21st Century: An Interactive Multipurpose Final Exam

Sarah MK Ko The Interactive Multi-Purpose Final Exam __

The Interactive

Multi-Purpose

Final Exam
Sarah Ko* McGill University**

*Sarah is a global educator and Managing Director of iHeartTeaching . She is a Graduate student at
McGill University for Educational Leadership. The working paper is derived from a final essay
submission towards a course on Leadership Theory and Education. Sarah is a licensed teacher.

**Prepared for Michael G. Doxtater, PhD, a professor in Organizational Learning, Integrated Studies in
Education, Suite 331, Education Building, McGill University. The author wishes to thank Michael for the
brilliant opportunities he had provided throughout the seminars. The stellar bonhomie with
intelligence from the live peer presentations and on-site expert feedback had inspired the 21 st
Century Final Examination concept and its treatment towards promoting educational leadership.

Sarah MK Ko The Interactive Multi-Purpose Final Exam _1_
May 1st 2011 , Montreal, Quebec, Canada. iHeartTeaching, LP.
Final draft submitted to McGill University, April 25th, 2011.

I dedicate this proposal to my parents

Contents at a Glance:
I. Introduction 2
II. The Conventional Final Exam 2
What is the problem 3
Existing Solutions 5
III. Proposed Solution 6
What Questions Will be Suitable? 8
IV. The Purpose of the Expert-based Final Exam 8
Why Should Educators Use the Expert-Based Final Exam? 9
A)The Pedagogy Behind the Use of the Expert Final Exam 9
1)Constructivist Learning 9
2)Experiential Learning 9
3)Reflective Learning 10
4)Successful Intelligence 10
5)Problem-Based Learning 10
B)The Motivation: Revisited 10
V) Applications 11
1)Sample Expert Question 11
2)Final Examination is Taken: How to Grade 11
3)The Final Exam lives forever... 11
4)Public feedback to Expert Final Exams 12
VI) Measuring Policy Impact and Improved Learning 13
VII) Conclusion: On Leadership 14
VIII) Extensions: Students are the experts 14
Part 1: Ministry Guidelines and the Educational Reform 14
Part 2: Using Technology as Part of the Learning Process 15
Part 3: iHeartTeaching Resources 15
IX) References 16

About the Founder

Sarah MK Ko is passionate about discovering ways to promote children, youth, university and graduate
students to become leaders of today and better leaders of tomorrow. Her current research focuses on teacher
education at McGill University’s Teachers College regarding the experience of pre-service teachers teaching
the new Ethics and Religious Culture Program, among other nuanced topics, such as, school improvement
(both domestic and foreign), and technological integration in the classroom.

I. Introduction

The objective of this proposal is to articulate the need for introducing an expert-based final

examination that concocts to display student-centered approaches derived from the constructivist,

experiential and reflective learning methods which integrate leadership. Experts from outside the

school premises will be able to foster a sense of leadership attached to responsibility for the final

examination participants in a manner that promotes creativity in students, while taking into

consideration of how immersed students are with technology through the mobile devices and social

media trends. The final examination, or final exam for short, is normally taken at the end of the

academic semester, term or year at the high school, college, or any university level course.

Our proposed final exam is interactive with a multipurpose application, while maintaining the

strongest regard for regulations which govern it—along with rules against cheating. Final exams can be

posted to the online community for various feedback. For the pupil undergoing this novel route, they

will be able to appreciate the expert's emic account, via question(s), while their expansion by etic

approaches to provide a synthesis of the class achievement along finer expectations, within the time

constraints and the added pressure.

The proposal is organized as follows: there is a discourse on the conventional examination, its

shortcomings as we present a new modus operandi (operational model) for a final exam design, and

relay the advantages through the different leadership-enhancing approaches coupled with learning

incentives, as we later posit on its motivation, applicability, and transition into a hypothetical

application and final exam design, while its promising benefits bode well with MELS's professional

competencies, as we also conclude with an extension into the technological merits of it.

