Veteran teacher Nancy Flanagan was asked by a candidate for advice about education policy. Nancy wrote a list of ten ideas that she thought would be useful guideposts. She now updates her guide for legislators.
She writes (and I summarize):
#1. You don’t know education just because you went to school…
#2. Plan to pay many non-photo op visits to lots of schools…
#3. Take the tests that kids have to take…
#4. Be picky about what you read, listen to, and believe…
#10. Honor our democratic foundations. Public education is the most democratic of our institutions, one of our best ideas as Americans. Public schools may be tattered and behind the technological curve, but systematically destroying the infrastructure of public education is profoundly selfish and immoral. Don’t be that legislator.
This is a thoughtful and thoughtful-provoking post. She updates it.
What would you add to her list?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
#11 A well educated public is actually helpful, not hurtful, to getting honest politicians elected. Especially education in accurate history, civics and science– that is, science as it is done by hypothesis, experimentation, proof and results rather than teaching so called facts only.
But us oligarchs need an ignorant, easily manipulated, peon class!
on the nose
Oh, this is wonderful, Ms. Flanagan!
Some additions
Eschew the notions that schooling is for just children and should be standardized. Our Prime Directive as educators is to help students become intrinsically motivated, life-long learners. Why? Because learning should be not something we UNDERGO in the first few years of life but something that we UNDERTAKE, at some point, so that it then becomes a lifelong pursuit. Standardization is for nuts and bolts and the lower grades. A diverse, pluralistic society needs young adults entering it who have had, in their high-school years, their diverse interests and proclivities nurtured.
Reject the idea that there is ONE magic formula in education. I doubt that there has EVER been any committed, life-long learner who has not benefitted enormously, along the way, from BOTH teacher-centric and student-centric teachers. In this time when “the sage on the stage” is so derided, I often find myself thinking of a couple counterexamples: my fifth-grade teacher Mr. Schimezzi, who lectured to us, daily, in FIFTH GRADE. Horrifying, huh? His classroom style would not have survived any standard evaluation process being used today. But we in his classroom were mesmerized. He was endlessly fascinating and engaging. He revealed to us many, many wonders on the paths of the great garden that of human cultural accomplishment through the ages. We little people blessed to have been his students wanted to know more, more, more of what he knew. We reaped the windfall of his passions and what we most learned was that we wanted to be like him. We said to ourselves, “What he has, what he is—give me some of that!” Flash forward 12 years to one of my undergraduate English professors, Alvin Rosenfeld, a specialist in Jewish studies who happened to be teaching, one year, a survey course in 20th-century American poetry that I was privileged to take. Straight-up lecture, a lot of it consisting of little more than his reading classic works aloud. But he read with such clarity, with such perfect rendering, that the obscure became plain, and out of his vast learning, he chose again and again to share just what we needed to know to make things click. Yes, I benefitted from those student-centric guides who facilitated my own work—my brilliant classical guitar professor Javier Calderon, my 11th-grade English teacher Mr. Long who discovered my writing and threw out his curriculum to nurture this. But to those other teachers I have enormous debts. There are many ways to be a good or great teacher, just as there are many ways to be an excellent musician or playwright. Ibsen is not Beckett is not Joseph Stein, who wrote the book for Fiddler. Joe Pass is not Paco de Lucia is not Julien Bream is not Yngwie Malmsteen. But all of these—masters.
Kill the standardized tests, which are invalid and suck up resources, especially in the English Language Arts. The standardized tests that purport to measure achievement are purest numerology. Those tests don’t measure much of what is important and don’t measure what they purport to measure at all validly. Anyone who takes them at all seriously is deeply deluded and hasn’t thought carefully, or at all, about the chasms between the sham, pseudoscientific tests and what they supposedly measure.
“Standardization is for nuts and bolts and the lower grades.”
