{"id":4537,"date":"2017-05-25T08:23:05","date_gmt":"2017-05-25T08:23:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/classicalconversations.com\/?p=4537"},"modified":"2025-03-10T15:15:16","modified_gmt":"2025-03-10T15:15:16","slug":"celebrating-assessment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/classicalconversations.com\/blog\/celebrating-assessment\/","title":{"rendered":"Celebrating Assessment"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"bsf_rt_marker\"><\/div><!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('audio');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-4537-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/classicalconversations.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/Celebrating_Assessment...1.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/classicalconversations.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/Celebrating_Assessment...1.mp3\">https:\/\/classicalconversations.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/Celebrating_Assessment...1.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p>I\u2019ll never forget my Challenge I philosophy assessment.<\/p>\n<p>Although philosophy was one of my favorite courses, I was dreading the blue book exam. The study guide alone was overwhelming. We had learned\u00a0<strong>so<\/strong>\u00a0much! How could I possibly retain all the details? And what was a blue book exam, anyway? Wasn\u2019t that for college kids?<\/p>\n<p>I studied and stressed the week before the exam, cramming and crying. I finally spoke to my Challenge I Director about it. He smiled and told me not to worry.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m actually planning for this exam to be fun,\u201d he said. \u201cYou like philosophy, right?\u201d I said I did. \u201cAnd you\u2019ve been doing the reading?\u201d I had. \u201cAnd you\u2019ve been listening and talking in class?\u201d Of course! Getting me to\u00a0<strong>stop<\/strong>\u00a0talking was usually more of a trick. \u201cThen you\u2019re going to be fine.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I tried to believe him, but I was still nervous when he handed out those pale blue books. \u201cHave fun with this,\u201d he told us again. \u201cUse what you know. Be creative.\u201d He then handed out the typed exam. I took a deep breath and scanned the page.<\/p>\n<p>And my face lit up. The page was full of imagination-igniting questions\u2014questions of relationship, questions of personal growth, questions of problem-solving:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cImagine a conversation between Socrates and Locke. How would that go?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhich philosopher has influenced you the most? Why?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWould you call yourself a empiricist or a rationalist (define)?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I hardly knew where to start! Eventually, I put my pencil to the blue book and recorded my thoughts. I realized that what we had been learning wasn\u2019t just abstract, textbook nonsense; it applied to real life. What I learned had genuinely shaped my thoughts, my understanding, even my personality. I was different because of what I had learned. I could explain more easily, think more clearly, and discuss more intelligently.<\/p>\n<p>I knew a lot of facts: I knew that Democritus (c. 460 BC) came up with the idea of the atom, what he thought was the smallest building block of creation. I knew that Aristotle thought there were three forms of happiness: pleasure, freedom, and knowledge. I knew that Kant believed in a categorical imperative, that we should behave as if our behavior was setting the standard for everyone.<\/p>\n<p>But my mind had also been stretched and challenged in less quantitative ways, which the blue book assessment honored as well. I was invited to bring my imagination and what God was doing in my heart to the exam. The test I had most dreaded in all my life ended up being one of the most beautiful and profound experiences of my life.<\/p>\n<p>I learned\u2014for one\u2014that I had retained more facts and figures about philosophy than I had realized. I learned that applying knowledge and myself could be an extremely fun and rewarding experience, even if it\u2019s in the form of a test. I learned that \u201cschool work\u201d and imagination are far from mutually exclusive.<\/p>\n<p>My friends and I actually talked about the assessment later, just because we enjoyed the thoughts it prompted.<\/p>\n<p>Ever since that fateful day in April 2009, I haven\u2019t dreaded a single blue book exam. Even in my hardest college classes, my mind would drift back to the philosophy exam in Challenge I, and I would smile.\u00a0<em>Have I done the reading? Have I listened and talked in class? Then I\u2019m going to be fine.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>I can say with certainty that \u201cassessing to bless\u201d is a very real thing, and a very real blessing!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I\u2019ll never forget my Challenge I philosophy assessment. Although philosophy was one of my favorite courses, I was dreading the blue book exam. The study guide alone was overwhelming. We had learned\u00a0so\u00a0much! How could I possibly retain all the details? And what was a blue book exam, anyway? Wasn\u2019t that for college kids? I studied [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":87,"featured_media":4539,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[465],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-classical-christian-education"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Celebrating Assessment - Classical Conversations<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Read, &quot;Celebrating Assessment&quot;. 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