II. The Conventional Final Exam

The conventional final exam tests students through a series of thought processes with a standard

library of correct or plausible solutions, which are expected to be fulfilled progressively at the final

juncture. The structure of the final exam serves to present an individual student's scope of the course,

while she or he presents the answers in a thesis or a logical proof, or arranged as an expository

statement, as well as, in an argumentative or in a formulaic manner. So, it is at the final juncture of the

final exam, where the student can demonstrate their achievements and mastery of their learning. While

the conventional final exam is similar in its questions raised from the preceding years, given that the

course is moderated by the same head instructor, or arranged to test core competencies, the structure is

more-or-less the same, as this allows students to prepare well for it. Little known research is present to

provide views of whether how best the performance scores on a final exam should be reflected on the

final grade for the entire course. Such questions, however, shape the student's view and subsequent

orientation for their treatment of learning over the course, as to how they will cope on the final exam.

Does the final exam itself produce the unique identity of the course, or is it the other way around? It

can be taken for granted that the final exam which is a method to quantify a student's merits to be

ranked against others, is passive and protective, albeit there is an utmost care with school regulations.

What is the problem?
The problem with the conventional form of a final exam is that students are not asked to apply

what they have learned to a real-life situation that is largely connected to a career 1. The questions posed

in the conventional exam are sometimes disconnected to the actual application in real life, and students

sometimes have a difficult time associating the purpose for learning specific theories or equations when

they do not see the use for it in their everyday lives. Therefore, the conventional exam lacks a purpose-

driven element other than the apparent need to do successfully on the final exam itself.

The conventional form of testing relies on students to memorize certain facts, figures and

descriptive information from the textbook and class notes. The grader then subjectively evaluates each

collected final exam, albeit a strict or rigid marking scheme, unless the style of the exam is entirely

1 Oblinger and Verville (1998) express the relationship between critical thinking and what students engender as
employees in later business settings.

multiple-choice based (and students can fill-in the popular scantron cards). As a concession, there is a

lack of scholarship in the area of final examination approaches, however, there has been favorable

research dealing with the dynamics of experiential leadership and learning, for example. Our new

official final exam design hopes to be the remedy to fulfill some of the applicability and challenges

asserted by educators in the extant literature2.

In some ways, rather, the expert-based final exam is a window for applying experiential

leadership within the confines of the final exam, in which case the instructors in charge of each course

or classroom may opt for it, meaning that there will be more than one multipurpose exam for each

different subject. That stated, the final exam qualifies for intelligence (c.f., Sternberg, 1996) which

bridges essential skills upheld at secondary institutions and beyond, to challenge analytical-thinking as

one can garner the “analytical, creative, and practical” orientations3. In our tweaked version of the final

exam, the experts administer the level of uncertainty, as well as, the practical ambiguity pertaining to

the course subject's expertise that is reflected in an open-ended final exam question with defined limits,

such that the student is not only tested on the course materials, but also may be afforded with the

opportunity to deliver tangible solutions for the benefit of the expert who is collaborating with their

head instructor. Since that uncertainty has been moderated by the expert, everything else that is implied
4
by the final exam design does ponder together the realms of discovery, integration and application 5 in

one sitting. Lastly, our hope is to promulgate the final exam solutions provided by each student as

online publications, in the form of discussion boards, so that the greater audience may provide

feedback and engender a continuity for leadership. There will be a resurgence of interest after the

finals.
2 Kajs and McCollum (2009) provide a thorough evaluation of Tolerance for Ambiguity (TFA) in the literature, in their
call for assessing leadership potential at schools. Our assessment with the final exam is not exhausted for TFA.
3 Reiterating Sternberg (1996), Nancy Huber, University of Arizona (2003) approaches problem-solving skills for
grappling with the ambiguity which arises both inside and outside academic institutions. Our approach goes beyond
these confines.
4 Reiterating Boyer (1990), Nancy Huber does validate Boyer's discussion on four distinct pillars and the eventual overlap
as one can view it in an applied landscape (or the private sector, in their case).
5 Susan Komives (2001), also reiterated by Nancy Huber, advocates experiential knowledge and leadership that are
reinforced by reflection. Our final exam does this on-pronto: the assessment hinges on sincere reflection for the students.

