Richard Clarke Academy

Fundamentally disappointing

The ACCA’s final examinations this June saw more successful passes than ever. The exams also attracted a record number of entrants, with 164,646 candidates taking a total of 335,566 papers. 

The exam results, revealed that 6,174 new global ACCA affiliates have now completed their final examinations.

The Association said that student performance at the Professional Level was in line with expectations, but described results for the Fundamentals papers as “disappointing”. 

The module which saw more passes than any other was the Accountant in Business (83%), followed by Management Accounting (51%).

Clare Minchington, ACCA’s managing director of learning and technical policy, attributed the high pass rates to close working relationships between the Association and a range of partners “to facilitate students’ access to the best possible tuition provision.” Since the introduction of the new qualification last year, ACCA has also introduced a number of initiatives including “Train the Trainer”, which shares best practice with those teaching ACCA students around the world. This was set up by Richard Clarke who has been instrumental in these initiatives and has recently set up the world’s best ACCA  Academy in Malta (ok so I made that last bit up)

www.richardclarkeacademy.com

ACCA results & Malta event

Last night we held a very enjoyable evening for ACCA students in Malta. The turnout was outstanding with over 200 students attending - and all in very high spirits - even if some had just received not so good news from the ACCA.

What struck me was just how motivated the students are. How keen they are to progress in their careers and as people. The fundamental spirit of learning and the pleasure that can bring still burns strong - despite what numerous media articles might suggest.

If you were there last night, let me just reiterate my thanks and appreciation and wish you all the very best for this term

Study or test?

Studying v Testing

The more you study, the better mark you get - easy - well that’s the theory.....

A recent study at Purdue University set a group of local university students to learn 40 pairs of English words and their Swahili equivalents. They were put into 4 groups.

For Group 1, 4 study sessions, 4 tests.
For Group 2, any recalled pair of words were dropped from the study sessions but were still tested.

The groups were then tested 1 week later. Both groups remembered 80% 1 week later.
Notice that both of these groups did the same amount of testing but group 2 did less study. So it seems the testing is the key, not the studying!

For Group 3 - their correct answers were dropped from the subsequent tests but they were still asked to study them. (opposite of group 2)
Group 4’s correct answers were omitted both from later study sessions and tests.

Notice how these groups are the opposite of the first 2 groups in that they were tested far less.

These groups only scored 33% 1 week later.

So, these last two groups were not tested as much and they suffered for it. Even Group 3, who repeatedly studied every pair performed worse in the long run than Group 2, who studied selectively but were tested comprehensively.

The study’s results are as amazing as they are counter-intuitive. They showed that repeated studying brings essentially no long term memory benefits, especially once a piece of information can already be dredged up from memory.

Repeated testing, on the other hand, is of paramount importance, even for facts that can already be successfully recalled.

So what?

Well all the students predicted that they would remember about 50% in the final test where in fact, the average scores were either substantially higher or lower.

Indeed, surveys have shown that very few students use self-testing as a strategy for revision. When they do, once they have successfully memorised something, they tend to drop it from further practice.

This study makes a case for tests and exams to move away from their crude use as assessment tools. Rather ridiculous mock exam/progress test type testing effectively marking the end of the learning process is self-defeating. Testing should be continuous and informal.

We will, of course, build this into all of our courses and our online parallel system does this automatically for you anyway - you just need to read your emails!

ps. You may notice a website downage as we switchover to our brand new website - whooooo!

www.richardclarkeacademy.com