Don’t mean to pick on you, Bob, but you need to disown the last part of that sentence from “and” on. There is nothing “standard” about the lower grades. I have a feeling I know what you meant–learning my numbers and letters–but there are probably thousands of primary teachers who would grit their teeth if they read your comment, including your fifth grade teacher.
Agreed. I meant this only in a relative sense, that there are some basics.
And thank you, speduktr, for that correction!!!! xoxoxoxo
“Those tests don’t measure much of what is important and don’t measure what they purport to measure at all validly.”
If I may reiterate/reuse my thoughts on that “measurement” that I have posted before but are still very relevant.
The most misleading concept/term in education is “measuring student achievement” or “measuring student learning”. The concept has been misleading educators into deluding themselves that the teaching and learning process can be analyzed/assessed using “scientific” methods which are actually pseudo-scientific at best and at worst a complete bastardization of rationo-logical thinking and language usage.
There never has been and never will be any “measuring” of the teaching and learning process and what each individual student learns in their schooling. There is and always has been assessing, evaluating, judging of what students learn but never a true “measuring” of it.
But, but, but, you’re trying to tell me that the supposedly august and venerable APA, AERA and/or the NCME have been wrong for more than the last 50 years, disseminating falsehoods and chimeras??
Who are you to question the authorities in testing???
Yes, they have been wrong and I (and many others, Wilson, Hoffman etc. . . ) question those authorities and challenge them (or any of you other advocates of the malpractices that are standards and testing) to answer to the following onto-epistemological analysis:
The TESTS MEASURE NOTHING, quite literally when you realize what is actually happening with them. Richard Phelps, a staunch standardized test proponent (he has written at least two books defending the standardized testing malpractices) in the introduction to “Correcting Fallacies About Educational and Psychological Testing” unwittingly lets the cat out of the bag with this statement:
“Physical tests, such as those conducted by engineers, can be standardized, of course [why of course of course], but in this volume , we focus on the measurement of latent (i.e., nonobservable) mental, and not physical, traits.” [my addition]
Notice how he is trying to assert by proximity that educational standardized testing and the testing done by engineers are basically the same, in other words a “truly scientific endeavor”. The same by proximity is not a good rhetorical/debating technique.
Since there is no agreement on a standard unit of learning, there is no exemplar of that standard unit and there is no measuring device calibrated against said non-existent standard unit, how is it possible to “measure the nonobservable”?
THE TESTS MEASURE NOTHING for how is it possible to “measure” the nonobservable with a non-existing measuring device that is not calibrated against a non-existing standard unit of learning?????
PURE LOGICAL INSANITY!
The basic fallacy of this is the confusing and conflating metrological (metrology is the scientific study of measurement) measuring and measuring that connotes assessing, evaluating and judging. The two meanings are not the same and confusing and conflating them is a very easy way to make it appear that standards and standardized testing are “scientific endeavors”-objective and not subjective like assessing, evaluating and judging.
Thase supposedly objective results are used to justify discrimination against many students for their life circumstances and inherent intellectual traits.
I agree, Duane, that the ELA tests (and many parts of the math tests) do not measure what they purport to measure, However, And, of course, there is no unit of measurement of learning IN GENERAL. But there certainly are specific units of measurement of learning for many tasks, and such tasks can be precisely measured. For example, consider a test of knowledge of the hiragana and katakana syllabaries in Japanese. For a test of this knowledge, the unit of measurement is number of hiragana and katakana the student knows (in each case, there are 46 of these (or 71, if you count forms with diacritics). Knowledge (or lack thereof) of these syllabaries can therefore be very precisely measured, using the term measurement quite precisely. The same sort of thing applies to measurement of, say, knowledge of the times table for some set of natural numbers, say 1-9, where the unit of measurement is the number of uniquely formed products that the student knows.
Sorry about the hasting typing of the comment above. Here, a correction of the opening:
I agree, Duane, that the ELA tests (and many parts of the math tests) do not and cannot measure what they purport to measure. And, of course, there is no such thing as a unit of measurement of learning IN GENERAL. However, it is certainly possible to establish precise measurements of some knowledge and of some learning. For example, consider a test of knowledge or learning of the hiragana and katakana syllabaries in Japanese. For a test of this. . . .
