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Oral Exams

Administering in-person oral examinations can be an effective assessment of student learning–and one that is resistant to academic misconduct or unwanted assistance from technology. Grading is also significantly faster than grading stacks of essays.

Here are some ideas to consider in giving oral exams:

  1. Be clear about expectations, especially for length/duration of answers. Oral exams can be a bewildering, foreign experience for some students. Many will not have completed oral exams before, and will not know what to expect. Do what you can to demystify the process. For example, if the entire interview is to take ten minutes and there will be five questions, giving students those details informs them each answer should last about two minutes.
  2. Consider practice sessions. Not every student performs well automatically in an oral exam environment, even when they are academically prepared. The skills needed to score high may not be skills that they use frequently (or ever). As such, students benefit greatly from a chance to rehearse giving verbal answers. One efficient way to accomplish this is for students to quiz each other during class time set aside for this purpose.
  3. Consider sharing enough details about exam questions for students to prepare. Some instructors share the actual questions verbatim ahead of time. While this option is the most student-friendly, it can also be enough to share the topics without the exact wording.
  4. Share examples of strong responses (long before the test). One way to capture student responses to share with next semester’s students is to record their answers (if they give their permission), though this act may increase nervousness. It could also be enough to type one of your own out.
  5. Cycle through a small “test bank” of questions for each student. Because students may talk to their classmates after completing your exam, you’ll want each student to have a unique exam. This could take the form of having a few questions written out for each of your topics, and giving each student a unique combination of the test bank questions, even though every student will be asked about every topic.
  6. Use rubrics for grading, and share them with students. Be explicit about whether you are grading what students say, how they say it, or both. Apply the grades to the rubric while your memory is fresh. This could take the form of giving each response a grade before moving to the next question.
  7. Think about adding an ungraded ‘warm up’ question. Students often arrive nervous, and a quick question to help them settle in can reduce stress.
  8. Do what you can to put students at ease. Inform students of your own note-taking. Some students perceive instructor scribbling as directly assigning a grade (which it might be), and that can lead to a cascading nervousness. Assure them before the exam begins that your writing is mostly taking notes-to-self, and does not indicate strength or weakness in their responses.
  9. Keep an eye on the clock, and give students periodic information about how much time is left. Some students rush, and reminders between questions can help them relax and answer more effectively. Conversely, if a student takes too long to answer the first question (which is rare), they will benefit from hearing that they should make ensuing answers shorter.

Scheduling Oral Exams

Obviously, students each need a their own time block reserved for them to take the oral exam. However, in most classes, the total time needed for all students exceeds the normal meeting time of the class. If you’re going to be asking students to sign up for an exam time that is outside the meeting pattern of the class, you will need to proceed with some student-friendly options, like a wide range of available times, perhaps even spread out on different days.

A small class might consider passing around a piece of paper with time slots already identified, so each student could just write their name next to the desired slot. However, not every student will be able to identify their availability on the spot. It’s also not a completely fair process–whoever gets the paper first has more choices.

Fortunately, Webcourses offers an automated, fair way for students to select their time slot, which then disappears for other students once that slot is claimed:

  1. In global navigation (the far left bar in Webcourses NOT specific to your class), select “Calendar”
  2. Click the PLUS icon at the top to add an event
  3. Switch to the “Appointment Group” tab at the top
  4. Enter the name of appointment (example: ENC1101 oral exam) and the location (classroom space is hard to obtain outside your assigned time, so it’s common to meet in your office)
  5. Select which calendar (the name of the course)
  6. Add the date and the time range. If you’re offering options for a second date, you’ll need to repeat this process for the second date
  7. Add a checkmark to “Limit each slot to 1 user”
  8. Divide into 30 minute slots. Click “GO” to create the slots.
  9. Publish
  10. Send directions to the students on how to select a slot (see below)

Example of Directions to Students

Description: Instead of a final exam for this course, you will have a one-on-one oral interview with the instructor. This will be conducted live (synchronous) at a pre-arranged time you select. The interview will last up to 25 minutes. During the interview, the instructor will pose five “meaty” questions that you should answer in about 3-4 minutes each. These questions call for you to give interpretations, very much like the conversations we’ve had in small groups all semester long. The questions will be long-arc, asking you to tie together elements from throughout the semester. There will be a basket of questions, so no two students will have exactly the same exam. You will definitely want to be familiar with the facts, the observations, and the arguments we’ve made all semester as you prepare for this interview—take good notes all semester and review them thoroughly before this assessment. During the interview itself you will not be able to access or view notes.

Select your interview time by clicking the CALENDAR icon on the left, then clicking for “Find My Appointment.” These interviews happen outside the scheduled class time. Plan for the interview to be comprehensive, with questions reaching back to all elements of the course throughout the semester. Be prepared to answer the oral equivalent to “short answer questions” (if written, answers would be 3-5 sentences each). You’ll be asked a question calling for mild-to-medium analysis, and your job is to provide a cohesive analysis, using as many details as you can to support your analysis. They won’t be HUGE questions, but they also won’t be simple fact-based, one-sentence answers. Here are a few examples of what this might look like if this were a Harry Potter course:

  • Explain how the male-female dynamics shift in the later movies between Harry, Ron, and Hermione.
  • Apply our readings on fascism to the Death-Eaters and their worship of Voldemort
  • In what ways could Professor Snape be seen as both a hero and an antihero?
  • Analyze Dumbledore’s leadership style through the lens of our reading on Machiavelli.