Harvard PSTUM subscribers may or may not be interested in a recent post "Re: pre-to-post tests as measures of learning/teaching #2" [Hake (2008)]. The abstract reads: ****************************************** ABSTRACT: Among the thoughtful responses to my post "Re: pre-to-post tests as measures of learning/teaching" were those of POD's Ed Nuhfer and Chemed-L's Logan McCarty. Nuhfer implied that there are people who proclaim multiple choice tests to be the standard for determining quality of education, but I know of no one outside politics who's stupid enough to make such an absurd proclamation. McCarty argued that: (1) the highest form of learning that we achieve in introductory courses is *skills* not facts or concepts; (2) pre/post testing inevitably promotes "teaching to the test"; (3) he (Logan) could employ traditional non-interactive teaching methods in such a way that his students would do well on tests such the Force Concept Inventory (FCI); (4) the FCI is "incredibly narrowly focused"; (5) Newtonian concepts hinder students' understanding in non-Newtonian areas; (6) "concepts" are at a lower level of Bloom's taxonomy than "skills"; and (7) writing ability can't be tested with multiple choice tests. I argue that McCarty is wrong on all 7 counts and has therefore flunked his pretest ;-). ****************************************** To access the entire 24 kB post please click on <http://tinyurl.com/3cmgou> Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University 24245 Hatteras Street, Woodland Hills, CA 91367 &lt;rrhake(a)earthlink.net&gt; <http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake> <http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi> REFERENCES Hake, R.R. 2008. "Re: pre-to-post tests as measures of learning/teaching #2," AERA-L post of 31 Jan 2008 16:21:15-0800, online on the OPEN AERA-L archives at <http://tinyurl.com/3cmgou>. This is a slightly improved version of the post with the same title transmitted to Chemed-L, PhysLrnR, and POD on 30 January 2008.