Roting is made up from the root word, 'rote'.

but 'rote' alone means nothing

rote learning does, though

from www.wikipedia.org :

Rote learning, is a learning technique which avoids grasping the inner complexities and inferences of the subject that is being learned and instead focuses on memorizing the material so that it can be recalled by the learner exactly the way it was read or heard. In other words, it also means learning just for the test.

The major practice involved in rote learning techniques is learning by repetition, based on the idea that one will understand the meaning of the material the more they repeat it. However, in many fields, especially mathematics, this can often produce poor results.
Rote learning is sometimes disparaged with the derogative terms parrot fashion, regurgitation or mugging because one who engages in rote learning may give the wrong impression of having understood what they have written or said....

Mr Neo, my Econs tutor, says that we should be thinkers.

"Don't be ROTERS!!"

because in the recent common test 2, many juz anyhow answer the essay questions without considering about the question requirements.

well, i have an Econs test tml, which i have not yet studied for, as of 11:11pm.

im know im lazy,

but i juz can't figure out why are they going to choose one question from the common test and retest us,

after they have given up the solutions and outlines for the essays?

isn't that encouraging us to be ROTERS...cos its juz memorising and vomit everything out word for word tml

(im not encouraging anyone to quit studying for this re-test...i later also will studying one laz. juz say say only ma)

well, that said, I actually got worried that they might change the question, cos we aren't supposed to be ROTERS.

we can't directly apply - and we mus re-craft our answer, shud the question change.

but my fears were answered : the question that came out for the Arts cohort was the exact 3rd Essay question from the common test.

I still feel that it(the re-test) is unjustified. besides, Mr Neo once told us not to memorise model answers

cos "students tend to give the same answer to a different question"

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After going thru the answers for the Econs MCQ last week,

I have thought of something called the ROTE trap.

I feel a strong urge to apply what i have recently learnt - statistics - to explain wad a ROTE trap is.

well, if u can catch this :

Assuming a person who totally has never taken Econs before is taking the same MCQ test,

for a randomly selected question,

the probability of his getting it correct is 0.25, cos there are only 4 choices.

For a class of 20 people who has never taken Econs, the expected number of students who will get a randomly chosen question out of 20 questions correct is therefore, 5.

With that in mind, in comparison with a different class of 20 people who have taken Econs,

the probability that less than 5 students getting a randomly chosen question correct is extremely small.

Moreoever, the probability that less than 5 students in such a class getting up to 3 randomly chosen questions wrong is even small.

(i actually tried to work out the values of the probabilities, but i failed miserbly cos i was...confused.)

in sum,

1. there shudn't be cases where there are 3 questions(or more) where only 4 or less people get it correct.

2. even if that question is extremely tough, about 5 people shud get it correct if everyone tried to tikum the answer ie answered the question as though they nv take econs.

to explain the phenomenon, i was inspired by Yong Han to introduce a term called

"ROTE trap"!

certain MCQ questions are deliberately crafted in such a way that

even if you are an Econs student,

you have a higher probability of getting it incorrect than someone who doesn't take Econs.

because u fell into the ROTE trap!

here's how the ROTE trap works :

teachers who set the paper deliberately set questions (dangerously) similar to the MCQ in the TYS...and cos we've done them before, we choose the answer that looks overwhelmingly familiar.

but the options have been tweaked. Either that, or the question itself is tweaked.

we ought to see more of these ROTE traps in future MCQs, but possibly less in the 'A' lvls itself, cos questions were known to be repeated - exactly the way it was.

the catch is : if a question can be answered correctly by the option that a ROTE learner would choose, then it is, highly possibly, wrong!

ps. if this and/or the last post has bored you, then you weren't meant to be my target audience...=(