Experiment Tested!

Last class I shared my fear of taking tests with my classmates. Before I conducted the experiment I explained to the class the way I feel when I take tests and why it is a fear of mine. This is what I said to the class.

"Since I was an elementary school student I can recall feelings of horrible test anxiety. To this day, the night before a test I am can’t sleep because of all of the concerns about the test consume my thoughts. Then when I sit down to take the test, I can feel the fear overcome me. I feel my heart start to race, my body gets hot, and my mind is so overwhelmed with possible bad outcomes that I find it very difficult to simply focus on a question long enough to finish the sentence. Usually I leave feeling frustrated because I might have done better if I had just relaxed and not let myself feel overwhelmed.

For my Fear Experiment, I will be attempting to get you guys to understand why taking tests is a fear of mine. My hope for the experiment is that you all may be able to immerse yourselves in the experience just for a moment so that it feels real to you. I made up a test of general knowledge questions from the website TEFLGames.com and added some distractions to the page to symbolize my fear and frustration when I take a test. You will have 5 minutes to complete as many questions as you can. To put a little pressure on the outcome of the test, the person that gets the most questions correct will win a $5 gift card to McDonalds."

I was really excited to see the urgency most of the classmates showed when they were answering the questions on my test. I heard several people say "It is so difficult to read through the entire question!" and "This is hard!"  I feel like the urgency and frustration to complete the test in the five minutes I allotted was likely fueled by competitiveness but I think it did a good job giving them an idea of how frantic I feel when I take tests. 

I think next time I would like to try to have a longer test and extend the time to about 15 minutes. I would like to see if the 15 minute time limit and more questions would breed more frustration. The reason I left the experiment to only 5 minutes is because I was concerned it would be too difficult to get people to care long enough for it to still feel relevant and worthy of the time they were putting into it. 

Overall, I was pleasantly surprised at the effort my classmates used to try to understand my fear. I felt like the experiment was successful in creating frustration, anxiety, and a sense of urgency. Even if it was just for a gift card to McDonalds...   :)