Here is a little piece that I wrote for a local newspaper--the Blue Stone Press (May 15, 2015)--in response to an article on parents opting out of testing for their children. It was published as a Guest Analyst Opinion.
It’s sad that so many parents are opting out of the current
testing, as Jillian Nadiak noted in BSP (May 1, 2015). It’s also a big mistake.
The
Mistakes
Perhaps the major mistake is to
assume that parents—simply by virtue of the fact that they are parents—are the
best equipped to make educational decisions for children, even their own. In
fact, the very reason we have schools and teachers and teacher education
programs is because parents cannot effectively educate their children. Parents
don’t assume they can diagnose and cure childhood illness and so we expect them
to seek competent medical treatment from doctors and nurses. And there are laws
that will penalize parents for not seeking competent medical care. But, with
education everyone seems to see themselves as expert.
The second mistake is to assume that testing is bad.
Frequent testing is clearly one of the best ways to assess student learning.
Without frequent testing, it’s impossible to identify a student’s weaknesses
and ultimately turn these into strengths. And isn’t that what education should
be all about?
Frequent testing is also one of the best ways to assess
teacher effectiveness. Some teachers and some teacher organizations,
unfortunately, are objecting to this testing because it threatens to provide
objective evaluation of their own performance, of their own teaching
effectiveness. And much like testing is designed to promote student learning,
it can also and should also function to promote teacher learning. From the
results of testing, the teacher can see where he or she promoted effective
learning and where improvement is in order.
The third mistake is to assume that taking tests is not a
learning experience. It surely is. In taking tests students learn a multitude
of skills—time management and reasoning strategies, among others—and, at least
for the time of the test, are forced to think. And that’s a good thing.
The
Bogus Arguments
The arguments that teacher and
parent groups are raising are weak at best. One frequent argument is that the
tests are bad—they don’t reflect the learning goals they should reflect.
Creating tests is a difficult task and to improve tests, you need test-taking
results. It’s that simple. You need to analyze tests and test scores to create
better tests. No one claims the current tests are perfect but they are clearly
necessary if we are ever to get to perfect tests.
Another argument is that testing takes a great deal of time
and takes time away from the actual teaching. Testing actually takes a very
small portion of the school semester’s time and is a form of learning. Learning
to take tests is a skill that students will need throughout their professional
lives. It’s ironic that we expect plumbers and electricians to have passed
their respective tests, but we don’t want our own children and students to take
corresponding tests.
Still another argument is that it stresses children out.
Television commercials have parents begging for testing to stop oppressing
their child; it’s incredible. First, it’s not the testing that creates the
stress. If testing is approached as a helpful and student-friendly experience, it
will be accepted as easily as a history discussion. The stress seems to be
produced by administrators who put pressure on the teachers (so they look
good), by teachers who put pressure on the students (so they look good), and by
parents who put pressure on both teachers and students (so they look good). We
need to think more of what’s good for the student. The aim of testing is not to
determine who is doing well and who isn’t; rather, it’s an educational tool to help
teachers teach more effectively. People universally enjoy crossword puzzles,
jumbles, KenKen, and similar tests of verbal and mathematical skills, there is
no reason the same can’t be true in the classroom.
The
Consequences
As with any decision, there are
consequences and, in this case, the consequences are not good.
First, opting children out of testing prevents teachers from
discovering student weaknesses and their own weaknesses as well. Without the
ability to identify weaknesses, we cannot adjust teaching strategies to achieve
the results we all want.
Second, we prevent students from learning the essential
skills of test taking and will leave certain students without test scores that
are likely to prove significant in their further education and perhaps even in employment.
Third, those districts that do not have a sufficient number
of students taking these standardized tests will be penalized by the state
which may withhold certain funding. So, by opting out, parents will be denying
their own children state funding. Does this make sense?
Joseph A. DeVito is Emeritus
Professor of Communication, Hunter College, CUNY and—in the interest of full
disclosure—is a Pearson author but has nothing to do with their testing
division. He has lived in Accord for some 30 years.
