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Wasting Time

The story about online proctoring of children made for pretty sad reading. While some kids will suffer from anxiety being constantly watched, others will find ways to hack the system to they proctoring system does not work. Either way students will be wasting time away from education and learning. As the spokesperson for the county says in this story about a hacking operation carried out by a sixteen year old :

“It’s a cat and mouse game. So when you put something in place, they’re just trying to figure out how to get around it.”

The question is why do we need to play such games with our kids. Would it not be more interesting to think about assessments that do not need proctoring because it is open book and allows days instead of a hour to complete. Challenge the student to apply the learning not just regurgitate it. Make it so that they get credit for using as many resources they can find to help them do well - online and offline. Even better provide incentives for collaboration. If you worked with a team, extra credit - a high team score results in a boost in individual scores too. Those are the useful life lessons for young people to learn. 

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