Chapter 144: Chapter 144: Tests, tests, tests
The sun hung high in the blue sky. At this time of year, it seemed to have matured as well. It was no longer as passionate as it had been in the summer more than a month ago, but much warmer and more reserved. The bright sunshine shone on people, and it also brought a warm feeling.
Unbeknownst to me, autumn is getting stronger and stronger. The leaves of the sycamore trees are turning yellow, and the thatch on the hillside is also half green and half yellow. The fields where the wheat and soybeans have just been harvested are still bare, refreshing and opening up the view and mood a lot.
Outside the window, the first-year students were having physical education class. Actually, it wasn't really physical education class. The PE teacher just took out a basketball and let them slam it against the broken backboard. The rest of them gathered around the cement ping-pong table, while most of the others just ran around the playground.
In the classroom, there was a loud rustling sound as Feng Yiping and the other third-year students took another exam.
Entering the third year, the books and exam papers on the desks of the students piled higher and higher. Between the two rows of desks, you couldn't see each other without looking up.
Another distinctive feature was that they were holding fewer books and more exam papers.
It was not unusual to have an exam every three days. Even if the exam papers were printed, the school probably could not afford the cost, so each student had to pay a deposit of ten yuan.
The teachers themselves set the questions. They try their best to find past exam papers from all over the place, as well as mock exam papers from prestigious schools, and school leaders use their connections to get well-known teachers to guess the questions for this year's exam... In short, it seems that until the exam, there will be a seemingly endless stream of tests.
There is no need to review from textbooks either. When the teachers enter the classroom, they rarely bring their textbooks. More and more time is spent going through exam papers, one after the other.
It is probably at this time that examinations return to their true function. Except for the more important mock examinations, the scores of other examinations are not important. What is important is to find deficiencies through examinations.
It seems that the teachers don't want everyone to have an easy time, especially in mathematics. Feng Yiping has compared the difficulty of these examinations with that of the formal middle school entrance examination.
The subject that takes up the most study time is also mathematics. From 7pm to 9pm in the evening, the mathematics teacher often doesn't finish one comprehensive question, which is really very sleepy-inducing.
Feng Yiping actually has some reservations about this approach. The last comprehensive question in the mathematics section of the middle school entrance exam is of course the most difficult, and it also accounts for the highest proportion of marks, as much as 20 points. To put it bluntly, it is used to create a gap.
But for students like Feng Yiping, they of course have to find a way to solve this question, but for most of the students here, even if they try their best, they can only get the easiest first question right. It would be better to spend the effort on doing the previous questions that are much easier.
Feng Yiping once told Xiao Zhijie and Wang Changning that during the middle school entrance exam, they should finish the previous questions first. If they find the comprehensive question too difficult, they should simply give up and not waste that time. They should consolidate the previous questions as much as possible.
This is not meant to belittle them. Feng Yiping himself also planned to do the same. After doing so many exam papers from different places and years, everyone came to the conclusion that sometimes the teachers who set the questions were really arbitrary. The last comprehensive question sometimes seems difficult, but it is actually simple, and sometimes it is not difficult, but really difficult.
The math teacher also admitted that there were some years when even they had a hard time doing the comprehensive questions.
Moreover, Feng Yiping clearly remembers that the mathematics in the middle school entrance exam for his year was the most difficult in history. To what extent was it difficult? He vaguely remembers that there were not many candidates who passed in the entire county at that time.
As the bell rang at the end of the class, the mathematics teacher urged from the stage, 'Come on, hand in your papers!'
Everyone handed in their papers reluctantly. Zhang Qiuling rubbed her wrists and asked, 'Feng Yiping, did you finish the last question?'
'No, there are still a few steps I didn't have time to write.' This time the question was definitely top-level difficult, and many classmates were still sitting in their seats, absolutely defeated.
Xiao Zhijie laughed and said, "Definitely won't pass this time!'
'Me too," Wang Jinju in the back row said dejectedly.
'Feng Yiping, how are you?' Huang Jingping asked.
'Haha, it was just so-so. But don't worry, it was really difficult. If the exam was like this, the results of students from other schools would also be disappointing.'
'Exactly,' Xiao Zhi Jie said, 'If everyone gets a low score, even if they fail, it's possible that your score isn't that low.'
'Haha,' everyone laughed. Xiao Zhijie always had such a crooked logic.
They didn't argue for a few moments, and the physics teacher also walked in with a stack of papers in a smile, "Haha, I set a test last night, everyone do it in these two classes, it's fine, it doesn't count for the grade!'
There was an instant outcry from the bottom, and a student shouted, "Teacher, I haven't gone to the bathroom yet!'
The teacher knew that the previous two classes were also consecutive tests, 'Go, go.'
In the first lesson of the afternoon, he saw the English teacher enter with another stack of papers. Before he could say anything, there was a continuous sound of sighs from the students, followed by the sound of desks being slammed shut as everyone consciously put the textbooks they had taken out back in their drawers.
'Why are you sighing? The only way you can avoid being afraid of exams is to take more of them, so that you don't panic when the real thing comes. I've arranged with the other teachers that you do this set of exercises in the next two lessons. Don't even think about cheating, because it's a good thing to expose your problems at this time.'
Fortunately, the next two lessons were politics and chemistry, and there were no exams, although chemistry also covered the previous exam paper.
That wasn't all. During evening study time, Mr Wang came in again with a stack of A4-sized papers, 'This is an essay on a given topic, and there's also an essay on a set topic. Hand them in before the next study session.'
Before the papers were even handed out, the maths teacher came in with a stack of papers and went to the door, "Oh, Mr Wang is here, I was going to say that I'll go over the day's papers tonight, so maybe tomorrow." He quickly booked tomorrow night's study session.
You have to say that the teachers are quite dedicated. The exams were in the morning, and the papers have already been marked.
On the way back to 502 in the evening, even the usually lively Xiao Zhijie was very quiet. He asked Wang Changning, 'How many times did your class take the exam today?'
'Three times. How about you?'
'We had another test during evening study sessions, so four in total. I feel like I'm about to 'burn out'!'
When they arrived home, they were both too tired to move and just lay on the sofa. Feng Yiping went into the kitchen to prepare a midnight snack – something that had only started this semester.
One of the most obvious effects of the heavy mental workload was that even Xiao Zhijie, one of the few fat kids in the class, had finally lost some weight, not to mention the other students who were already quite thin.
The teachers were also worried that everyone would only eat plain rice and pickled vegetables, and that their nutrition would not be sufficient, so they asked the parents to send eggs to school, and ensured that the third-year students living in the dormitory would be able to have an extra boiled egg a day.
They had a plate of pan-fried mantou slices with winter melon and pork rib soup, which gave them some strength. Of course they couldn't go to sleep right away, so they studied English and politics for a while, and finally turned off the lights and went to bed at eleven o'clock.
And tomorrow, barring unforeseen circumstances, will be another hard day.