Roseanne Woods was a high school principal in Florida for 32 years. She is now a protester and a blogger. She is outraged by Florida’s punitive testing and accountability regime. In this post, she describes a state that cares more about testing than teaching.
For her steadfast dedication to real education, I place Roseanne Woods on the blog’s honor roll.
She writes:
“Children are stressed out and parents are m ad enough to want their children to “Opt-Out” of all high-stakes testing. Frustrated teachers are leaving the profession and superintendents are demanding real change. Lawmakers: how about some real relief?
“Florida schools are about to hit the big testing/school grades accountability iceberg this spring. Why? This year, instead of FCAT, all 3rd-11th grade students will be taking brand new tests on the extremely challenging Florida Standards Assessment (FSA), aka, Common Core Standards. Third graders who don’t score well on reading will be retained and high school students who don’t pass will not graduate. Schools will receive A-F school grades based on these scores.
“Not to worry—districts have been assured by DOE that the scores will be “normed” (manipulated) to match last year’s scores. Somehow, that gives little comfort
“Here’s a sample 3rd grade math problem— ‘A bakery uses 48 pounds of flour each day. It orders flour every 28 days. Create an equation that shows how many pounds of flour the bakery
needs to order every 28 days.’
“Any wonder many parents are having trouble helping their children with homework?
“There are now 154 of the 180 days on the Florida State Testing Calendar devoted to a variety of required state assessments in grades K-12 that effect schools’ grades. Any wonder that schools are spending more and more time prepping and practicing for these tests?…
“To make matters worse, schools also have to implement Florida Statute 1012.34– requiring 50% of a teacher’s evaluation be based on “rigorous” tests for every subject/course taught. So, at great expense, school districts have been scrambling to create over 1200 tests on courses not covered by the required Florida Standards Assessments, FSA. These district assessments must cover quite the spectrum including art, physical ed., drama and guidance counselors. By law, elementary students must take 6-7 end-of-course tests to prove their teachers did a good enough job to be eligible for a performance bonus.”
Florida is a very sick state. Please, someone, invite the Governor and the State Board of Education to visit Finland! All that time and money for testing is wasted.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I feel great sympathy for everyone having to deal with this overwhelming testing boom, but every time an educator or parent cites a math problem like this as proof of why common core is awful, I cringe and see it as proof of why the math element of common core is so necessary. I’m not talking about the test test testing, which has nothing to do with best practices; I’m only thinking about the decades of serious research and professional experience by accomplished math teachers that is embodied in that word problem and how it would have been taught in a best practices class (and has been for decades prior to Common Core). That principal need to examine that problem again, word by word, draw a simple picture of it helps, and SURELY the simplicity of it will jump out at her?
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I’m not sure that this particular problem is a stellar example of good mathematics, Jessica. Is the bakery open 7 days a week? 5 days a week? Does the equation that is asked for demonstrate a deep understanding of multiplication, reading, or divination using chicken entrails?
How would a parent of an 8/9 year-old deal with this kind of ambiguity since they themselves most likely didn’t have the benefit of superior mathematics teaching? And what about the fact that this problem needs to solved on a computer? How does this problem explore demonstrable knowledge of the mathematical practice standards?
Perhaps this principal could have chosen an even more ridiculous example because they are there, in abundance. Our district threw out about 35% of the state’s recommended practice problems in 3rd grade math because they were incoherent, incorrect, or covered things not taught in that grade.
That problem is not the best example of the gains we’ve made in mathematics teaching and learning. I’ve been taking professional development courses from the state of Florida, the NCTM, and the AFT for years now and we (and do) do much better on the classroom tests we create ourselves.
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Is this math problem appropriate for an 8 year old? So an eight year old should be able to write 48 x 28 = 1344? Do 8 yr. olds do this multiplication by using a zero for the space holder and adding the results? Or do they have to do (40 x 20) + (40 x 8) + (20 x 8) + (8 x 8) = 1344? One of the unintended/intended outcomes of high stakes testing and the notion of a common core is that cognitive skills are being pushed down to inappropriate ages for cognitive development.
I’m honestly not sure if this math problem is appropriate, but I am sure that there is a lot of pressure to push curriculum down to lower grades.
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Jessica: ELL, LEP, SPED. See any problems now? Maybe rewrite the question in Tagalog, and give it to your English speaking 4th grader to decipher.
