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Would You Pass the Information Literacy Test?
Grundelfeldsten writes "The Educational Testing Service -- the maker of the SAT and the GMAT -- has a new test called the Information and Communication literacy assessment. The test is designed to measure your "ability to make sense of the multiple streams of information that our computers throw at us every day," according to a Wired News reporter who just took it and described the process. The questions focus on completing tasks with Internet technologies, like using search engines efficiently and weeding out irrelevant email messages. Are such tasks really tied to technology? Or is "Information and Communication literacy" just a way for ETS to make money by selling more tests?"
Don't bother trying the free demo if you don't have Flash, block popup windows, or
restrict cookies. That's some of the most pointless web site coding I've ever seen.
Avoiding flash, popups and cookies gives you IT_literacy++.
Most universities over here have this as a standard test for first year students, to make sure they can use search engines properly and also reference material properly.
The unqualifiable answer to that question is an emphatic YES. The fact of the matter is that what we here on /. think of as "computer usage" is a far cry from what normal people with actual exposure to the sun and a plethora of IRL friends think. For us, a computer usage scenario includes hooking up and programming an LED disco light floor to our Linux laptop using USB 2.0 and getting it to spell 55378008.
The typical computer user gets online, checks his email, checks his stock prices, then gets back to his real life. Our real life revolves around computers, so such minimal usage seems strange and scary to us. However, it is actually what most users do.
You'd be surprised to learn that the computer usage scenario of the "real person" I described above is actually that of a "Power User". The typical person can barely turn the computer on, much less open Outlook Express without help from one of these Power Users. So, in fact, this test is useful as a step in the process of weeding out non-computer oriented hires.
You are given a Slashdot poll. How should you respond?
A) Choose an honest and accurate option
B) Choose an obviously ridiculous option
C) Do not answer, and complain that your preferred option was unavailable.
D) Refuse to answer, citing moral, philosophical opposition to the poll itself.
E) CowboyNeal
Surely a better test would be to measure the user's ability to use tools (spam filters, RSS feed aggregators, tivo-style commercial skipping, popup blockers, slashdot dupe checkers etc) to efficiently cope with / filter the "multiple streams of information" we're all bombarded with?
No Norm, those are your safety glasses; I'll wear my own thanks...
The ETS people at least understand one thing many employers don't: the important computer skills are independent of the various tools used to carry them out. We've all heard (or experienced) horror stories of applicants being turned down for a web developer position because they don't have experience with a specific piece of software (Dreamweaver, for example). Many employers can't grok the fact that someone who knows how to code pages in a text editor will learn Dreamweaver or whatever in-house application is being used in 10 or 15 minutes. Someone who is competent at database admin will be equally competent with MySQL, dBase, or - the most common case - the customized proprietary software that only exists at your company. It's time employers stopped looking at paper certs for competency with specific pieces of software and started looking at actual skills. Maybe ETS can help them do that.
"If it's real, then it gets more interesting the closer you examine it. If it's not real, just the opposite is true." -
I took this test when they were doing a pilot test at my college (they did the same at several colleges) a couple months ago. My college offered a $25 amazon gift card and a chance to win ipod. It took a couple hours to go through the whole thing, and the interface was kinda klunky. Plus at the end when I tried to fill out the comment part about the test it crashed the browser so I couldn't send my comments in lol. What was really cool was that they ended up sending out TWO amazon gift certificates (I think they accidently sent out an extra to everyone, perhaps some ppl complained because they entered wrong email to send the cards to or something) to me for $25. So I got paid $50 for a couple hours hehehe.
"Carl Brigham, a bona-fide racist designed the SAT in 1925. "
Who wasn't racist in 1925? That was one of those wonderful interbellum years where the Klan hit its high water mark and Congress worked hard to decide who could immigrate and who could not (note that "Nordic" was specified; couldn't let those filthy Slavs, Italians or Iberians in, no matter what their skin color was).