No, it is not possible “to establish precise measurements of some knowledge and of some learning.”
No, no, no!
What is possible is to assess, evaluate, judge “some knowledge and of some learning.”
Why do you feel a need to supposedly measure the teaching and learning process?
OK. Call it assessment.
You forgot the I’ll in front “call it assessment”.
❤
There should be a smiley face emoji after that comment! 🙂
Here’s ONE of the many actual problems with the supposed measurement of reading and writing by the state standardized tests of the Common Core and similar “standards”:
The tests are supposed to measure reading and writing ability by testing for proficiency in the “standards.” But they don’t validly do this. At Grades 9 and 10, for example, the Gates/Coleman bullet list of skills for ELA contains 80 standards (including progressive language standards from other grade levels), as well as breakdowns of some of the writing standards into sub-standards. A typical standardized bubble test in ELA will consist of about 30 multiple-choice questions and one or two short writing prompts. So, there are fewer test questions than there are standards, meaning that some of the standards are not tested, and those that are, are tested by 1 question. (When testing companies assign to writers the job of creating questions for these tests, the assignment is typically to create one or two questions for each in a list of standards). Now, here’s a problem: each of the “standards” is a statement of a very broad skill. Here’s a sample “standard”:
Consult general and specialized reference materials (e.g., dictionaries, glossaries, thesauruses), both print and digital, to find the pronunciation of a word or determine or clarify its precise meaning, its part of speech, or its etymology.
Now, imagine that you are a question writer for one of these tests. You get a list of 30 standards like the one you just read (a small portion of the standards for the grade level) and are told to write ONE question for each standard to test whether the student is GENERALLY PROFICIENT in the standard. Try this. I’m serious, literally, try doing this. Try writing ONE multiple-choice question that will validly test whether a student is proficient in this standard IN GENERAL. The one multiple-choice question will have to test the student’s ability IN GENERAL, to find word pronunciations, to determine word meanings, to clarify word meanings, to find the part of speech of words, to find the etymologies of words, and to do this in both digital and print media and in both general and specialized reference materials, including dictionaries, glossaries, and thesauruses. Obviously, no one multiple-choice question would be able to test for ability to do all this IN GENERAL. The question would be an invalid, woefully incomplete and random measure of one instance of one part of the general “skill.” And so it would be for each question for each “standard.” Of course, all this invalidity in the testing for proficiency in each “standard” can’t add up to overall validity, so, the tests do not even validly test for what they purport to test for. It’s as though I claimed to be able to test whether someone has the knowledge of French, of French culture, and of international law and diplomacy to be an excellent U.S. ambassador to France by asking him or her for a recipe for gougères.
About the Japanese syllabaries and times table examples: I misspoke slightly. The UNIT of measurement in a test of these is knowledge of one of the items. And these are easily tested. Show the kid the katakana character and ask him or her to name its sound, or name the sound and have the kid write the character. Have the kid perform the multiplications rapidly (without falling back on addition). 1 x 1 is 1, 1 x 2 is 2 . . . 9 x 9 is 81.
What you describe is not measuring. It is counting correct answers to then get, at least I suppose, a percentage correct “grade.” Counting is not the same a measuring.
There is a clear quantification of an amount that varies from one instantiation to the next, Duane. Measurement. Height in inches knowledge of katakana in number of katakana.
A clear quantification does not necessarily imply or mean measurement.
I do want to say, Duane, that I am extraordinarily pleased by your detailed attack on pseudoscientific numerology in Education Reform, on the perversion by these people of concepts like data and rigor and accountability. These grifting Deformers have sold the whole country on Procrustean beds.
