A comprehension question that rewards copying
An unseen passage of about 150 words describes a hill village where the well has dried up and the women now walk two kilometres to a spring. Near the end the writer says that on winter mornings the temple bell can be heard from the next ridge and that this sound is «تنها چیزی که تغییر نکرده است». You set six comprehension questions for 24 Class X candidates. Question 4 reads: «نویسنده چرا از صدای زنگ یاد میکند؟» Nineteen scripts answer with a copied sentence: «زنگها صدا میکردند». Five give a one-line inference; three wrote their answers in Assamese. The scheme gives 1 mark for Q4 and forbids half marks; the paper is out of 30 and the pass mark is 10. Scripts must be returned within a 40-minute period. The section head has asked for a revised wording of Q4 and a 2-mark split for the re-test.
1. Diagnose why nineteen candidates copied rather than interpreted, and propose a revised wording for Q4 that removes the invitation to copy.
Read the worked answer
The stem contains «چرا», which is genuinely causal, but the verb phrase «یاد میکند» is vague: it can be answered by 'because the bells rang', which is a fact from the passage, not a reason for the writer's choice. The copied sentence is also the only sentence containing زنگ, so simple lexical matching is enough to look like an answer. The question is therefore testing location, not inference.
Revision: «منظور نویسنده از «تنها چیزی که تغییر نکرده است» چیست؟ چرا این صدا را برای بیان منظور خود برگزیده است؟» This forces two moves: identifying what the bell stands for (continuity, the unchanged past) and explaining the contrast with the dried well and the two-kilometre walk. If the re-test must keep one stem, use: «نویسنده با یادکردن صدای زنگ چه چیزی را دربارهی آبادی میگوید؟» Both versions keep the passage as the authority and cannot be answered by lifting one clause.
2. For Q4 as originally set (1 mark, no halves), what would you award to a copied answer and to a one-line inference answer? Show the reasoning you would record.
Read the worked answer
A copied answer such as «زنگها صدا میکردند» gets 0. It restates a detail; it does not answer why the writer mentions the bell, and awarding 1 would make the item a scanning exercise and inflate the section.
A one-line inference gets 1 only if it names the function of the bell, for example «برای نشان دادن اینکه فقط این صدا عوض نشده» or «برای مقایسه با خشک شدن چاه». A response that says only «چون زنگ قشنگ است» gets 0: it is an inference, but not one supported by the passage.
Record on the script: 'Q4 requires function, not location.' Because the scheme forbids half marks, the boundary between 0 and 1 must be stated in the moderation note; otherwise the five inference answers will be marked inconsistently across scripts.
3. Write the 2-mark model answer for the re-test in Persian, and list the textual details it must cite.
Read the worked answer
مدل: «نویسنده صدای زنگ را یاد میکند تا بگوید تنها چیزی که در آبادی تغییر نکرده، همان صداست. چاه خشک شده و زنان تا چشمه راه درازی میروند، اما صدای زنگ هنوز از ridge همسایه شنیده میشود؛ پس این صدا نشانهی پایداری و آرامش گذشته است.»
Required details, one mark each:
- what the bell stands for - continuity, the unchanged past, or consolation;
- the contrast - the dried well and the women's two-kilometre walk against the bell that is still heard.
Answers that merely translate «تنها چیزی که تغییر نکرده است» without linking it to the village's change get 1 at most. Answers written in Assamese are accepted for content under the same two-point split; the Persian model is used for feedback, not as a language test.