"Is This Really What Education Is About?"

[heightsyankee]

I know we hashed out a lot about testing last week, but this is a worthwhile read, especially because it gives info on supporting a resolution to minimize reliance on testing. If I remember, some people asked "what do we do?" in the last thread, so this is possibly a jumping off platform...

www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/is-this-really-what-education-is-about/2012/05/19/gIQAoEf4bU_blog.html


Posted at 07:00 AM ET, 05/20/2012
‘Is this really what education is about?’
By Valerie Strauss
This was written by Vicki Abeles, a parent of three and the director of the documentary, “Race to Nowhere” and Jo Boaler a professor of mathematics education at Stanford University. “Race to Nowhere” challenges common assumptions about how children are best educated.

By Vicki Abeles and Jo Boaler

Welcome to standardized testing season, when students nationwide are clearing their desks, sharpening their pencils and fighting feelings of anxiety to meet our schools’, states’, and federal government’s desire for a simple, quantifiable way to measure them. Is this really what education is about?

It shouldn’t be. Educators across America agree that high-stakes testing has taken the place of meaningful teaching and learning in our schools. They’re united in their conclusion that it’s a poor tool for assessing a child’s educational progress and needs. They agree that an over-reliance on standardized testing actively worsens the quality of American schooling. At best, they say, it leads to a narrowed, inflexible curriculum aimed at test prep and regurgitation. At worst, it erodes our students’ abilities to grow into lifelong, creative learners and inquisitive problem solvers.

But the perception that parents and the taxpaying public want standardized tests — that we in fact need them in order to hold our teachers and school boards accountable for our children’s educations — persists. And so standardized testing remains ascendant across American school districts. As our classrooms have been turned into test prep centers, important subjects that are not emphasized such as science, history and art have been significantly reduced in schools. In turn, students are becoming disengaged, stressed, checked out and — worst — dropouts.

Even for those students who stick with it, tests degrade the educational experience, fueling performance anxiety and the false impression that academic success is about speed, accuracy and competition. In the elementary schools of Palo Alto, California, for example, students as young as first grade are given a district-mandated test of 50 math questions to solve in three minutes. Children often cry when they’re given these tests. Worse, they imbibe the message that math is a performance subject and success is all about reproducing facts under pressure even though the latest science tells us that speed tests are a direct cause of math anxiety and that they impede mathematics learning.

And the pressure is harsh, indeed. At a high school in the Bay area, the principal announces whether his school has performed better or worse than neighboring schools over the PA system. And the statewide test scores appear on students’ transcripts — an inclusion that’s prompted some teachers to remark to students that the scores will “follow you for the rest of your life.” Such public anxiety is found across grade levels. At a screening of the film, “Race to Nowhere,” held at the California Teachers Association, several educators volunteered that the state of California has developed an official protocol for what to do when a young child vomits on a standardized test. Enough said, no?

Perhaps even worse than the anxiety they create, standardized tests also erode the student’s relationship with his or her teacher. As Deborah Stipek, former dean of education at Stanford University, has pointed out, standardized testing doesn’t just limit the teacher’s ability to innovate her curriculum or pace his lessons to individual student needs. It also destroys teacher’s ability to cultivate the trust, respect and sensitivity that turn her students on to learning. “When tests become high-stakes, teachers naturally focus their attention on the knowledge and skills the tests measure,” she writes. This leaves little time for educators developing what Stipek calls “a secure relationship” between the teacher and the student. And it undermines the benefits of that relationship, which is a student who is unafraid to ask questions and undeterred by challenges.

Beyond the educational sector, industry and government entities recognize the risks of an over-reliance on standardized testing, too. A 2010 IBM survey of more than 1,500 chief executive officers from around the world found that executives hire for creativity, not for rote memorization and test-taking chops.

Meanwhile, a recently released report by the National Endowment for the Arts found that disadvantaged students do better academically if they are deeply involved in in-school or extracurricular arts programs. And the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, in conjunction with the Education Department, has announced a plan to bring art, music, dance, theater and other forms of creative expression into eight struggling schools in Washington D.C. -- to make them better.

These shifts are promising — but only if they signal national reform that de-emphasizes standardized testing countrywide and reintroduces educator autonomy and curricular versatility in every classroom. As it stands, American students will spend the better part of a week this month taking standardized tests. They will be denied the opportunity to develop their passions, to think deeply, and to experience critical thinking, innovation and teamwork. And they’ll be taught that it’s fill-in bubbles and timed answers that measure their academic worth and growth.

This is why we support the National Resolution on High-Stakes Testing. Inspired by a statement that has been adopted by more than 473 Texas school boards representing nearly 2.7 million students, this resolution is backed by a coalition of major national education, civil rights, and parents groups. It calls on federal and state policymakers to reduce standardized test mandates and instead base school accountability on multiple forms of measurement. Initial signers include the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Parents Across America, the National Education Association, and the National Center for Fair & Open Testing

We urge everyone who is concerned about the future of education in America to read this resolution and to endorse it, publicly and vocally, in communities and before school boards across the United States. For too long, state and federal policymakers have claimed that it’s the public — parents and taxpayers at large — who demand standardized testing as a tool of measurement and liability for the American education system and its educators. It’s time to demand a new model: classrooms that eschew rote memorization and test prep; teachers with the power to implement effective and flexible teaching strategies; students who are connected to their teachers and love to learn. Policymakers will find it hard to argue with that.