Existing Solutions
Cary Moskovitz is the Director of the Thompson Writing Center of Duke University, and serves as an
administrator for the Duke Reader Project which seeks experts to volunteer by reading the students'
final projects submitted in the form of papers. 6 Her column, Reader Experts Help Students Bring the
Write Stuff, appeared in The Chronicle of Higher Education (2011), as she explained that students in
this project benefit from receiving additional feedback once submitted, on both strengths and weakness
of their essays from these outside experts. This university is making an effort to provide a customized
learning to graduate students who require constructive criticism from those who exercise insider
knowledge in their respective practice.7 Unlike our online public interface design for the 21st century
examination, the Duke final projects simply end with the expert's feedback.
What is particularly interesting are the real-time comments presented below the online article by

the Chronicle's readership. One reader expressed that this program could potentially be used to hire less

professors since the expertise and responsibilities are being spread across stakeholders and the globe.

Other readers commented on the quality of university education at Duke, on whether this would bring

an improvement or deficiency. Although this Duke Reader Project is beneficial to students who need

another perspective other than from the course instructor, one of the comments written by a course

instructor pointed out that students essentially have to revise their work accordingly to what the course

instructor recommends over the expert; however, the course instructor assures that there is no

disagreement in terms of what the expert and the course instructor will have suggested. Rather, he

states that it is the art of writing that a student needs to fulfill while capturing multiple views in a

coherent manner, so that the endeavor culminates in presenting accurate facts and information to the

reader. All in all, our proposed final exam builds on these positive tenets, while the online publication

of the final exam at a later juncture will provide the same opportunities presented by online

engagement by the greater audience at large, and so that students truly discover the versatility to carry
6 A couple of weeks after the author, Sarah Ko's presentation at McGill University, a similar program's effectiveness was
revealed in the online version of The Chronicle of Higher Education. Source: Moskovitz, Cary. (March 27, 2011).
Reader Experts Help Students Bring the Write Stuff.. Retrieved from http://chronicle.com/article/Reader-Experts-
Help-Students/126904/ on March 27, 2011. The online commentary posted by the readers of the website allows for the
public and those involved in the program to respond to the comments in an open and respectful way.
7 Duke University Reader Project, compiles feedbacks in both audio and paper versions in the different field of studies:
http://dukereaderproject.org/faculty/feedback-examples/

life-long learning.

Aside from Western philosophies, another author for a Chinese newspaper posited that the

Chinese educators strictly encourage enlightenment and enrichment of learning to their students by

solely requesting books to be read. 8 He comments that thinking out-of-the-box is rarely asked of the

students, that after a few attempts at it, his students worry and question why he is not asking the

questions where the answers are simply in the books, since they are so accustomed to the tradition 9. He

rather tries to engage them in critical thinking with their minds rather than referring to their books; as

instructional psychology shifts in China, for example, expert visitations at the final exam can retain the

level of structural consistency such rigid learning environments, too, demand. Our proposed final exam

can be a window of opportunity for all educators, namely towards any instance affected by the rigid

learning-environments. Furnham (1994) indicates that the rigid structure is common ground, but

ideally, the versatility of the final exam affords in it: the flexibility, and dynamic thinking in relation to

self-awareness and personal transformation, and to the beneficence symbolic of the interrelations in

lifetime learning, leadership and innovation10 (Huber, 2003).

III. Proposed Solution

The interactive multipurpose exam is a proposed solution that integrates technology and some

interactive parts to essentially promote student autonomy and ownership which are germane in

learning. Our goal is to tilt the administrative strategy so that final examinations can allow room for

outside experts to visit the school premises and provide their expert questions which will be directed to

the exam takers. This way, the student is empowered to deliver insights as an expert and are keen on

applying the foundations of their lessons. The pedagogy behind the interactive multipurpose final

8 Anonymous author teaches English at Beijing Foreign Studies University. Books Don't Hold All the Answers. Metro
section, China Daily USA, on March 27, 2011.
9 DeRoma et al (2003) posit that students exhibit discomfort with ambiguous or uncertain structure of courses and grading
itself.

