We might be surprised at the progress made in every field of study, but the methods of testing a person’s knowledge and ability remain as primitive as ever they were. It is really extraordinary that after all years, educationists have still failed to devise something more     1     than examinations. For all the     2     that examinations test what you know, it is common knowledge that they more often do the exact     3    . They may be a good means of testing memory, or the knack of working rapidly under extreme pressure, but they can tell you nothing about a person’s true ability.

As anxiety-makers, examinations are     4     to none. That is because so much depends on them. They are the     5     of success or failure in our society. Your whole future may be decided in one fateful day. It doesn’t matter that you weren’t feeling very well, or that your mother died. Little things like that don’t     6    : the exam goes on. No one can bring out the     7     in him when he is in terror, or after a sleepless night, yet this is precisely what the examination system expects him to do. The moment a child begins school, he enters a world of fierce competition where success and failure are clearly     8     and measured. Can we wonder at the increasing number of “dropouts”: young people who are written off as     9     before they have started a career? Can we be surprised at the suicide rate among students?