Delivering the Monsignor Pádraig de Brún Memorial Lecture at NUI Galway, Prof Eugene Galanter from North America said that children should be “educated, not scored”.

School tests are abusive, he said, they “terrify children and parents, resulting in sleepless nights, and their only result is to permit one parent to tell another how much better her child is doing”.

The educational guru, author of over 150 books on education and learning, claims that the only benefit of tests is as "a managerial tool for resource allocation”.

His company, Children’s Progress Inc, has developed computer programmes for young children to help educators pinpoint how best to challenge and support each child.

Prof Galanter is currently working with NUI Galway on a pilot project which involves testing this assessment technology in a number of primary schools in the Galway area.

The professor explained that the technology “captures every keystroke of every child in every classroom”. This information allows the educators to examine what a child is and isn’t learning, and is “critical” to the teacher’s role, he said.

“Because the entire system is internet-based, special needs for special children can be identified, and every teacher, every appropriate school principal, educational specialist or special technologist, can call up with a few mouse clicks summary data for the entire classroom, the school, the regions, indeed for entire nations.”

The information gathered allows for “timely attention to be given to problems that may go unnoticed”, Prof Galanter said.

The pilot project in Galway has revealed a high standard of education. Where there were difficulties, the children “did not fail to do the task – rather, they managed to learn how to solve the problem,” Prof Galanter said.

“Apart from showing that Ireland has bright students, this indicates that children can be taught by the ‘assessment’. The results demonstrate the universality of human natures and the ability of children regardless of background or culture to acquire the foundations of a universally viable education,” he said.

Prof Galanter is also a celebrated scientist, and received the croix de guerre with palm for his service in the US army infantry during the second World War. (Source: Irish Times)