10 Lane and Klenke (2004)discusses entrepreneurship and the pathway to innovation for leadership success in education.

examination are varied and rests on the intentions of the instructor, yet there is a high likelihood that

this would spur motivation11 to enable students to prepare for it, without defeating the purpose of

overlooking the entire progress and materials offered throughout the course. Students are inspired to

exploit their interpersonal skills, as they become accustomed to project mastery over ambiguity that is

presented within the final exam(s). Effective management would provide tolerance for uncertainties

(Taylor, 2000), since the surprise element ineffably comes with the outside expert who prompts

students with questions which maybe unforeseeable.

A couple of questions to support an adaptation for the proposed exam are as follows, since it

will provide an assurance for its productivity once the examination session has been expired:

• Do you think that the students will remember the content of information they had spent
studying towards, after taking their final exam?
• How can we make test questions effective so that students can remember the impact or
relevance of the questions?
In best practice, it is useful to pose questions which are authentic and relevant to their learning

and personal experiences; likewise, as this is how the expert-based Final Exam evolves, the degree of

authentic leadership to emanate from the program is contingent on whether there will be grounds for

the transformation, and whether open-access to the final exam solutions will trigger further

productivity, in regards to how well the memory of the lessons, once the final exam is written, shall be

rekindled in the future. The eventual sharing of final exam solutions onto the school website can solicit

a wealth of replies from outsiders, besides the experts who had initiated the questions, and altogether, it

is the access from expert's visit to the launch of final exams for all to see, is what will drive students to

believe that they can bring immediate or necessary resolves to various degrees of problems at hand

(c.f., Khan, 2010)—and who better to motivate them? The final exam itself induces an exploratory

scope within a framework of an independent test which amounts to open-mindedness, creativity,

11 Norr and Crittenden, (1975), develop a study for instructor evaluations compelled by motivational techniques, from
class structure, governing collegiate instructions, to balance professionalism.

providing a comforting sense to grapple with an investigative eye, as well as, with enduring views

(Sallot & Lyon, 2003).

What questions will be suitable?

In another words, how could a teacher or a course instructor make the exam questions relevant to their

learning whilst asking questions which seeks them to think about their identity and roles in society?

The simple answer is to be flexible as possible. The exam questions should be broad, yet to the

scope of what the course has covered, experts know what to expect and know what to ask of the

students. There should be at least one final exam question posed by the expert. The instructor integrates

technology with social media for a private submission of answers directly from the exam booklets or a

form, whether on paper or assisted by a computing device. The purpose of the question seeks greater

knowledge which goes further by elucidating textbook information by making it relevant to the current

world events. There will be a less emphasis on graders whose contributions otherwise don't matter

much either way, besides the subjective grades awarded by them. There will be rather a greater

emphasis on the experts who arrive to produce best practice questions.

IV. The Purpose of the Expert-based Final Exam

The purpose of the new exam design is to assess the students' ability and to integrate textbook

information, classroom notes, and developments12 within the course through social interactions to broad

human influences and experiences through current world events. It also allows for flexibility for

students to show their leadership in curating expert-level arguments.

12 Yaffa (2003), a Technion-Israel Institute of Technology thesis, explores the outlooks for interpersonal relations,
which can be achieved by styles and perceptions, in regards to the principal's development. The research is
constrained to Tolerance of Ambiguity, however.

Why Should Educators Use the Expert-Based Final Exam?

Educators should adopt the new design in the classroom during final exams, because it brings

real and relevant matters to the forefront of the course content whilst expanding students' learning of

the course content applied to real challenges, or upon epiphanies, and vital problems which require a

heightened level of conflict resolution, problem solving skills, and strategic thinking, while

incorporating real perspectives. This form of examination entices students to be creative, think out-of-

the-box, and learn to apply their answers to a “real” problem in the “real” world. Students will apply

their knowledge of the subject in accordance to the real occurrences pertaining to the public debate or

public-policy decisions, at hand, or will have anticipated in the near future. This way, the questions on

the exam are profound and applicable outside of the course.