It'd be pretty damned strange for someone doing anything in 1925 to not share those views. Why do you think Hitler was so popular in the US in the 1930's?
is "Information and Communication literacy" just a way for ETS to make money by selling more tests?
... unethical? Capitalistic? Smart? One of those, I'm sure ...
Gosh, no, is that the impression you got? Jesus. When a private corporation expands its offerings in order to generate sales, they're always doing it out of the goodness of their hearts. Why, if it had anything to do with making money it'd be
Companies have a right to make money. That's why they're there.
Tried the demo and couldn't get past the first one. Too many words.
I can handle multiple streams of information just fine, but one bloated verbose thing obviously wipes me out.
I can really see the bias now that everyone talks about. I'm perfectly fine at processing large amount of information if I can read it in chunks. But this wordy spaghetti academic writing is too confusing for me. I had a flashback to the reading comprehension sections of the tests in school where I had to read over the same paragraph a dozen times before I could figure it out.
I can see how I did so awful in college, but am doing great in the real world.
Help me take back Slashdot. When did 'News for Nerds' become 'FUD and Conspiracy Theories for Extremist Nutjobs'?
I find it amazing that people always want to find a way to mathatize (I know mathatize is probably not a word) everything. Lets create a test so we can put people in pigeon holes and see who is better then the other. Person A got 25 more IT vocabulary words right then person B, I guess Person A is better then computers then person B. except for the fact that Person B has been doing computer programming for 40 years and created (and forgot) many of those IT vocabulary Words. When will people realize that people are not something that can be graded on 1 demential grading scale, and things like common sense, experience, creativity, determination, or bravery (willing to break it apart and tinker with it). Can often compensate any failure in just knowing the information. Yea these methods are a little slower then just having the answer at the tip of finger to fill out the question, but in real life it works just as well.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
This article underpins what you said ...
t 143.shtml
http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/14_03/sa
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
My Evil Stepmother once told me that she wanted to go to community college to learn how to "do computer".
She would never pass a test like this. She thinks that AOL is the internet. She also thinks that it is great that there is lots of free (as in spyware, not beer or speech) software out there like gator and comet cursor.
I think that she is an excellent example of a real, average computer user.
I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords
I'm 21. I've had computers since I was 8, regular internet since about 12. I assume most people do. So why are some people naturally well disposed to figure out how to use search engines and email while others think of a computer as a magical device they cannot use?
I'd rather see a real assessment of the skills required to successfully use a computer as part of regular life - then test for these skills such as pattern matching, ability to follow complex instructions...
It's much more fair on people who have less computer access and more to the point, weeds out those who have real potential to do the job with a bit of instruction from those who will never do these things particularly well.
I'm also working on the idea of putting together a primer for people who don't understand what computers are for. They're often sold as appliances but with the multitude of functions they are supposed to have now, they obviously must be quite complex. Explaining the basics in clear language (including why we need such weird jargon) might help get people started on the right track instead of confusing themselves into a frenzy.
*#*#*#*#*#******* I love peanut butter sandwiches!
I don't think that being able to filter out signal from noise on the internet has very much to do with technological know-how. The technology involved is either transparent (if you're a competent computer user) or an obstacle in carrying out the decisions you've made (if you're not a competent computer user).
Whether you are capable of making the right decisions about what information to accept or reject is almost entirely an issue of language skills and reading comprehension.
The people who continue posting their sob-stories as comments to some random guy's blog entry because they're convinced that the blog entry is Maury Povich's homepage aren't doing it because they're confused by Teh Intarweb (although it is a secondary factor); they're doing it because they can't read.
The guy thinking "Why, yes, I would like a penis enlargement; let me send you my credit card number!" would probably be falling for a snail-mail snake-oil scam right now if it weren't for the internet.
People who don't have good language skills are usually oblivious to the mistakes made by others, and thus often can't tell the difference between a genuine official document and something which is obviously not an official document because it is full of spelling and grammar mistakes and makes no sense.
