Archives for category: Common Core
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A Report on the Assessments

By dianeravitch
April 14, 2015 //
44

A letter from a teacher:

“Two of the students that I tutor called me up to give me feedback about the tests. One student is an honors student in the 6th grade in a middle school. He is a high achiever from a professional family. He was so upset that his voice was breaking up on the phone. He described a poem that he did not comprehend at all. He stated that the vocabulary was so difficult and that he never encountered most of the words that were used in this poem.

I asked if at the bottom of the poem some of the meanings were footnoted. He said no.

He then said that at the end of the assessment, his English teacher looked at the poem and said to the class that she did not really understand the poem herself . In addition, there was another nonfiction passage that he had to read twice to get any meaning from. As a result, he was unable to complete all the questions for this passage by the end of the assessment.

My second student is a 8th grade student who goes to a middle school in Queens. He has second language issues that have caused many gaps in his vocabulary. He said that he had to read many of the passages twice and could not finish the test. He said that the passages on the assessment were harder than the passages I gave to him. The readability of the practice passages I gave to him were mostly on the 10th grade level. Most of the material I used came from two well known publishers. Both these publishers claimed that their material supposedly mimic the difficulty level of the assessment. I guess not.

More important is the fact that this is a boy whose parents have very high expectations which have caused him to have issues in self-concept. After this assessment, his self-concept is in the garbage. His parents were always opposed to opting out because of their cultural background. His mother came on the phone and is now considering opting her son out from the rest of the assessment.

What I am hearing is nothing less than criminal. Forget about the fact that it appears that these passages and questions are so hard that teachers cannot comprehend them. Also forget about how these tests are being used against us teachers.

It is more important that these assessments represent, in my mind, child abuse. What is the purpose of destroying children that try so hard. Both of these students are boys who want to please their parents. their teachers and me. They now feel like failures. No child should ever be made to feel this way. I even feel like a failure because I worked so hard with these two boys. At least I understand that it is not me. It is the tests. There is no doubt that the purpose of these tests is to create failure. They were never intended to measure learning.

Categories Common Core, Testing

The Utter Uselessness of the Common Core Tests: Opt Out

By dianeravitch
April 14, 2015 //
64

Parents are told that their children should take the new online Common Core tests because doing so will help their children.

 

The president of the State University of Néw York said students should not opt out:

 

“When it comes to whether students should opt out of standardized testing, no one is actually talking about what’s best for our kids. Standardized tests have become a pawn in political debates about teacher evaluations and we have lost sight of what they are: a way to measure what students know so we can help them improve,” President Nancy Zimpher wrote.”

 

Advocates and defenders of the tests assert that parents and teachers will learn about how the children are progressing, and teachers will be able to use this information to tailor instruction to meet the needs of individual children.

 

None of this is true. The information provided by the tests is worthless. It is a score. It offers no information about how to help students improve. It gives a score and a ranking compared to others in the state.

 

There is nothing individual in each student’s report. The teacher can’t see what the student got right or wrong. The teacher and parent learn nothing except the student’s score.

 

A test is valuable to the extent it is diagnostic. If a test is diagnostic, it identifies strengths and weaknesses so the teacher can help children do better. This report is not diagnostic. It says nothing of importance.

 

This is akin to going to a doctor with a painful stomach ache. He gives you tests, then says he will get back to you in four months. When you see him again in four months, he tells you a score, and he compares you to other patients with similar symptoms, but he has no prescription, no advice about how to feel better. Why would you want to know that you are better or worse than others with similar symptoms? Wouldn’t you prefer to have treatment?

 

Knowing that the test consume a large part of the school year, knowing that they are designed to fail most kids because of their absurdly high passing mark, knowing that the tests have no diagnostic value, the best decision for parents is to opt out of the testing. Send a message to the state capitol and to D.C.

Categories Common Core, Education Reform, Opt Out, Testing

Peter Greene Watched Chris Hayes Interview Arne Duncan

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
20

Chris Hayes interviewed Arne Duncan and Peter Greene reports on what happened.

You can imagine Arne artfully dodging and weaving when Chris asked straightforward questions. Arne insists that Common Core is confused with the unpopular tests (that Arne funded). Arne suggests that politicians are upset by Common Core but Real Parents welcome it.

“Hayes: I want to talk about Common Core for a second. (And he smiles a little smile, like “let’s do this silly thing, I’m going to ask a question, you’re going to sling baloney, it’ll be fun”). Are you surprised by how controversial Common Core (which he characterizes as “kind of an obscure issue in certain ways”) has become?

