It is that time of year when national exams loom into view. Secondary school exam halls are being readied and populated with mock exams, while primary classrooms begin to be covered up and rejigged to allow for Sats readiness.
It can be a difficult time for pupils who struggle to perform under pressure. If teachers are going to best prepare them for such challenges, they need to pay close attention to the “knowing-doing gap”.
The “knowing gap” is the vital lack of knowledge pupils exhibit that puts limits on being able to read, write and respond under pressure in exam conditions. The related “doing gap” describes the failures to act and “do” revision, preparation or to focus their mental attention.
The problem is that our examination data typically just focuses on the knowledge gap.
The ‘knowing-doing gap’
Getting no marks for an osmosis question in a biology exam starkly reveals a knowledge gap, for instance. Similarly, in Sats reading preparation, not answering about the meaning of an important phrase once more reveals important gaps in language and knowledge.
And yet, in both cases, it may be issues with the doing that are actually driving the failure.
For the biology exam, the student may have vaguely remembered the process of osmosis but didn’t revise. In the Sats reading exam, it may be that the pupil read slowly and dysfluently. They barely had time to reread the passage to answer the question, so they made a mistake even though they partially understood the phrase in question.
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What is key for exam feedback is getting beneath the surface of knowledge recall and connecting the dots between the knowing-doing gap.
Happily, there are practical approaches teachers can undertake to assess and monitor both knowing and doing.
Here are three practical approaches:
Exam wrappers
These are short, reflective exercises that help pupils and teachers monitor exam preparation and the use of study strategies. Teachers can easily generate these via artificial intelligence for pupils at various stages. For example, for a biology mock exam, teachers can pose questions about number revision hours and the strategies used, along with some explanation of their use of timing in the exam itself. This can transform how teachers interpret the knowledge gaps they spy in their marking.
Skill checks
These are quick diagnostic assessments that explore the underlying skills needed for exam success. For example, for the Sats reading paper, a quick reading fluency (or handwriting words per minute) timed assessment could help appraise the accuracy, pace and expression of word reading of pupils. This can give vital steers for the type of preparation needed for ultimate exam success in reading and beyond.
Feedback clinics
These are short one-to-one or small group feedback sessions. Too often, pupils struggle to interpret written exam feedback. It wastes time and effort. A short clinic discussion can be more useful for interpreting both pupil and teacher feedback. They also offer more scope to discuss pupils’ knowledge and their preparation (the doing) that drives their performance.
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