I admit that a familiarity with the types of information sources available on the internet, their usual form, and their relative usefulness and reliablility, is helpful. For example, someone new on the internet may be unaware that nobody ever sends official warnings of danger to random people over email - and so they may be fooled by a well-written email hoax which more knowledgeable people would immediately mark as BS.I can state absolutely that I was not a racist in 1925.
rewriting history since 2109
I don't know if this test in particular is a valid solution for it, but I've suggested that the art-and-design college where I work use something like this to change the handling of computers in their curriculum. Currently they assume incoming students know nothing and put an Intro to Computers class on their first-year class list. And a lot of them need it. But the ones who show up the first day of class with a scuffed-up PowerBook loaded with Lightwave, Final Cut, Macromedia Studio, and Adobe Creative Suite would be better off skipping the (IMHO) remedial education (a waste of their time, money, and enthusiasm) and go right into a studio class that teaches them what to do with Photoshop, not how to use it.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Do YOU qualify for a free iPod?
Has anyone here been to a University in the past several years? Everything from Art to Business to IT Programs at Univs now have their own "Intro to Computing" classes that they force just about everyone to take because they're under the assumption that most students haven't used a computer before.
Now, I'm not talking classes about how to build web pages, or how to effectively utilize Google, I'm talking about "Ok, now class... this is a... mouse!" and there aren't ways currently to profeciency test out of them. I had to sit through my intro to computing class because attendance was required, and while I was there I kept myself busy tinkering with my linux server in my dorm room. The professor caught me once and asked what I was doing... I answered and they had NO clue what I was saying. I wonder who needs an intro class more.
A test like this, while ridiculous to those of us used to technology, is needed right now at the College level. They don't believe that students come to college now with basic computer skills, and the only thing that will convince them are test scores that prove this point. In the immediate future, at least these tests could allow those of us who know where the power switch is to skip those sorts of classes that are just a waste of our time.
This problem is very easy to fix. Let's do what was done in the former USSR in order to make sure that only the ones who can go on to get more education when it comes to public schools. I went to one of the best schools in the United States (according to Newsweek) and I was astonished by a number of people who clearly did not belong there. I can only imagine what happens in the rest of the public schools that are ranked lower than mine.
It works like this. Everybody is evaluated in terms of academic performance after then 10th grade. Anybody with a GPA of 3.0 and higher can move on further. People who have GPAs of 2.6-3.0 can move on after a consulation with councelors and only if their GPA is going to improve from there. Students who have a GPA of lower than 2.6 must find education somewhere else (vocational schools, private schools, etc.). Why should we waste our taxmoney on people who are not willing to study to begin with? In my case, 60% of people who attended the 9th grade did not come back to the 10th. That was pretty kick ass, considering the fact that everybody who made it actually wanted to study and move on. Classes were better, people were better and teachers had more room to breathe. Some of them finally started teaching instead of policing the ones who caused problems.
When I came to the United States, I was surprised to find out that this education system was willing to keep everybody regardless of their academic performance and behavior. In order to get expelled you had to some something quite outrageous that even most troublemakers did not attempt to do on a daily basis. This system is basically designed to have as many suckers as possibe. WTF? I believe this is the core of the problem. However, I do not have a Ph.D in Education; therefore, the final word is not mine.
Anyway, after you 'take care' of students who underperform and caused troubles, make sure that people who graduate from high schools meet certain requirements and make Information Studies as a part of the deal. Some bright kids do not have computers at home and it is hard for them to learn about something they do not have. Make sure that there is a class that these folks can take in order to broaden their knowledge. Then add a programming course or two because in the future everybody will need to be able to do something like that. I can't tell you how many biology and geography students I've met who were not prepared to take even simple programming classes in college (part of their requirements in order to do some sort of studies). In Belarus we had a course on simple algorithms where students had to write simple programs using BASIC. Mind you, this was in a country where majority of households do not have computers! We had only one class with 20 computers where kids had to share machines. I am sure that in the States we can come up with a better alternative. Once you make classes smaller by, weeding out the ones who do not want to study anyway, our schools can spend more money per student.