[WOT?*]

Yeah, the parents want standardized testing:

www.thenewstribune.com/2012/05/13/2143215/parents-of-550-snohomish-students.html

Parents of 550 Snohomish students refuse to let kids take MSPs

SNOHOMISH – A testing protest by parents in one Western Washington school district isn’t likely to affect the state budget, but the parents feel they got their message out that statewide academic testing is a waste of money.

Associated Press
Published: 05/13/12 12:05 am


SNOHOMISH – A testing protest by parents in one Western Washington school district isn’t likely to affect the state budget, but the parents feel they got their message out that statewide academic testing is a waste of money.

An organized group in the Snohomish School District kept 550 students from taking the statewide Measurements of Student Progress last week, the Everett Herald reported.

The students who didn’t take their exams represented about 12 percent of the 4,501 students between third and eighth grade required to take the test in Snohomish. Last year, just 12 students missed the standardized tests in that district.

State education officials told The Associated Press the students won’t be punished for refusing to take exams.

But the schools and the district may suffer from the after-effects of the protest.

The students who did not test but were expected to will be counted as “not tested,” which gets tallied in the “not meeting standard” category in the test results for each school. These numbers are used to determine if a school and its district are meeting the federal requirements of the No Child Left Behind law.

The parents group, “We Support Schools Snohomish,” believes its effort has been successful because it has raised awareness among lawmakers that parents are concerned about the exams.

“We’re not against testing. We want student assessment, but we want smarter, more effective and more cost-efficient testing,” group member Michelle Purcell said.

Read more here: www.thenewstribune.com/2012/05/13/2143215/parents-of-550-snohomish-students.html#storylink=cpy

[Guest]

"standardized testing as a tool of measurement and liability for the American education system and its educators"

If we don't do standardized testing to serve this purpose, what will substitute in its place? Will there be no mechanism for measurement and liability for the education system, even though it is a part of the executive branch of government? Then why should we expect any public official to submit to an audit or inspection of how well their jobs are being done and what our tax money has bought us? If testing hurts education, ok let's get rid of it. Why has no one proposed a better way to see which kids aren't learning so that the causes/trends can be identified and resources directed at fixing the deficiency? Does "high stakes" testing mean that something happens based on the test results? Wasn't taking action the ultimate point of the standard testing?

Personally I can think of no other way to find out what a kid knows than to ask. Don't teachers still test over material to come up with a grade for the semester? How do educators help students cope with the stress of these normal tests? Are we getting rid of report cards totally because testing is not a good measure of learning? I think they tried that once before and it did not help education.

[Deleted]

May 23, 2012 1:28:06 GMT -5 @Guest said:

"standardized testing as a tool of measurement and liability for the American education system and its educators"

If we don't do standardized testing to serve this purpose, what will substitute in its place? Will there be no mechanism for measurement and liability for the education system, even though it is a part of the executive branch of government? Then why should we expect any public official to submit to an audit or inspection of how well their jobs are being done and what our tax money has bought us? If testing hurts education, ok let's get rid of it. Why has no one proposed a better way to see which kids aren't learning so that the causes/trends can be identified and resources directed at fixing the deficiency? Does "high stakes" testing mean that something happens based on the test results? Wasn't taking action the ultimate point of the standard testing?

Personally I can think of no other way to find out what a kid knows than to ask. Don't teachers still test over material to come up with a grade for the semester? How do educators help students cope with the stress of these normal tests? Are we getting rid of report cards totally because testing is not a good measure of learning? I think they tried that once before and it did not help education.

What testing has become is the problem. When we start teaching to the test rather than teaching for the sake of learning, when we have pep rallies before the test, etc.

Why can't we go back to world of my youth where we randomly showed up to school one day and our teacher announces clear your desk, we are takign the IOWAs today. No prep, no hype, no stress. My parents and teachers knew where I stood academically and I was never worried about my future hinging on the test, even though it sort of did since the test determined who got to take SATs in 7th grade, etc.

[heightsyankee]

Aw, banana fish, you didn't GBGBCN after all!!

[mrslefty]

May 23, 2012 1:28:06 GMT -5 @Guest said:

"standardized testing as a tool of measurement and liability for the American education system and its educators"

If we don't do standardized testing to serve this purpose, what will substitute in its place? Will there be no mechanism for measurement and liability for the education system, even though it is a part of the executive branch of government? Then why should we expect any public official to submit to an audit or inspection of how well their jobs are being done and what our tax money has bought us? If testing hurts education, ok let's get rid of it. Why has no one proposed a better way to see which kids aren't learning so that the causes/trends can be identified and resources directed at fixing the deficiency? Does "high stakes" testing mean that something happens based on the test results? Wasn't taking action the ultimate point of the standard testing?

Personally I can think of no other way to find out what a kid knows than to ask. Don't teachers still test over material to come up with a grade for the semester? How do educators help students cope with the stress of these normal tests? Are we getting rid of report cards totally because testing is not a good measure of learning? I think they tried that once before and it did not help education.

I use projects to assess student learning as well as notes and checklists. If I see a student doing something I will need to grade I check it off in a checklist along with the date and a quick sentence explaining what was going on. I rarely use tests aside from district and state tests.
I would support a portfolio for students along with a test. That way students have more than one way to show what they know.

[sam20]

I'm really happy to see this increased scrutiny on standardized testing. I worry about the type of education my kids will be getting once they start school. I don't want her just learning how to take a test. I feel like kids only learn the stuff long enough for the test then don't retain any of it after that.