Learn yourself
the difference between descriptive and procedural knowledge, between knowledge of what and knowledge of how (NB: Use of the word skills should be forever banned from EdSpeak. The term leads to insane levels of vagueness and puffery.) Understand that education is primarily about cultural transmission–the passing of knowledge from one generation to the next and that skills, if looked at carefully, turn out to be application of both kinds of knowledge. Otherwise, there is no “skill”; there is no there there.
the difference between acquisition (largely unconscious and automatic processes) and learning (largely conscious and directed processes) and ways to systematize and accelerate acquisition, consistent with how the brain is organized to carry out acquisition of different kinds, and, in particular, of vocabulary and syntax
the relative pedagogical value of diagnostic and formative assessment and lack of value of summative assessment
the usefulness of operationalizing instruction on concepts (turning them into concrete operations that can be carried out)
the importance of world knowledge and of syntactic competence and fluency to reading comprehension
the following facts about motivation: a) that extrinsic punishment and reward are DEMOTIVATING for cognitive tasks and b) that our goal must be to develop intrinsic motivation that will produce self-directed, life-long learners.
These are wonderful suggestions designed to guide legislators understand the issues and the consequences of their actions in education. I wish elected representatives would embrace this level of “due diligence.” Too many politicians do not speak from the brain or the heart, but from another part of the anatomy without understanding anything while still having an unwavering opinion. In the current polarized political climate too many elected representatives are a closed circuit operating in a closed mind. Most politicians are not seeking a guide, their opinions are shaped by ideology or the amount of money they can get in their war chest. If we want thinking representatives that care about issues, we have to get the money out of politics.
I wish elected representatives would embrace this level of “due diligence.”
Amen
I really appreciated the way Nancy spoke to the legislator audience in plain, easy to follow, every day English. No “educationese.” It would be very hard to attack her for speaking down to them from a pedagogical pedestal. Nothing there for them to sputter over.
Yes. As I clearly didn’t, above. Nancy has a gift there.
The suggestions are spot-on. I only wish that representatives represented the interests of those they supposedly represent. It is difficult for the public to get honest representation when billionaires and corporations are waving so much money at politicians.
Wonderful list… if additions are welcomed…
Talk with students – Listen to students
Trust teachers
Substitute teach in the middle of a pandemic where the AG is suing schools for enforcing mask mandates
Every complaint is important, but dig to see how wide spread or not it really is
Shut down hate and incivility
When confronted on burning a book, ask if they’ve read it; when confronted with there is xyz everywhere in our schools, ask for the data….
#9 is spot on. Would add to the “Old fashioned way”, that financial and resource support for University Colleges of Education to do this is critical.
“#1. You don’t know education just because you went to school.
Even if you were paying attention in high school, your perspective as a student was extremely narrow and is now obsolete. Study the issues, which are more complex and resistant to change than you think. Here’s a brief list of things that, in my experience, legislators don’t know diddly about:
A cooperative classroom and how to achieve it
Formative assessment
Effect of class size on daily practice (not test scores)
Difference between standards and curriculum
Special education
Research-based value of recess and exercise
Differentiation vs. tracking
What quality teaching looks like in practice
The fact that ALL learning is socially constructed.”
The difference between standards and curriculum is the most important of all of listed.
Who can be against “standards for learning”?
I can and am. How/why?
Because those standards and the process used to come up with them are completely bogus. I discuss the problems with them in Ch. 6 “Of Standards and Measurement” of my book “Infidelity to Truth: Education Malpractice in American Public”.
Chapter 6
Of Standards and Measurement
Truth is not only violated by falsehood; it may be equally outraged by silence. Henri Frederic Amiel
Amen!!!