The interactivity imposed in the final exam with its later online implications, via collaboration
of individual feedback on the web, adds to the positive effects which truly make the public figure or
experts' presence a celebrated multipurpose tactic, although this has never been attempted in higher
education systems, let alone at primary learning centers.

a)The Pedagogy Behind the Use of the Expert Final Exam:
1)Constructivist Learning

Constructivist learning theory posits that students are constantly including new knowledge to the already

known knowledge. They are expanding their knowledge all the time!

2)Experiential Learning

Based on the primary experience, the person reflects and observes what had happened to self and forms

an abstract concept that can be later used as new knowledge when confronted with the same or similar situation.

This would vindicate leadership styles13 in the process of experiential learning.

13 Williams (2006) poses alternatives to Canadian reform, as he suggests different leadership styles. Other methods for
conceptualizing decision-making are covered to enhance collaboration, by means of projecting leadership from the helm
of the principal in various situations. Nevertheless, schools in New Brunswick can be open to a blueprint which hopes to
implement and transform its own schools into professional learning communities (PLCs).

3)Reflective Learning

Reflective learning is when one thinks about the past in a critical manner and can summarize her or his

past into what happened, and what she or he learned, and what she or he can do differently to improve, or avoid

the problem altogether.

4)Successful Intelligence

Robert Sternberg explains the “Successful Intelligence” approach that consists of analytical, creative and

practical fronts.

5)Problem-Based Learning

The expert-based final exam is a form of problem-based learning, except that the dynamic layer of

having an expert involved in making a question does not attempt to support the test-takers for a biased solution.

There is no attempt made to cue a favorite solution by them. The exam officially commits to tapping on what

truly motivates problem-based learning, as described in the following section.

B)The Motivation: Revisited

Let's revert to the motivation for students preparing for a final exam, amid alternatives:

• How will the motivation of each student change once they discovered the new incentives ?
• The closed-book and closed-environment remain unchanged, although a public figure or an outside
expert can pose questions directly in a manner to students that allows them to instinctively 14 open
their dialogue (in which case, one will write individually without sharing).
• Students are then motivated to perform their best with a level of comfort, ease, and decorum.
Students are inclined to showcase their leadership skills in writing, in hopes that the solutions to
the questions are treated as articles towards public debate.
• Students perceive themselves as experts. Self-confidence can be elevated to the point of expressing
new ideas at the vanguard with common ideological frameworks developed in class .
• When students have access to the kinds of questions for which the experts have reserved for
themselves and are willing to share, because it is a matter of public interest hinging on societal
values, these test-taking students will produce new knowledge.
• Students, overall, will turn an otherwise unproductive, but mandatory final exam to harness individual

14 Stoycheva, 2003, investigates the milieu for informed risk-taking attributes, utilized in learning environments, which
are applied to talent recruitment and the public's understanding.

merit (individualization of leadership) and to bring productivity to the shores of academic freedom
and to the peaks of applicable public policy-making decisions. The motivation serves well for
students if they are empowered to sport an active stance with outside agents.

V)Applications

Class subject: Global Education
Class level: Senior level (4th Year University)
Course syllabus: textbooks, readings, midterm exams and a final exam
Final exam structure: 3 hours, closed environment, 5 short questions, 2 essays, and an expert question
by a public figure

1)Sample Expert Question

The public figure is Mayor of Montreal City. He asks a question regarding a specific nature of bureaucracy and
how global education can be implemented by school teachers who have attained international experience.

2)Final Examination is Taken: How to Grade

Next, the professor for the unit and its team of graders will evaluate the final examinations.

The professor and graders will first skim through the answers to the expert questions to draw a consensus, which

can plausibly be based on the quality of thought, depth, breadth and sophisticated expertise matching the

solutions desired. The expert-based final exam is therefore an interactive, multipurpose examination, which

harnesses the spirit of testing at the final stage of learning over the entire curriculum, and as such, its

instrumental value coincides with the pursuit of leadership as the questions are proctored, and once more when

the individual expert-based solutions are later posted on the web.

3)The Final Exam lives forever...

Once the exams are graded and distributed back to the students, their solutions (expert-attempts) are posted to
the website. For each solution that can be collectively grouped together by students, the solutions are now open
for public debate in the form of an online forum.

