Survey finds 16.3% Thai university students cheat in exams

[culicine]

I don't think the facts on cheating are racist. Generally, in Asia, exam scores are much more important than they are in many other countries. This starts when they are quite young. Where I work, KG students must sit for a written exam and they will get a % score and we have parents who will come in an argue about the % score. That's a lot of pressure that starts pretty early.

One wonders with all this emphasis on exams from such a young age, why are Thai students so far behind many other countries when it comes to international assessment performance. it's to do with the curriculum and how it is taught, and of course the problem of rampant cheating an a lack of accountability on the student's part. The list goes on. Rather than making learning fun for young kids, they are constantly put under pressure, even from the age of 2 or 3. It's no wonder many kids rebel against this and end up hating school. They just study to pass a test rather than any innate hunger to gain knowledge.

[Scott]

Students can't really be held accountable for the fact that the curriculum teaches them a lot of material that is of little or no value. In most western countries, we also test students as a method of determining progress, but the issue is handled differently.

In the early years, the examinations are done with an eye for determining if what we are teaching is understood. It's the curriculum/teaching methods/material that is being evaluated as much as the students knowledge. Students may not even know it is an exam. As students get older, exams start taking on more importance, but it isn't until a student is pretty far into the eduction process that they have to start getting nervous or anxious about exams.

If a country is going to actually use exams as a measurement, then the tool has to be accurate. Unfortunately, an exam is of little value if a score of 25% becomes 50%, because that is what a student must get.

The issue of cheating is endemic. When our foreign teachers give an exam, it's not uncommon for the Thai teacher to give the answers in Thai because she believes the Foreign teacher can't understand. This is particularly sad, since our scores are much, much less important than the Thai exam scores.

[transam]

My wifes son entered for a 3 year army course at his high school , part of the test for acceptance was a rout march/run to see if the candidates were up to it. The lad is in no way athletic, quite lazy, so we thought he will fail.........He didn't , BUT, his chum who plays football for a team, failed . His parents were devastated and frog marched to the school to sort it out, and yes, ma & pa offered an incentive but were told we can do nothing for you regarding this course...

[attrayant]

I once gave my students an exam in which I mixed up the order of the questions. The first 5 questions were the same and then after that they were mixed up. After the exam was finished, I told the students that the ordering of questions was changed. They were shocked and complained bitterly that it wasn't fair. Only a handful of students did not have the same sequence of answers.

Another teacher once caught 28 students out of a class of 32 cheating.

Fortunately, we had an administration who did not take kindly to cheating and we were allowed to give them a zero on the exam with no retest and a letter written to the parents. Once this was started, it did not take long for cheating to decrease significantly.

This was at the Mathyom level, by the way.

I'd love to do this at my school, but exams are too tightly controlled. I give one copy to the administration and they run off 50 copies for me.

But I occasionally do this with worksheets or homework that I give out in class. On a math assignment I'll change the values or change a plus sign to minus.

It creates a lot if work for me on the back end (having to grade four dozen homework assignments individually), but sometimes it's totally worth it to see the shock on their faces when they start to compare papers and then realize that they're not going to be able to copy a friend's answer. One student even had the nerve to tell me "not fair, teacher!"

[kunnatee]

Students?

Teachers cheat.

They set the example.

Teachers cheat to get promotions.

I was asked to correct a file written in French by a Thai teacher of French. (French native here)

I could not understand, or even guess the meaning of, anything that was written. (She shouldn't be allowed to teach French even to Prathom students)

It happened to be the translation of a Thai text.

I re-translated from Thai because what she had written was useless.

Then I came to understand that this was the file to be presented to get her promotion from KS2 to KS3.

When I said I didn't agree, I was told "But she cannot do it herself, it's too hard for her! She needs you to help her"...