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This is clearly overreach on accountability, but Florida has become infamous for that and for judges who think it is Ok for teachers to be evaluated on the performance of students they have not taught–legally OK ….even if unfair.
I wonder if the all of the end-of-course tests in all of the subjects will be developed in a manner that meets the most recent standards of test development published by the American Psychological Association.
I wonder if the constructs and standards for tests in each subject at each grade, complete with item analyses, will be published along with “reasoning” about grade-to-grade distributions of items–technical discussions of the kind made available by the Florida State Department of Education for the FCAT.
Of course, these tests are just a piece of a larger concept of proper education (and wrong-headed), where every subject is a separate “course,” the content taught and tested is never taught or learned in connection with any other subject in school, and never learned about unless in school at a specific grade and from a specific “teacher of record.”
And of course, this out-of-control testing regime is, by design, intended to justify and create a demand for educational alternatives.. especially so-called “personalized” programs, online, data gathering all the time, no need for testing windows, just data dashboards with real time performance measures…in those subjects well-suited for that delivery system–the others nice, but not necessary enrichments.
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I agree, Jessica, with the other comments written — I would add, though, that many, many kids do NOT see this as simple: it doesn’t tell you how many days the bakery is open per week, etc. and although for someone trained in the ways of math word problems (which do not occur anywhere else and are truly not helpful), that IS a pretty easy problem, it is equally useless — as a mom who would have been able to help her kids with that problem, I would have said: this is a great example of why word problems are over-rated. Just make the problem simpler than it could ever possibly be in real life and work it — don’t read it too carefully and don’t think about it at all.
A better problem: So, we need to help Babe’s Bakery figure out how much flour to order each month. What information would you want to have from Babe ? How would you use that information to figure out how much flour to order ?
An open-ended problem-solving problem …. that’s the ticket. BUT that wouldn’t be tested on a standardized test….
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Given that we teach multiplication is repeated addition of equal groups, could a 3rd grader write 48+48 . . . till s/he has 28 addends? Inefficient but possible the way the question is worded.
Also, why does Gr 3 test item say “Create an equation”? Wouldn’t a mathematician say “write an equation”? Is “create” used because it’s a computer test so not literally written, or are test writers composing items to look rigorous?
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Its a crappy word problem. Period. No one talks like that. No one in the real world uses math in such a convoluted way. No baker puts in an order for 1.344 pounds of flour. No baker orders flour every 28 days. No 3rd grader should ever be judged and defined by such a crappy question. This is a typical CC word problem written by an item writer who has no real world experience in anything. If the standard being tested was double digit multiplication why is their any need for such obtuse and confusing writing style. These are gotcha questions misrepresented as rigor.
In just a few minutes of Googling I found bulk flour sold in 50 pound bags.
If a bakery shop uses one 50 pound bag of flour per day, how many pounds of flour do they use in a 7 day week? How many pounds are used in a 30 day month? How many 50 pound bags are used in a 50 week year? Show your work.
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Why not just ask for an answer….instead of “write an equation” ….if showing work is expected, it should be sufficient. Why complicate everything?
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I am a retired public school teacher that graduated from high school in the 1960’s. Let’s go back to the 1960’s and 1970’s.The USA was number one world wide in education. Now we are something south of twentieth. Just why is that? The only tests we had were final exams and then there was the PSAT and the SAT. Sure we had tests in out subjects but not all the tests students are now exposed. Now students have final exams. SAT’s, GQE’s and ACT’s. Teachers have ECA’s. Teachers are being deprived of a living wage. In Indiana, merit raises have been eliminated and there is no money for across the board raises. For making Qualified or Highly Qualified teacher, a teacher in Indiana receives a Stipend for one year but their base pay remains the same. From that standpoint a teacher in Indiana will never make more that an entry level wage plus a Stipend that is worth one thousand dollars before taxes. There was a video conference discussion about ECA’s. We were told NOT to teach to the test. I asked what I was supposed to teach considering that is what the student was supposed to be tested on. Just what has happened to education in this country.
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The U.S. has never been “number one” in education. Read Diane Ravitch’s book, “Reign of Error,” which covers this myth in depth.
That being said, I agree that the endless testing and the devaluation of public education and teachers is appalling.
Recently my faculty was told that it is unethical to NOT “teach to the test.” How sad.
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Threatened Out West,
It used to be considered unethical and unprofessional to teach to the test. Now it is expected.
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And I contend that it is unethical to give any test to any student without having first read and vetted it.
