Paper vs. Digital

          Thinking back to when I was in in primary and secondary education, I can remember several times when my school administered standardized tests, such as the MEAP and ACT, to the students in certain grade levels.  The students would come in and receive a test booklet and answer sheet to fill out with #2 pencils.  The mental image that I get when thinking of these wonderful test days (We got out of school early, what more could you want? Let's take a test every day! Sarcasm sarcasm sarcasm.) looks a bit like this:

However, a shift in testing format is occurring, in which paper-based tests are becoming less common and digital-based tests are becoming more common.  Rather than filling out answer bubbles by hand, students simply click on the answer they want, and voilà the bubble is filled in perfectly!  Now, the image I get of standardized testing looks like this:

          Just by looking at the second picture, it seems to me that taking these fate-determining tests on the computer would be a welcome change because there is more privacy, depending on the testing site of course.  When I took the GRE on the computer, I was at a testing site that looked very similar to the  one in the picture above.  I thought this was awesome because I had my own little cubby with dividing walls, so I couldn't see anyone else and they couldn't see me.  I was even provided with silencing headphones.  Sitting down to take this test, I was optimistic that this was going to be easy to take since I wouldn't have to flip between pages and make sure my answers were bubbled in dark enough.  Halfway through the test though, my eyes were watering and I had a headache (why did I choose to wear my contacts for a five hour test that consisted of starting at a computer screen?).  My experience with digital-based testing illustrates to me that maybe we need to rethink making the switch from paper to computer.

          In Educ 504, I attempted (and failed) to answer some questions from the 12th grade math portion of the Smarter Balance assessment.  On the first question, the calculator tool froze on top of the question and I couldn't get it to go away, so I tried to just move on to the next question.  This seemed like a logical idea, especially since students are often told to skip something if it's too difficult and then come back to it at the end.  Unfortunately, this assessment forces students to put some answer before moving on to the next.  I do not think that this is a good tactic because students might try to spend more time writing something in the answer space, which is very time inefficient.  Not all digital-based tests force this upon students, but there are other cons to taking a test on the computer:

• Navigating the pages might be difficult
• Students might not be familiar with the icons
• Split screens make things very busy
• Students can't really "talk to the text" unless they write on the screen (I think this is discouraged?)
• Inefficient scrolling techniques cause a loss of valuable test time
• The mouse might be hiding 
• Students might not be skilled typers
• There might not be any scratch paper
• Puts extra stress on students (especially their eyes...)

You get the idea, right?  On the other hand, there are some pros to switching to taking a test on the computer:

• The test is cheaper to produce
• Scores are received much quicker, if not instantaneously (it can feel like 7.5 months before you get the paper scores back...)
• There is no hassle of labeling the tests and sorting through them
• Students can tag specific questions to easily find at the end to review

         Even though switching to digital-based testing might seem like a really good idea at first, I don't think it is necessarily better than paper-based testing.  "Reading linear texts on paper versus computer screen: Effects on reading comprehension" was a Norwegian study that discovered that students who read texts in print scored significantly better on a reading comprehension test.  This research demonstrates that students do better on paper-based tests, so it is very confusing to me as to why so many people are advocating for digital-based tests.  Have these people never taken a test on the computer before?  Do they care more about costs than student growth and learning?  If money is the driving force behind this decision, then we need to elect new people to make these decisions.

          I believe that the most important aspect of standardized testing should be to try to assess what level students' are at in their learning in order to evaluate teachers and help these said teachers to revise their lessons to better equip their students for future courses and life in general.  The cons of digital-based testing outweighs the pros for me, so I think that it is important that we do not let paper-based testing become obsolete.  At the very least, we should give students a choice of how they want to take the test, such as how the MTTC test gives students a choice between paper and computer.

          Do you advocate for paper-based or digital-based testing?  Both?  What factor weighs the most in your decision?