I propose a class for either late highschool or early college

[crashhelmet]

Like ikea instructions. Always, always make sure you read, count, comprehend and plan from the instructions before you even dare to consider putting two boards together. Otherwise you end up with something non-Euclidean.

I couldn't figure out why you needed a pencil to put together a Benno CD tower until we put the back panel on...then we had to take it off again because the pencil is there to mark where you need to nail the panel to the boards, the spots for which are covered up by the panel itself. >.< we got off lightly! We had to go and buy some new dowel after we misread the instructions on a wardrobe, tried to saw the wrong bit to length and it snapped...

My failure on my last Ikea construction was due to not realizing I bought a Full sized bed frame and not a Queen. I put the whole damn thing together and then noticed it looked a little small. I was too pissed off to take it apart and try a return. So my queen size box frame overlaps the Full sized bed frame.

[HYHYBT]

Thank you, and my fault for simplifying the statement to that point. Still, even put like that, it's only not a lie in a technical, weaselly sense, and it only "doesn't matter" in the narrow, lesser sense that, when taken that way, it does not change the correct way to take the test.

[HYHYBT]

Crashhelmet: ow, that stinks!

[Ginger Tea]

An example of one of these 'speed' tests if not already posted.

I had two of these, one in my teens at school, failed.

Another at the 'job club' ages ago, remembered the first and just read, heard someone call their name part way through and although I had not done any of the questions at all and was just reading, I ended up slipping up when I read I had to say my name out loud, ours were ordered differently so you couldn't cheat, so it wasn't a case of the other guy was doing his questions faster than I was just reading, though I can dawdle on reading at times, more so if I have a podcast in the background, music I can zone out but reading whilst others are talking even a recording is distracting, but I digress.

I knew the score with the test but came undone when faced with a line that had fooled another participant and I in turn took action, I then cursed under my breath and carried on reading and accidentally did a number or word puzzle as I actually knew the answer without looking it up.

[ben_who]

Who in the world are you lucky people who got tests where the first instruction was to read the whole thing? I never received this test like that; they were always some ten or twelve step procedure where the final step was to disregard step three. Nobody passed, and the teacher got to give a smug lesson in reading all the instructions while failing every student.

By the time we hit junior high school, we all knew that the teachers like to pull crap like this to "keep us on our toes," that we would get one or two exercises every year that had nothing to do with the subject matter being studied and everything to do with making us feel like prats. That whole "starving alien" exercise annoyed the hell out of me, and we did it TWICE, with two different teachers, in two different years. (The second teacher was pretty surprised at the intricate detail he received from some of the students. Evidently he didn't know that we'd already done this one.) Sometimes the teacher would actually get pissed off at us if we got it RIGHT.

In second grade, we were told to write sentences as an exercise. We'd just been read a story about a kid named Zachary who, because of his initial, was always last in alphabetical order. We were told to write the sentence, "Zachary was always last in line" on our bright yellow fuzzy paper with the blue penmanship lines. Midway through the exercise, she changed her mind, and decided that the sentence should be "Zachary was last in line." Well, I always read and wrote above my grade level; the sentence was fucking done, dude, it was on the paper, and it couldn't be erased.

[gremcint]

Another one is a lot of students I've run into get an assignment with three questions and think they only have to answer one for the assignment despite never being told this.

[Fire_on_High]

Why does the statement that the test is about speed a lie? I mean, it's pretty much a given that anyone actually following the instructions properly will be done far sooner than those who fail to do so.

Any other time dawdling around reading instructions while everyone else blazes on head will get you absolutely SLAUGHTERED on completion speed. They're going to be done before you and they're going to be judged your betters for it, regardless of anything else, because "first done" tends to garner points, even if only subconsciously.

Welcome to the race, a lap behind everyone else...enjoy!

[Andara Bledin]

Wow. Way to miss the entire point of the thread by a mile. Good job! >_>

[HYHYBT]

Another one is a lot of students I've run into get an assignment with three questions and think they only have to answer one for the assignment despite never being told this.