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I agree with both of you, Diane and Duane. I nearly got up and walked out of the meeting when that statement was made.
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dianeravitch:
TAGO!
And it should remind us of the emptiness of the clever but misleading selling point for high-stakes standardized testing: “if you’re going to teach to the test, make sure it’s a test worth teaching to.”
Consider: those tests sample only a very small part of vast areas of knowledge and skills.* Hence, when [as is more and more the case] you align teaching with the test you severely constrict what students learn and can do. *That’s not a bug, that’s a fundamental feature of how they’re designed, produced and pretested. It’s called sampling.*
In other words, you emphasize and impart test-taking skills that emphasize superficial thinking and thoughtless haste and discourage creativity and risk-taking.
And it often comes very close to making schools places that resemble “obedience schools” for animals.
Just sayin’…
😎
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Who is best qualified to write these tests, teachers who know the limits and abilities of her/his students or these people who are now writing them divorced from the individual classrooms? Are all children in all classrooms exactly at the same place in their abilities, mathematical or otherwise? Is it possible even that they could be?
Whether this particular problem in math is appropriate for some classes, or none it illustrates the inane supposition that all children are the same, that they have the same abilities at the same age level and/or from the same home and societal environment?
I have almost come to the conclusion that this is being done on purpose, they want the children to fail so that they can point out the failure of the public schools. AND since so many of the charters are not graded as are the public schools, it gives the politicians grist for their mills of saying that public schools are failing so they can reap the harvest of money for education. Cy cal? Probably but can even these politicians be that dense that with all the data out there they cannot even put 2 + 2 together?
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Gordon, New York custom orders tests from Pearson designed to fail. The near 70% failure rate in math and ELA, two years running, is all the data needed to prove this.
Claims that the tests are more rigorous are sheer nonsense. They are academic death traps and are being used to mislabel students as chronic failures at stages of brain development that are still all over the map. We are making a huge mistake in trying to definitively measure ‘works’ that are very much in progress.
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Absolutely it’s being done on purpose. Failure sets the stage for corporate $$$ reform. Also, the general lack of respect for children is obvious. Children “should” be able to do this problem. Says who? Why? And how are children benefiting from this exam?
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We’re hearing rumors in Florida that the parent trigger bill will be introduced again in the upcoming legislative session. With the predicted high rate of failure on the new tests, are the privatizers setting the stage for a massive turnover of public schools to charter and voucher schools, or might it just be a diversion to co-opt the anti-testing movement?
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Hey, but at least we will have the best darn bakers in the world with lots of flour and no idea what it is used for.
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Needed that. Thanks.
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Great job opportunity in Fullerton California for a Superintendent who wants to work in one of the best districts in the nation. Please apply. We do not want to repeat the same mistakes of Florida. We are just beginning the testing process and we have a Governor who is on record of NOT BEING IN FAVOR OF NATIONAL TESTING.
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“There are now 154 of the 180 days on the Florida State Testing Calendar devoted to a variety of required state assessments in grades K-12 that effect schools’ grades. Any wonder that schools are spending more and more time prepping and practicing for these tests?…”
This statement above does not pass a simple sanity test. The Florida State Testing Calendar is available to every one at the FSDOE. The calendar shows blocks of 2 to 4 weeks for various tests. Adding the entire test day blocks including weekends and holidays results in over 122 days for testing (FSA). The NGSSS assessment tests add another 54 days inclusive of weekends and holidays. But there is significant overlap between FSA and NGSSS testing.
One needs to sit back and analyze what is going on. It is prudent to assume that any given test is going to last a single instruction period some where during the block of time assigned for that test. There are only 6 FSA tests and they should last at best 6 hours or at worst 12 hours in a given year. There are three more tests named NGSSS assessments. These may add another 3 to 6 hours for the testing. A total of 18 hours, i.e., 3 days out of 180-day school year is devoted to testing assuming a 6-hour school day. This is no where near the 154 days stated in the blog. The testing time is 1.67% of the total available instructional time.
Therefore the statement “There are now 154 of the 180 days on the Florida State Testing Calendar devoted to a variety of required state assessments in grades K-12 that effect schools’ grades” is false and is fear mongering. Whoever is a party to publication of this false statement is harming the children in Florida and the Florida State Department of Education (FSDOE).