Many students from the same class, yet a different course, and also outside their own campus, school, or
institution, may very well participate in providing the feedback.

4)Public feedback to Expert Final Exams

The best solutions by exam takers will not go unnoticed, as the public provides feedback and commentary as
responses. We can expect the newspaper columnists, corporate executives, policy makers, and government
officials to digest these insights and make the appropriate decisions. Youth are empowered to speak (and vote)
for the very policies for which they can create! Parents will be supportive, too. The illustration depicted, below,
provides the web display and appearance of the official final exam content and its solutions by each student,
which have been uploaded to the web. Students can keep their identity anonymous, by being referred by an
electronic alias to tag their solutions, as well as, keep a track of their input into the others' expressed solution
answers.

Students partaking in the 21st century, expert-based exam will understand that the final exam dates and
the proctored setting make it not only official, but also formal: the individual's performance on the official exam

date and location are what becomes officially recorded and graded; its is a formal examination and must be
proceeded with regulatory diligence and care. The potential feature of displaying official grades pertaining to the
expert's question, with the evaluators' official commentary can be an option for promulgating the public
disclosure of respective solutions by individuals. The administrative body will consider these additional routes.
However, a distinction needs to be clarified by the schools and its teachers, so that students understand that the
later (online) publications are unofficial representations and any public support or the very opposite, any signs of
dismay, will not affect their grades.

VI)Measuring Policy Impact and Improved Learning
Students will have the opportunity to provide feedback in the course evaluation. The teacher or course instructor

can evaluate the quality of the final exam answers. There is improved learning across ages and online audiences

as the answers will be made available to the public. The public can engage through commenting. A general rule

of respect will be established to protect the dignity of the students to reinforce constructive criticism. Their

answers can persuade or even convince policymakers to adapt to a certain philosophy, or way of expressing or

means to implement a positive transformative change.

Our assessment with the final exam is not biased to exhaust the student with ambiguity, however, it

presupposes on the notion that there is an enhanced surprise element due to the presence of an expert witness

posing the final exam questions during the event to take place. This enforces a well-rounded character for

improved learning by an early engagement with policies at large.

We encourage others to infer on the benefits and costs associated with measuring the policy's
impacts. How was the 21st century final exam implemented and what were the difficulties15?
Policy impact is inevitable since social media editors of established websites for news services
are honing the very efficacy arising from user-generated feedback on newsworthy and public forum
initiatives. The online editorial content now demands emerging dialogues, via user-generated
comments, which are natural properties of both public debate and news. It is plausible to forecast
possibilities, whereby 'editorial picks'16 of such news services, via websites, can feature their top-ranked
final exam solutions, as well as, any particular comments from the vast public deemed to warrant
attention.

15 If you are a school teacher or an university professor who has attempted either an expert-based final exam or posted
solutions online with user-generated feedback capabilities, or both, then please write to the author:
sarah@iHeartTeaching.com, or submit a form, via, http://www.iHeartTeaching.org
16 Social Media Editor of BBC News, Alex Gubbay, explains the propitious nature of integrating user comments into their
editorial content: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2011/03/comments_and_making_our_covera.html

VII)Conclusion: On Leadership

The contributions to the final exam with future information flows, which are inherently substantial for

decision making purposes at the executive and sovereign levels, equate to true empowerment for youth.

Youth can serve as leaders while establishing their mastery of the course and providing relevant

expertise to the matters they will be encounter once departing school, or as soon as they employ their

techniques to the outside world. For the pupil undergoing this novel route, they will be able to

appreciate the expert's emic account, via question(s), while their expansion by etic approaches to

provide a synthesis of the class achievement along finer expectations, within the time constraints and

the added pressure. The impact of this learning process at hand—due to the vigor of anticipation over

the rigor of the testing environment—will be second-to-none. The presence of the expert can only add

to the prestige and reputation the course offering brings to its pupils.

The following sections extend our conclusions, as we build bridges towards devising new

ministry guidelines, to plan ahead coupled by reform, and to better integrate technology, since the latter

has been reserved until now due to its advanced nature, as the transition bodes well with the eighth

professional competency provided by the MELS17.