The word standard is in the top 1000 most used words in American English1 and the Miriam Webster online dictionary gives the following definitions2:
Standard
1: a conspicuous object (as in a banner) formerly carried at the top of a pole and used to mark a rallying point especially in battle or to serve as an emblem
2a: a long narrow tapering flag that is personal to an individual or corporation and bears heraldic devices b: the personal flag of the head of state or of a member of a royal family c: an organization flag carried by a mounted or motorized military unit d: banner
3: something established by authority, custom, or general consent as a model or example: criterion <quite slow by today’s standards>
4: something set up and established by authority as a rule for the measure of a quantity, weight, extent, value, or quality
5a: the fineness and legally fixed weight of the metal used in coins b: the basis of value in a monetary system
6: a structure built for or serving as a base of support
7a: a shrub or herb grown with an erect main stem so that it forms or resembles a tree b: a fruit tree grafted on the stock that does not induce dwarfing
8a: the large odd upper petal of a papilionaceous flower (as of the pea) b. one of the three inner usually erect and incurved petals of an iris
9: a musical composition (as a song) that has become a part of the standard repertoire
For the purposes of this discussion, obviously definitions 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 do not concern us. It is the somewhat similar and perhaps inter-confusing definitions of 3 and 4 that interest us.
As mentioned above before NCLB the definition of standard as used in the individual state’s curriculum standards and even today in curriculum standards promulgated and promoted by subject area organizations such as the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics or the American Council of Teachers of Foreign Languages the term standard as used fell/falls under definition three as they were never meant to be used as “a rule for the measure of a quantity, weight, extent, value, or quality” as in definition four but as a model for teachers to use. Confusing indeed!
Another way to look at the concept of standards is that there are two accepted types of standards, metrological and documentary.
Metrology is the science of measurement and a metrological standard “is an object, system, or experiment that bears a defined relationship to a unit of measurement of a physical quantity. Standards are the fundamental reference for a system of weights and measures, against which all other measuring devices are compared. Measurements are defined in relationship to internationally-standardized reference objects, which are used under carefully controlled laboratory conditions to define the units of length, mass, electrical potential, and other physical quantities.”3
A documentary standard “is a document established by consensus and approved by a recognized body, that provides, for common and repeated use, rules, guidelines or characteristics for activities or their results, aimed at the achievement of the optimum degree of order in a given context.”4
Many governmental departments promulgate documentary standards, for example the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or the Environmental Protection Agencies (EPA) while at the same time being the certifying agent to ensure that the standards are followed. The ISO1 promulgates international standards but is not the certifying agency, other agencies do the certifying of companies compliance with their standards. From the EPA:
“When developing regulations, the first thing we do is ask if a regulation is needed at all. Every regulation is developed under slightly different circumstances but this is the general process:
Step 1: EPA Proposes a Regulation
The agency researches the issues and, if necessary, proposes a regulation, also known as a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM). The proposal is listed in the Federal Register (FR) so that members of the public can consider it and send their comments to us. The proposed rule and supporting documents are also filed in EPA’s official docket on Regulations.gov
Step 2: EPA Considers Your Comments and Issues a Final Rule
Generally, once we consider the comments received when the proposed regulation was issued, we revise the regulations accordingly and issue a final rule. This final rule is also published in the FR and in EPA’s official docket on Regulations.gov.
Step 3: The Regulation is Codified in the Code of Federal Regulations
Once a regulation is completed and has been printed in the FR as a final rule, it is codified when it is added to the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). The CFR is the official record of all regulations created by the federal government. . . . “2
The ISO has strict rules for making and issuing standards. The key principles in standard(s) development:
1. ISO standards respond to a need in the market.
ISO does not decide when to develop a new standard, but responds to a request from industry or other stakeholders such as consumer groups. Typically, an industry sector or group communicates the need for a standard to its national member who then contacts ISO.
2. ISO standards are based on global expert opinion.
ISO standards are developed by groups of experts from all over the world that are part of larger groups called technical committees. These experts negotiate all aspects of the standard, including its scope, key definitions and content.
ISO standards are developed through a multi-stakeholder process.
The technical committees are made up of experts from the relevant industry, but also from consumer associations, academia, NGOs and government.
