful. Everyone should not emerge from an exam thinking they did well. I don't think I did, and clearly I wasn't alone. But having said that, some of the questions outright sucked.

The sacral hiatus? C'mon, give me a break. An arrow pointed to a single lymph node on a chest xray instead of the hilum of the lung? You have got to be kidding me. We haven't even had radiology or clinical medicine yet. Laying a deflated, discolored, flat stomach on a table out of a cadaver (one we've never seen)? It looks like mesentary. Orienting a liver upside down for identification of specific left/right, up/down orientations? Nothing we would have to do in clinical practice. The logical question; why? For what purpose do these identifications feed our greater doctoring goals.

I would guess that out of the total about 15% of the questions were not only not emphasized on reviews, in lecture or in the book, but were clearly miniscule elements of knowledge that were way out of bounds of the knowledge necessary for the skills we will need in clinical practice. Not a single question about the lung segments we will soon auscultate.

I haven't a clue what grade I earned.  I studied my butt off for this one.  I hope I got my every loving B, but I do know that while overall a good exam, there were some horrible questions...and I don't think I'm alone in saying that.

P.S. (4 hours later) I love to read what I wrote after I find out my score. I did just fine, and beat the average enough to feel like my study and understanding it solid. But my gut feelings about the exam have not changed just because of my score. The more clinical the better IMHO.