Quizzing practice is essential for developing critical thinking skills in students. The primary reason why quizzes are so valuable is that they represent a relatively devious way of learning where students also have a chance to engage in unconventional activities. According to Clinton (2018), quizzing is one of the shortest pathways toward a thorough practice of existing knowledge. At the same time, a quiz could be utilized to stipulate interest in learning among students and facilitate the process of processing any new subject matter. Regardless of whether quizzes are individual- or group-based, the outcomes will always be associated with brainstorming and other activating events that cannot be achieved with other ways of validating student knowledge (Ross, 2018). Moreover, quizzing could be an unorthodox approach to retaining information and consolidating it properly. This also gives educators more flexibility in terms of testing student knowledge.
For quizzes, robust multiple-choice questions are essential because they signify the ability of the given student to answer the question. All the input data has to represent the topic of discussion while also aiming to distinguish the possible gaps in student knowledge (Jones, 2019). Educators can utilize multiple-choice questions to produce improved results through the interface of stimulating students’ critical thinking abilities. Some of the questions can be left open-ended to discover even more gaps, but the general approach to quizzing requires the educator to follow a firm quiz generation script (Clinton, 2018). In the case where potential answers are close enough, students are motivated to utilize all of their knowledge to identify the correct response by remembering it instead of guessing. Ross (2018) suggests that multiple-choice questions spark critical thinking and chain-thinking at the same time.
References
Clinton, V. (2018). Reflections versus extended quizzes: Which is better for student learning and self-regulation?Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 18(1), 1-10. Web.
Jones, J. A. (2019). Scaffolding self-regulated learning through student-generated quizzes. Active Learning in Higher Education, 20(2), 115-126. Web.
Ross, B., Chase, A. M., Robbie, D., Oates, G., & Absalom, Y. (2018). Adaptive quizzes to increase motivation, engagement and learning outcomes in a first-year accounting unit. International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education, 15(1), 1-14. Web.