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Florida is buying their tests from Utah, where I am. We took the tests last spring. Each student took at least ten hours of testing. Since the writing section was not timed, it took some students eight or nine hours JUST for the writing portion. This year, interim testing was added. Many districts, including mine, have required the interim tests as well. This means that the library and computer labs are booked solid for testing for three weeks in late January until mid February, and then again for six weeks in April and May. Now, of course, not every student is testing every day in those windows, but the constant testing affects the entire school. To do planned research projects, I have had to check all of the books on the subjects out of the library and carry them up two flights of stairs and across the parking lot to my classroom.
In other words, we’re making kids as young as third grade test for three or four times longer than the bar exam, and the school is in an uproar for nine school weeks a year. This is NOT a minor thing.
And that doesn’t count other required testing that also affects teacher evaluations and school grades.
Perhaps if you were actually working in the classroom, you would know these things…
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Once again Raj, your ignorance of reality on the ground in actual schools embarrasses you.
Florida’s legislature passed a law last year requiring an end-of-year test in every subject in every grade, period. That is mentioned in the article. We are also required, as a Title I school. to give semester and quarterly progress monitoring assessments on computers to all children in the school. In my smaller elementary school that equals over 650 children.
That also means that high schools and middle schools have already given a round of these tests since they have courses that only last a semester. It was a total disaster.
The end-of-course tests are also required by the law to be given and taken on computers. Some school districts in wealthier parts of the state have plenty of computers. Other schools. like my elementary school, have only enough for 2 classes to test at any given time. Since we have so many students the testing drags on over weeks, rather than days. While testing is going on the media center (library) is closed so no student can check out a book or do research and the computer lab is closed so no student who is not testing is allowed to use the Internet or to complete any of the mandatory online courses we now have to give in reading, writing, and math for at least 2 weeks and maybe longer.
We have no idea how we will handle testing all the Pre-K, Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade students in every subject area including reading, writing, mathematics, science, social studies, art, music, physical education, and computer science by the end of the year on 40 computers. The district is suggesting that we start soon which penalizes both students and teachers because we are just halfway into the 3rd quarter of the school year yet students will be tested on end-of-year knowledge.
Impossible to do but mandated by state law. Ridiculous, idiotic, cruel, designed to fail, and all the other things that happen when idiot economists, psychometricians, and business people make laws and decisions about education and testing.
I don’t know if you are being paid to troll here or if you are simply ideologically attached to corporate reforms and the destruction of public schools but your statements become more and more pointless each time I read them, devoid of any and all reality.
There are actually not enough days in a 180 day school year to meet the requirements of the law as it stands. Your attempt to prove that testing only lasts a few hours at best is a total lie and is not based in any reality whatsoever.
You need to do your research if you want to be treated as a serious scholar.
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154 days out of 180 school days is unbelievable.
Here is the link for Florida State Testing Calendar of FSDOE.
Click to access FLORIDA%20STATEWIDE%20ASSESSMENT%20PROGRAM%2020142015%20SCHEDULE-%20LSMS%20(2).pdf
Do your own math. You get to have your own opinion, but not your own facts. Please do not make up your own facts. Get real. Please do not call someone else ignorant.
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Funny, you say “unbelievable.” But you don’t really know what is the fact because you can’t get the link open. Me neither.
There is no file! The webpage said it can’t be found.
Is that what you mean “fact?”
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Just add back the “.pdf” to the url and the page will load fine. The auto-link isn’t including it.
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Try this link
Click to access dps-2014-81a.pdf
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Threatened out West and Chris in Florida: the “test-time” argument is an old one. And already has been thoroughly refuted.
Rheeally! It’s occurred before!
Really! It’s been eviscerated!
For just one rheeally clear example, I refer you to Jersey Jazzman under a blog posting entitled “Why Is Michelle Rhee Wrong About Everything?”
[start quote]
[Jersey Jazzman] And now America’s #1 corporate reformer is wrong about the amount of classroom time taken up by standardized testing:
[Michelle Rhee:] Those test-crazed districts need to be reeled in. But a new study by Teach Plus, an organization that advocates for students in urban schools, found that on average, in grades three and seven, just 1.7 percent of classroom time is devoted to preparing for and taking standardized tests. That’s not outrageous at all. Most people spend a larger percentage of their waking day choosing an outfit to wear or watching TV.
…
[Jersey Jazzman] Let’s be very clear: in direct contradiction to Rhee, the Teach Plus report specifically says the 1.7 percent figure does not include test preparation time.
