My favourite subject in Senior Secondary School was biology.
I was great at other subjects and got comparable grades to biology, but I did not get as much of a thrill as I did with biology.
And it came down to one thing – continuous assessment.
The teacher had a discipline with continuous assessment that was unmatched.
After every topic, you were sure a test was coming. The test did not just cover the topic he just taught but all topics he had taught until the last.
The results were published with each student’s name.
There was only one way to do well in his class – continual review of lesson notes and recommended reading.
It made the exams that came at the end of the term feel unnecessary to me because it was like re-answering questions you had already mastered.
Biology was the one subject I did not need to read during exams. I understood it so well that I used the preparation time allocated to it for other subjects.
In every aspect of my life where I have taken the learning of continuous assessment and applied, I have excelled beyond my wildest dreams.
In aspects I wait for a target date in the future to assess progress, I have always fallen short of my expectations.
For what is important, I have learnt to have a continuous assessment loop to keep me grounded.
– Osasu Oviawe