ISO standards are based on a consensus
Developing ISO standards is a consensus-based approach and comments from all stakeholders are taken into account.3
The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and all other state educational standards might be considered a documentary standard but in the development of the standards no procedures have followed the formal protocol and processes as outlined by the OSI or government agencies in their development.4
In addition to that and perhaps even worse is that the proponents of these standards claim that the CCSS are standards against which ‘student achievement’ can be measured. In doing so educational standards proponents claim the documentary standard (definition three) as a metrological standard (definition four). In doing so they are falsely claiming a meaning of standard that should not be given credence5.
This confusion is compounded by what it means to measure something and the similar misuse of the meaning of the word measure by the proponents of the standards and testing regime. Assessment and evaluation perhaps can be used interchangeably but assessment and evaluation are not the same as measurement. Word usage matters!
The Merriam-Webster dictionary definition1 of measure includes the following:
1a (1): an adequate or due portion (2): a moderate degree; also: moderation, temperance (3): A fixed or suitable limit: bounds b: the dimensions, capacity or amount of something ascertained by measuring c: an estimate of whit is to be expected (as of a person or situation d: (1): a measured quantity (2): amount, degree
2a: an instrument or utensil for measuring b (1): a standard or unit of measurement—see weight table (2): A system of standard units of measure
3: the act or process of measuring
4a (1): melody, tune (2): dance; especially: a slow and stately dance b: rhythmic structure or movement: cadence: as (1): poetic rhythm measured by temporal quantity or accent; specifically: meter (2): musical time c (1): a grouping of a specified number of musical beats located between two consecutive vertical lines on a staff (2): a metrical unit: foot
5: an exact divisor of a number
6: a basis or standard of comparison <wealth is not a measure of happiness
7: a step planned or taken as a means to an end; specifically: a proposed legislative act
Measure as commonly used in educational standard and measurement discourse comes under definitions 1d, 2, and 3, the rest not being pertinent other than to be used as an obfuscating meaning to cover for the fact that, indeed, there is no true measuring against a standard whatsoever in the educational standards and standardized testing regimes and even in the grading of students. What we are left with in this bastardization of the English language is a bewildering befuddle of confusion that can only serve to deceive many into buying into intellectually bankrupt schemes that invalidly sort, rate and rank students resulting in blatant discrimination with some students rewarded and others punished by various means such as denying opportunities to advance, to not being able to take courses or enroll in desired programs of study.
The most misleading concept/term in education is “measuring student achievement” or “measuring student learning”. The concept has been misleading educators into deluding themselves and others that the teaching and learning process can be analyzed/assessed using “scientific” methods which are actually pseudo-scientific at best and at worst a complete bastardization of rationo-logical thinking and language usage.
There never has been and never will be any “measuring” of the teaching and learning process and what each individual student learns in their schooling. There is and always has been assessing, evaluating, judging of what students learn but never a true “measuring” of it.
The TESTS MEASURE NOTHING, quite literally when you realize what is actually happening with them. Richard Phelps, a staunch standardized test proponent (he has written at least two books defending the standardized testing malpractices) in the introduction to “Correcting Fallacies About Educational and Psychological Testing” unwittingly lets the cat out of the bag with this statement:
“Physical tests, such as those conducted by engineers, can be standardized, of course, but in this volume, we focus on the measurement of latent (i.e., nonobservable) mental, and not physical, traits.”
Notice how he is trying to assert by proximity that educational standardized testing and the testing done by engineers are basically the same, in other words a “truly scientific endeavor”. The same by proximity is not a good rhetorical/debating technique.
Since there is no agreement on a standard unit of learning, there is no exemplar of that standard unit and there is no measuring device calibrated against said non-existent standard unit, how is it possible to “measure the nonobservable”?
PURE LOGICAL INSANITY!