VIII)Extensions: Students are the Experts

Part 1: Ministry Guidelines and the Educational Reform
This from of examination conforms to most of the twelve professional competencies stipulated from the
Ministry of Education in Quebec. This exam corresponds to competencies 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. The
foundational competency one highly corroborates with the need of the teacher to “To act as a professional
inheritor, critic, and interpreter of knowledge or culture when teaching students.” Competency three states: “To
develop teaching/learning situations that are appropriate to the students concerned and to the subject content

17 MELS is an acronym for the Ministry of Education, Recreation and Sports; in French, Ministère de l’Éducation, du
Loisir et du Sport is the authority appointed by the Quebec Province, in Canada, to administer the Ministry of Education
and the province's educational activities and services.

with a view to developing the competencies targeted in the programs of study.” 18 in addition, competency four,
“To pilot teaching/learning situations that are appropriate to the students concerned and to the subject content
with a view to developing the competencies targeted in the programs of study.” Competency five, “To evaluate
student progress in learning the subject content and mastering the related competencies.” Competency six, “To
plan, organize, and supervise a class in such a way as to promote student’s learning and social development.
Competency nine states, “To cooperate with school staff, parents and partners in the community and student in
pursuing in educational objectives of the school.”

Part 2: Using Technology as Part of the Learning Process
The professional competency eight states “To integrate information and communications technologies

(ICT) in the preparation and delivery of teaching/learning activities and for instructional management and

professional development purposes. The benefits of integrating technology is that there is a real-time learning

component that supplements the different student-centered pedagogy, ie, constructivist learning, experiential

learning, problem based learning, and reflective learning, behind this exam. In addition, the use of technology

through social platforms promotes creative meta-cognitive processes and critical thinking beyond the classroom

context.

All in all, students are empowered to take ownership of their personal learning and growth!

Part 3: iHeartTeaching Resources

iHeartTeaching19 has compiled the author's presentation that was recorded live at McGill University. The

multimedia resources on the web-page provides a stimulating primer and discussion on our proposed 21 st century

final examination. The ensuing third-party journal, news and media coverage will be added for the instructor's

convenience.

The END
18 MELS (n.d.) “Core Professional Competencies for the Teaching Profession,” retrieved from
http://www.mcgill.ca/files/edu-e3ftoption/ProCompetencies.PDF on Sunday, April, 23rd, 2011.
19 The 21st century final exam is introduced along with the presentation and accomodating slideshow delivered on March
21st, 2011, at McGill University, as supervised by Professor Michael Doxtater. The presentation has been rendered into a
Vimeo video clip. The deck of powerpoint slides are also available for download. This working paper is also
shared online, via SlideShare. Source: www.iHeartTeaching.org:
http://www.iheartteaching.com/interactive-multipurpose-final-exam.html

IX)References

Anonymous. (2011, march 23). Books Don't Hold All the Answers. China Daily USA. Retrieved on
March 27, 2011. from http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/culture/2011-03/23/content_12216770.htm

Bryant M. (2011) BBC News Tries Adding Reader Comments to Stories, But Should it Bother? The
Next Web:

http://thenextweb.com/media/2011/03/19/bbc-news-tries-adding-reader-comments-to-stories-
but-should-it-bother/

Boyer, E.L. (1990) Scholarship reconsidered: Priorities of the professoriate. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Bylund, C. L., Brown R.F., Lubrano, et al. (2008). “Training faculty to facilitate communication skills
training: development and evaluation of a workshop” in Patient Education and Counseling, 70
(2008) 430-436.

Buchen, Irving H. (2005). Training future manager-leaders, Performance Improvement. Volume 44,
number 8. pp. 20-22.

Cochran-Smith Marilyn (2009), Boston College TNE Evidence Team, 'Re-culturing' Teacher Education:
Inquiry, Evidence, and Action, Journal of Teacher Education.

DeRoma, V. M., Martin, K. M., & Kessler, M. L. (2003). The relationship between tolerance for
ambiguity and need for course structure. Journal of Instructional Psychology, 30(2), 104-109.

