Why do we test and test and test? It seems like we are testing all the time in schools. Teachers test all the time: pre-tests, post-tests, chapter tests, state tests. Most people think that testing is how we determine if a student has learned, but oddly enough, studies have shown that testing is learning. Students who are tested on information soon after learning are able to do better on tests two weeks after the fact.

The New York Times published an article on a study of two different teaching methods. What would you think of a teacher that didn’t teach, but simply asked your students to read passages, and then take a series of tests? Would you think they were a good teacher? What if you spent a week in a teacher’s classroom and they didn’t show a video or a PowerPoint presentation or even lecture to the students on the topic? Many parents would think the students could not possibly learn in this environment, but this study shows that this method is highly effective in helping students store and retrieve information.  Most people agree that being able to access information from the brain is the measure of intelligence.

What impresses people about the fictional Sherlock Holmes is his ability to make connections based on his observations, but his ability to do that is based in his seemingly unlimited ability to retrieve information about almost anything: brands of cigarettes, the nature of chemical compounds, exotic plants, bugs, and illnesses. You name it, he can tell you about it without hesitation. In order to make connections about data it is first necessary to access that data. The brain can be trained to store and retrieve data far in excess of what we normally think possible today. In the past, people memorized vast tracts of literary information. Before Google, people had to memorize all the data in their fields.

Students probably won’t like the teaching method described above. First, it requires a lot of time reading and then testing and retesting but also because students who were asked to take the tests believed they would do poorly on the follow up test. They had less confidence in their abilities. But, even though they felt worse about their performance, the result was they did much better than the other group with the more “progressive” method. It seems that showing students what they are lacking helps them do better later on. The students with the process mapping technique didn’t have a chance to retrieve the information and therefore were not able to practice that skill, or understand what information they lacked.

Like a skeletal muscle the brain’s learning muscle has to be flexed to grow stronger. Exercising the pathways in the brain that store and retrieve information ensures that students can retrieve it when it counts. So, the next time you see your teacher, ask them why they are not testing more. You will probably surprise them.

Jeanne Whitmore is the founder and CEO of American Fork charter school Aristotle Academy, and an education columnist for the American Fork Citizen. You can learn more about Aristotle Academy at aristotleacademyk8.org or on Facebook.