So what does the study say about the amount of time spent in schools on test prep? The methodology doesn’t allow for precise answers, but there are some qualitative findings… [I urge all viewers of this thread to go to the original posting via the link below for the details that follow.]
A critique I would make about this report is that it is difficult to tell at times whether the teachers’ comments about test prep are always related to state- or district-level tests. But there’s enough here for us to say that there is evidence that preparing for state-level tests consumes a significant amount of instructional time.
So the report Rhee herself cites contradicts her main point: standardized testing does, in fact, gobble up lots of classroom time. Her statement above, according to the source she herself cites, is just dead wrong.
[end quote]
Note: All brackets mine.
Link: http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/2014/04/why-is-michelle-rhee-wrong-about.html
Threatened out West—I am sure that, just like you, I am shocked and amazed that the promoters and supporters of charters and privatization have a 98% “Satisfactory” [thank you, Bill Gates!] chance of listing THE WALKING DEAD as their favorite tv series for informational text. Not surprising: zombie ideas and policies and talking points that are proven failures that keep coming back to life are just like the undead hordes that constantly repopulate that tv show.
That’s why Jersey Jazzman writes that Michelle Rhee was just “dead wrong.” *Or am I, in the interests of making my point, having a Kayser Soze/Bennett Kayser moment and going way overboard? If so, I apologize.*
😎
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>”There are only 6 FSA tests and they should last at best 6 hours or at worst 12 hours in a given year. ”
>”Whoever is a party to publication of this false statement is harming the children in Florida and the Florida State Department of Education (FSDOE).”
Your 1st statement above does not match with the 2nd one. Your voice won’t be taken seriously here as long as you make this kind of argument.
Please don’t tell me if you’re here for trolling–well, hope you’re not.
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See link below
Click to access FLORIDA%20STATEWIDE%20ASSESSMENT%20PROGRAM%2020142015%20SCHEDULE-%20LSMS%20(2).pdf
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Raj,
The link is dead. Are you sure it really exists? Or are you deliberatly putting the link that is not working?
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Forgot to tell you. This is not high school or college entrance examination held in Japan, China, or South Korea. They have only twice. FSA forces this kind of exam hell at an early age. The word “ony six” and length of time already explains its insanity.
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Try this link. It is Florida DOE. It works
Click to access dps-2014-81a.pdf
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Raj, you have a very impressive resume. I hope you will be a regular contributor to the lively discussions here.
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““There are now 154 of the 180 days on the Florida State Testing Calendar devoted to a variety of required state assessments in grades K-12 that effect schools’ grades. Any wonder that schools are spending more and more time prepping and practicing for these tests.”
Actually, the post is correct. There are total 154 days FDOE has for test schedule in total. These apply to all schools across the state.
I did check the number of days.
Students have to take more than one test–FSA, End of Course Assessment, and anything that will be added–depending on what FDOE says. This applies to students from 3rd to12th grade.
Again, this is the lord of insanity that goes beyond the hell of school entrance examination for 9th and 12th grade students in Japan.
Done. No excuse for FDOE’s testing bureau machine.
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I am a Florida third grade teacher. We do not teach double-digit multiplication in third grade, except when multiplying by multiples of 10. It is not in our math standards or test specs so I will be quite upset if it does show up on the test. I’m tired of our tests not matching our curriculum.
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Which shows another lack of clarity in the question. The question directs one to “create an equation” – it does not say to solve the equation. So if a student writes “48 x 28 = ____” does that get counted correct? Or does it have to be fully spelled out: “48 pounds of flour per day times 28 days = ____”? Does it have to have an answer? I don’t care how “smart” one is, the only ones who can answer questions like that are the devious minds who thought it up and created the answer key, because they’re the only ones who know what they were thinking when they pulled it out of their, er, left shoe.
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48 x 28 = 1,344
The information on the left (48 x 28) must be equal to the information on the right (1,344). However, one of the variables can be missing, so 48 x 28 = Y would be considered an equation. So students just have to show that they can select the proper operation, in this case multiplication, in order to solve the problem. Apparently calculating the answer is not required to “create an equation”. And this is the so-called rigor that will inform us that an 8 year old is on track for college or career? And no test prep needed for this kind of nonsense either?
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Its just so natural for 8 year olds to be writing equations that they have not been taught to solve. Can’t think of a way to make math more meaningless to children. At this rate, Common Core math will to way more harm than good.