Finally, what the proponents of the educational standards and standardized testing regime don’t appear to understand is that in many areas of human interactions and feelings there cannot be any measurement. How does one measure the love of one’s spouse, children, parents or friends? How does one measure what is going on in the heart and mind of a distressed person who has just lost a loved one? Why do we even begin to think that we can measure what goes on in the body and brain of the student who is learning any subject matter considering all the various hormonal and endocrinal influences occurring outside the individual’s control, with the hundreds of millions if not billions of neuronal firings going on at any given moment that partially influence what happens in the mind of the student in a teaching and learning situation? How do we believe that the thousands and thousands of environmental influences on each individual could begin to be measured and accounted for? Are proponents of the educational standards and standardized testing “measurement” regime that arrogant, hubristic and presumptuous to believe that they hold the key to supposedly measuring the teaching and learning process or more specifically, the learning, aka, student achievement, of an individual student?
Considering the facts of the misuse of language, logic and common sense as outlined above, the only wise course of action is to immediately cease and desist, to abandon, those malpractices that harm so many students and contravene the state’s responsibility in providing a public education for all students. The billions of dollars spent by states on the educational standards and standardize testing regime would then be freed up to provide a better education for all students through perhaps such things1 as smaller class sizes, needed social services, foreign language instruction, arts programs, etc. And the state, by approving and mandating the fake standards and false measuring of student learning that are the malpractices2 of educational standards and standardized testing, by not adhering to a regimen of fidelity to truth is surely guilty of not promoting “the welfare of the individual so that each person may savor the right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and the fruits of their own industry.”
Sorry, but the footnotes did not come through on these pastings.
I suspect that the standards and testing movement in the U.S. is Bill Gates’s autism spectrum disorder writ large.
The thing that I can’t get past, Duane, is how many educators bought into this nonsense. One might expect the politicians to be ignorant of these matters, but educators? Heads of teachers’ unions?
The Common [sic] Core [sic] in ELA is a list of vague “skills.” It leaves out almost all content, despite making lip service to this in the text surrounding these “standards.” The skills are described so vaguely as not to be validly testable, and since the tests are what matters for VAM, school grading, merit pay, blah, blah, blah, the curricula and pedagogy have devolved to be prep to answer questions on these “standards.” All coherence and emphasis on acquired KNOWLEDGE is gone, just about. The print and digital texts based on these “standards” are an unholy mess. Years of the standards-and-testing occupation of our schools has led absolutely no improvement in outcomes by the Deformers’ own preferred “measure,” scores on state tests, and to no closing of gaps.
And despite all this failure, there seems to be no progress toward throwing off all this costly and curriculum-and-pedagogy debasing nonsense.
The real shock to me is that English teachers didn’t rise up in outrage when these “standards” were first promulgated. That is really, really shocking.
And the teachers’ unions could end the federal standardized testing mandate tomorrow, if they cared to, by taking this to the streets. Until they do that, they are complicit in child abuse. I mean that quite literally. They are child abusers.
Here’s the key problem, what journalists who write about this stuff and politicians who legislate about it don’t understand:
They think that all this is quite simple. You make a list of what kids need to be able to know and do (standards), and then you test to see if they know and can do those things (assessment). They think that the standards are a good or even great list of what kids need to be able to know and to do and that the testing is valid assessment of those things. But NEITHER IS TRUE. Both assumptions are demonstrably false for a great many reasons, some straightforward and some complex. But those reasons cannot be explained in a sound bite.
And the journalists and politicians never stop to ask themselves about those matters. They simply report the test scores and pontificate about how we need to get tougher on these teachers and schools. And they don’t understand that they don’t understand why the standards and tests are execrable. It’s a matter of what are for them unknown unknowns. They don’t know what they don’t know, and they don’t know that what they don’t know is what matters here.
And even after decades of failure of standards-based testing, they still haven’t bothered to start asking questions. It’s too much work for them to learn why the standards and the tests are execrable and don’t work as they are supposed to work.
Here’s a primer for journalists and politiicans on the testing and the standards:
Yes, it is child abuse!