Standardized Testing

A student walks into the library where the computers and dividers are set up and awaiting his arrival. He is nervous. This test determines a lot. This test may determine whether his teacher keeps his or her job. This test determines whether he moves up in math, or he stays in same spot. If he passes, he is given nothing more than a pat on the back. If he fails, he is shunned and possibly made fun of by his peers. All of this is running through his brain. He sits down, takes a breath, and begins. 

Standardized testing has been a way to assess schools, teachers, and students for the past 37 years, yet we have started to realize that standardized testing is really not the best way to asses anyone. My goal in this blog post is to show why we should vote to change standardized testing today. 

Is standardized testing effective? In my opinion, standardized testing is failing for three reasons. One, many students and teachers say standardized testing is too stressful, two, federal and state legislatures have set goals that are not achievable, and three, some students just are not good test takers.

Let's talk about the first reason. In every state, there is a final test for students in 3rd-12th grade. This is the focal point that teachers and students stress about every year, but they do so for very different reasons. 

Teachers stress about these tests because their jobs and their success as a teacher hinges on them. If the majority of the teacher's students do well on the test, the teacher is evaluated to be effective in the classroom. If the majority of the students do not do well on the test, the teacher may be in jeopardy of losing their position.  As a student I have noticed that teachers get more and more frantic as test day approaches. They often hand out numerous packets, multiple study guides, and if a student has a minor disruption in his or her class, there is often a harsher punishment than say, in the beginning of the year.   Many students feed off this added stress in the classroom and may emulate their teachers behavior as teachers are role models to children.  Another reason these tests are extremely stressful is because there is so much riding on them;  a teachers success, the school's performance, the state's performance, the country's performance, and the scariest of all for the student, the possibility of getting held back. 

For the student, being held back a grade comes with many fears; boredom, peer ridicule, and not being with kids your own age.  Being held back or the fear of being held back,  can be traumatizing to a child.  

The second reason standardized testing is failing is because federal and state legislatures have set the standards too high. In No Child Left Behind (NCLB) the government predicted that by the year 2014 all students would achieve 100% proficiency on standardized testing (NCLB was created in 2001.) This standard has caused districts across the country to be forced to teach to pass tests, instead of teaching for comprehension.    

The final reason standardized testing is flawed is because some students, are just not good test takers. For many taking tests is not a strong-suit, but these same students do understand the content being taught.  Usually students who are very good test takers have been taught at some point in their education how to effectively take tests. Personally,  my third grade teacher made all the difference in my ability to be a successful test taker. She took time and taught us different strategies on how to take tests and what we could use to effectively study for tests. For most children, they do not get someone like my third grade teacher early enough in their education (or at all) to help them succeed in test taking.  

The other reason is that many students get extremely anxious on test day. This anxiety makes students unable to focus on the task at hand, and if they get a question that is more challenging than the previous questions, they might over-think it or they might get so over worked that even the simplest questions can become massively hard. In addition, the lengthly time that these tests often take is not helping students either. On most tests you can leave an answer blank and come back to it later, but on some of tests, (for example CAT tests) you must put an answer right then and there, and once you click next you can never go back. If students are able to take a brain brake for just five minutes, the might have a new idea about how to approach the problem.

As you can see, standardized testing is flawed and needs to be re evaluated and replaced, but we need a call to action to do so. My suggestion would be to replace these tests with alternative assessments. Here are some examples: 

Math: Instead of making kids sit through large and laborious math tests, instead have them apply skills to the real world.  For example, you could give kids a project for creating a room space or house and have them use their geometry skills to help build the house. This way the government can still test the student and the student could also get a real life experience out of it.

Science: In science their are so many ways to test children, through research, writing and experiments at that are interactive and fun without it being a multiple choice test. This way, again you can still test the student on their knowledge and the student can have a hands on experience.

English: Have students have open dialogue with teaches about books they have read, using vocabulary they learned and writing essays about content.  

History: In history you could chose a topic you have just learned about and write as if you are in this time period, you would write about what decisions you would make and why you made those decisions. This way you would still get tested and the student would get a interactive and informative experience out of it and learn from the success and failures of history.

You might have noticed that each of these replacements had a theme to them, that they were all done after you had finished a topic. I recommend this for two reasons. Reason one was so the material would still be fresh in the students mind. If you put a test at the end of the year and you expect the child to ace things he or she learned at the beginning of the year, you are not going to get a great outcome. Alternatively, if you put it right after the student has finished the topic, it is fresh in their memories, this way they have an opportunity to get a better score.  Even worse, some standardized tests are cumulative of several years of education making it overwhelming for students to remember content from years ago.  

The second reason alternative testing is better is that it gives school more time to teach the material.  End of the year deadlines for standardized testing cause teachers to teach to the test instead of teaching the content to the best of their ability. 

I hope that you, the people, contact your local representative to talk to them about these ideas. This is the great part of living in a democracy.  You get to have a say in what we do in this country, because only you can change the way we live today and tomorrow.

Sites

Singer , Alan . "Common core is failing test and kids." The Huffington post . Alan singer , 5 Feb. 2016. Web. 14 Mar. 2017

"Standardized Tests ." ProCon.org. N.p., 31 Jan. 2017. Web. 21 Mar. 2017

Strauss, Valerie . "Confirmed: Standardized testing has taken over schools ."Confirmed:Standardized teasing has taken over schools . The washington post, n.d. Web.