August 15, 2006

Exam Papers as Entertainment

As a university lecturer, I have to say that marking exam scripts isn't exactly a barrel of laughs. It's tedious, with the occasional flash of entertainment. Sometimes I get an answer that is so bad I have to laugh, and occasionally I get strange little messages written on the scripts like "Please don't fail me".

But one script I marked recently was genuinely amusing. The candidate had given some data to illustrate the answer to a question, and the data consisted of some names - not just any names, but the names of the main characters of a well-known X-rated film! I just want to know: did that candidate think that I would recognise the names???