Here's a link to an article about increasing anxiety in young students preparing for high-stakes tests. I first read it on the same day that a beautiful young fourth grade girl stopped me in the hallway, crying her eyes out first thing in the morning last week. Long story.
School has become, in large part, testing preparation. I'm talking about the schools where I work, K-6. I imagine my experience is not much different from that of other teachers working in low-income regions. The district is under so much pressure to "show improvement in test scores" that all they really do is test now. Large swaths of instructional time are devoted to taking tests to prepare for taking more tests. Real instructional programs are being cut. Good, experienced teachers who are hired to perform a specific service (music specialist like myself who are meant to develop performance programs, ESL teachers who teach foreign-born students how to communicate in English, reading specialists who are supposed to be able to help students below grade level to "catch up" with their decoding skills) all have to fight to get any measurable instructional time with kids. "Advocating for your program" is the way I refer to it, but it's really a battle for instructional time and space.
Enough for now. I'll try to make some time to blog next week.
Or later.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
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2 comments:
Stan,
Thanks for the link! It can be downright depressing when we consider what has happened to our educational system. I don't see the standardized testing doing anything for us except standardizing us to the middle of the road. It is really tough when we can see discernable results and improvement in our students - and yet we are dismissed as "not a real subject" or "not part of the core". My district actually suspended the math curriculum for two months last school year so that all students could work on "Standardized Test Practice Packets" - I have never seen colleagues in math so frustrated. My assistant director and I took this very topic to task in our band show program this past September. Mustech.net published it on line if you want to check it out.
Sincerely
Travis J. Weller
How do we define the success of our educational programs?
I wish I could say that the "test packet" story was shocking, except it isn't. It's all too common now for school boards, administrators and teachers to actually believe that the tests are the point of education. I'm honestly becoming very cynical about it.
I'll make sure to check out that article, and appreciate you dropping by, Travis
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