Furnham, A. (1994). A content, correlational and factor analytic study of four tolerance for ambiguity
questionnaires. Personality and Individual Differences, 16(3), 403-410.

Gubbay, Alex (March 18, 2011), Comments and Making our Coverage More Social BBC News
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2011/03/comments_and_making_our_covera.html

Huber, Nancy. (2003). An Experiential Leadership Approach for Teaching Tolerance for Ambiguity,
Journal of Education for Business. 79(1). September/October: 52-55.

Kajs, Lawrence T. and McCollum, Daniel L., (2009). Examining Tolerance for Ambiguity in the Domain
of Educational Leadership. Educational Leadership. Volume: 13, Issue: 2, Pages: 1-17

Ko, Sarah (2011). An Interactive MultiPurpose Final Examination: A 21st Century Expert-Based
Solution. Submitted on April 25th, 2011. Supervisor: Michael G. Doxtater. Department of
Education, McGill University. March: Montreal.

Ko, Sarah (2011). An Interactive MultiPurpose Final Examination: a presentation . Speech delivered with
a slideshow presentation, March 21, 2011. Supervisor: Michael G. Doxtater. Department of
Education, McGill University. March: Montreal.
Video and power-point deck for slides can be retrieved from:
http://www.iheartteaching.com/interactive-multipurpose-final-exam.html

Khan, Shahid Nawaz (2010). “Impact of authentic leaders on organizational performance,” International
Journal of Business and Management. Volume 15, no. 12, pp. 167- 172.

Komives, S.R. (2001). Learning leadership: As individuals and in communities of practice. Concepts and
Connections, 9(3), 11

Lane, M. S., & Klenke, K. (2004). The ambiguity tolerance interface: A modified social cognitive model
for leading under uncertainty. Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies, 10(3), 69-81.

Moskovitz, Cary. (2011, March 27). Reader Experts Help Students Bring the Write Stuff. The
Chronicle of Higher Education.

Retrieved on March 27, 2011. from http://chronicle.com/article/Reader-Experts-Help-
Students/126904/
Norr, J. L., & Crittenden, K. S. (1975). Evaluating college teaching as leadership. Higher Education, 4(3),
335-350.

Oblinger, D.G., & Verville, A., (1998) What business wants from higher education. Phoenix, AZ: Oryx
Press.

Pieterse, A.N., Knippenberg D.V., Schippers M., Stam D. (2010). “Transformational and transactional
leadership and innovative behaviour: the moderating role of psychological empowerment: in
Journal of Organizational Behaviour. Volume 31. pp.609-623.

Preston L., Rudolph S. (1995). “Teaching teachers” in The Science Teacher, Volume 62, number 6. pp.
30-33.
Sallot, L. M., & Lyon, L. A. (2003). Investigating effects of tolerance-intolerance of ambiguity and the
teaching of public relations writing: A quasi-experiment. Journalism and Mass Communication
Educator, 58(3), 251-272.

Sternberg, R.J. (1996). Successful intelligence. New York: Simon & Schuster

Stoycheva, K. (2003). Talent, science and education: How do we cope with uncertainty and
ambiguities? In: P. Csermely and L. Lederman (Eds.), Science Education: Talent Recruitment
and Public Understanding (pp. 31-43), NATO Science Series, vol. V/38. Amsterdam: IOS Press.

Taylor, P. A. (2000). Strategies for enhancing student learning by managing ambiguities in clinical
settings. Nurse Educator, 25(4), 173-174.

Williams, R. B. (2006). Leadership for school reform: Do principal decision-making reflect a
collaborative approach? Canadian Journal of Educational Administration and Policy, 53, 1-7.

Yaffa, C. (2003). High school principals' managerial perceptions and their tolerance of ambiguity .
Thesis, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology.
Source: http://www.graduate.technion.ac.il/Theses/Abstracts.asp?Id=12776.

21st Century: An Interactive Multipurpose Final Exam

More Related Content

What's hot

Similar to 21st Century: An Interactive Multipurpose Final Exam

Recently uploaded

21st Century: An Interactive Multipurpose Final Exam