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“. . . left shoe.”
I just looked up the definition of left shoe and the first, #1 example was ASS!
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NY Teacher – yeah, that’s kind of the problem. Third graders have neither learned to multiply two digit numbers nor have they learned about variables. So they may very well get the 48 X 28 on the left side, but how in the world are they going to figure out what to put on the other side?
Duane – yeah, something like that 😉
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All of your comments are right on the mark. The Math practice PARCC questions are so confusing and state questions in ways that we do not normally communicate. The common core is already developmentally inappropriate. The PARCC takes developmentally inappropriate common core objectives and confuses the students even more. I think it is intentional. No test maker can be that unaware of what they are doing. If the PARCC and common core survive, our students will take many, many steps backwards in their Math and Language Arts achievement. What a shame….
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Let me put a few more lashes on this problem. Some brilliant thinkers among our children will be thinking that the bakery does not wait until they are out of flour, the amount needed may vary based on usage. Why not just ask the obvious: If a bakery uses 48 pounds of flour a day, how much would they use in 28 days? Simple, the testers use confusion and puzzle solving as a phony proxy for what they want to call higher thinking skills (mind reading?).
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They couldn’t ask that because 3rd graders have not been taught how to multiply two-digit numbers. They are asking which operation would solve the problem. Absurd.
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Reblogged this on Rosanne Wood and commented:
Thank you Diane Ravitch. Being on your “blog’s honor roll” means a lot to me. There is much more to say about what’s going on in Florida, and I will do my best to speak truth to power. I can only do this because after 36 years as a teacher and principal in the Florida public schools, I am retired; others are afraid to speak out.
In Florida, all education policy streams from Jeb Bush. His mouthpiece is his “Foundation for Excellence”, and all education policy for the last 15 years has flowed from this source. Because I live in Tallahassee, I often give my input to the Republican controlled Legislature. Every time I speak, people in the audience whisper their agreement to me, but they dare not speak it aloud.
Unfortunately, many states have followed his model of school grades, which I refer to as the “Shame and Blame Grade Game”. Never before have so many good schools, teachers and children had to wear the scarlet letter of FAILURE. Kindergartners now get A-F grades. (How cruel is that?) Teachers are told that they must adhere to pacing guides with everyone on the same page every day. ((How stupid is that?) Across our state, schools are suspending their curriculum to get students ready for the upcoming high-stakes test. Third graders who don’t pass will be retained. I’ll be writing more about this soon.
It is criminal what has happened to our schools. As someone said, it used to be considered unethical to teach-to-the test; now it’s the norm.
Again, thank you Diane for making Florida part of this conversation.
rosannewood.com
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Rosanne, you are my hero too! Keep on advocating for those of us still trapped in the classrooms in silence. I do what I can anonymously and through the FEA but sometimes it gets mighty lonely.
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>“Here’s a sample 3rd grade math problem— ‘A bakery uses 48 pounds of flour each day. It orders flour every 28 days. Create an equation that shows how many pounds of flour the bakery needs to order every 28 days.’
Geez! You’ve got to be kidding me. They put this as an exam for the 9th grade? I didn’t learn double-digit multiplication until 5th grade back in Japan many years ago. And what does it suppose to mean by “equation” ? I don’t see any point in this question. This is really dumb.
Well explains the idiocy and insanity of high-stake testing.
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>the 9th grade
Whoops, I meant “3rd grade.” Mistken for 9-year-old.
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“Any wonder many parents are having trouble helping their children with homework?
When I was in 3rd grade back in the 1970’s we didn’t get homework (other than ‘you should read at home’ and spelling words to learn).
We also didn’t automatically expect HS students who wanted to major in science to take calculus, (maybe because students weren’t pushed to ‘pick a major’ in HS (or even the first couple of years of college in some cases)).
I think they are pushing harder math in the lower grades because they expect too much of HS students.
What’s the hurry?
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The Common Core standards are placing more of an emphasis on STEM subjects causing a widening gap between students who already are up to the new standard and those who are not. With this new testing system, a whole new array of problems have arrived. If 154 school days are going to be devoted to “teaching to the standard” when is there time for students to be creative? Be active? When is there time for field trips? While I understand that in the public school system there needs to be certain standards set to try to equalize education across the country, how is placing more rigorous testing components on the backs of both teachers and students helpful?
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https://www.emptywheel.net/tag/susan-bowles/
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