I can see how that would catch people if they're routinely given very similar tests where they *do* only have to answer one, but otherwise that's a puzzle.

(On the other, thank you Fire On High, you nailed it.)

[siead_lietrathua]

Any other time dawdling around reading instructions while everyone else blazes on head will get you absolutely SLAUGHTERED on completion speed. They're going to be done before you and they're going to be judged your betters for it, regardless of anything else, because "first done" tends to garner points, even if only subconsciously.

Welcome to the race, a lap behind everyone else...enjoy!

it still isn't correct. if everyone takes the same time to read each question, it doesn't work out slower.

i'm gonna do some bullshit math:

20 question speed test, which includes the direction of reading all before starting.

5 seconds to read each question.

5 seconds for 5 of the answers to be written.
10 seconds for 5 ""
20 seconds for 5 ""
30 seconds for 4 ""

last question says to just sign name and not fill out test. that would take approx 10 seconds, because it might cause a brain burp or an "oh shit" moment.

so for someone to read the whole thing first and follow the CORRECT directions would take:
(20x5)+10= 110 seconds. (1.50 min)

for someone to do the whole test would be
(20x5)+(5x5)+(10x5)+(20x5)+(30x4)+10= 405 seconds (6.45min)

granted this does not apply for everyone, but it does show how the idea that reading the whole thing = slower is wrong in the case of a test like this.

edit: i can't emphasis this enough. this applies to tests that specify to read everything first, and not to a test that does NOT specify that requirement.

edit2: i think my problem is calling it a lie. just because something is tricky, hard or difficult to understand doesn't mean it's a lie.

[gremcint]

Wow. Way to miss the entire point of the thread by a mile. Good job! >_>

This entire thread has missed the entire point of the thread. I started a conversation that was going to be about people not knowing how to follow instructions and how beneficial it might be to teach a course in it as kind of a joke/commentary. then the thread completely derailed onto this one topic about whether or not a certain test counted as a test or not. for the record if it's a math test, it's a supposed to be a test of whether or not I know the material, and quite frankly I need to know my grade so that I know whether or not I'm prepared for the next course or whatever my job is so that test would provide NO BENEFIT TO THE STUDENT OR TEACHER.

[crashhelmet]

so for someone to read the whole thing first and follow the CORRECT directions would take:
(20x5)+10= 110 seconds. (1.50 min)

for someone to do the whole test would be
(20x5)+(5x5)+(10x5)+(20x5)+(30x4)+10= 405 seconds (6.45min)

Did you write your answers as minutes and seconds?

If you meant in mathematical hundredths, then your answers are wrong.

In hundredths, the times would be 1.833333333 minutes and 6.75 minutes

[Primer]

I just gave my 3 college math classes an email quiz. The instructions were basically, "respond to this email, and use the phrase "Scarlet Pimpernel" (or Lavender Jabberwok, or Mauve Maven, depending on the specific class) in a complete English sentence." I announced the quiz in class, and told everyone to check their school email for the quiz. I even posted on BlackBoard to check their school email for the quiz. A week later, fewer than half the students have responded. Of those, 2 did not have a complete sentence due to missing verbs, and several responded with ONLY the phrase, not even an attempt at a sentence. Two others used the words, but separated them so they did not have the required phrase.

Not a tough assignment by any means. I even told them to use the phrase as a proper noun, but gave extra credit if they actually did--a common noun got full credit.

What was the test about? Were they checking their school email as they were supposed to be, and could they follow simple instructions. The results? No and no.

[siead_lietrathua]

Did you write your answers as minutes and seconds?

If you meant in mathematical hundredths, then your answers are wrong.

In hundredths, the times would be 1.833333333 minutes and 6.75 minutes

thanks. i suck at non-calculator math.
(edit, i was basically going 110s-60s=50s which is 1m50s)
not that your changes negate the speed difference.