“Duncan: “It’s actually very simple. The goal’s to have high standards.” So, kids, the whole national consistency issue, the whole being able to compare kids in Idaho and Maine, the whole keeping everyone on the same page so mobile students will never get lost– that’s no longer the point.

“Duncan goes on to display how much he doesn’t understand about how this works. He talks about how, under NCLB, too many states dummied down standards. He says this was “to make politicians look good.” I’d be more inclined to say “to avoid punitive consequences for their schools.” If Arne had reached my conclusion (and really, given that he was in charge of a large school district at the time, it’s kind of amazing that he didn’t reach my conclusion) then perhaps he wouldn’t have figured that the solution was to make the consequences of high stakes testing even more punitive than before.

“Insert story here of how schools lied to students about how ready they were for college. So brave governors decided to stop lying to children. “Let’s have true college and career ready standards for every single child.” As always I wonder why reaching that conclusion leads to a next step where one says, “Let’s hire a couple of guys who have no real education experience, either pedagogical or developmental, and have them whip something up.”

As Greene shows, this is vintage Arne. Adroitly changing the subject, mouthing high-minded platitudes, never accepting that parents have valid reasons to be upset by the administration’s unvarnished support for high-stakes testing, closing schools, and inviting entrepreneurs to cash in on the educationmarket. NCLB went wrong, he admits, but he never acknowledges that Race to the Top was no different philosophically from NCLB and far worse in actuality when judged by the whipping it has given to schools and educators.

Categories Common Core, Duncan, Arne, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), Race to the Top

My Conversation with a Success Academy Charter Teacher

By dianeravitch
April 7, 2015 //
76

I have sometimes wished it were possible to have a completely candid conversation with a teacher at a Success Academy charter school. Last week, with no advance planning, it happened.*

 

A young man who is related to me asked if he could introduce me to his friend, Ms. Smith (a pseudonym). He told me she teaches at Success and wanted to meet me. I said, “Of course.”

 

I had no idea what the evening had in store. I have talked to SA teachers before, always in public, not in the privacy of home, and they were always pleasant, neither boastful nor defensive.

 

When they arrived, I opened a bottle of white wine and broke open a box of macaroons. “Betty” (that’s not her name either) told me that she had worked at SA for five years. She teaches fifth grade.

 

What is it like, I asked.

 

She said she loves the children, but the atmosphere is stifling for both teachers and children. She is looking for another job. Everything is about test scores, and the competitive pressure never lets up. Right now, they are getting ready for the state exams, and signs posted everywhere say “Slam the Exams!”

 

I asked how long the test prep went on, and she said they have been doing test prep for months. She said the kids would not take spring vacation until the exams were finished.

 

What’s so bad about test prep, I asked her. She said some of the kids explode or break down. They are very young, and the pressure gets to be too much for them. They might start screaming or crying, and they have to be removed from the classroom until they calm down. The children are assigned a color depending on their test scores, and every classroom posts the names of the children and their color–red, green, blue, or yellow. I forget which is best and which is worst, but the goal is to shame the lowest performing students so they try harder to move up into the next level.

 

The test prep plus the ” no-excuses” climate of tough and strictly enforced rules unnerves some children, she said. And she felt badly for the children who were humiliated. The harshly competitive environment, she said, was dispiriting and joyless.

 

What happens with the children who can’t adjust to the highly disciplined demands of the school, I asked. She replied that these children might be suspended repeatedly or their parents or guardian might be called to the school every day. Day after day. Eventually, the child’s parent or guardian will withdraw the child because they can’t afford to miss work every day.

 

She realized she had had enough. The money was good, she said, but the stress was exhausting. She was also troubled by the non-stop political propaganda campaign. This year, she didn’t get on the bus with thousands of others to go to Albany and demand more money so the chain could expand. She didn’t like the way the children, parents, and teachers were being used as political pawns.

 

When I told her that none of the eighth grade students who had attended Success Academy had passed the competitive exams to enter the elite high schools of NYC, either last year or this year, she was momentarily surprised. Then, she said, that explains why Success Academy is opening its own high school.

 

Our conversation continued for more than a hour. It was clear that the scales had fallen from her eyes. She felt certain that the hedge fund managers bankrolling SA charters know nothing about the children, nor do they care about them. They want to win. They want high scores, period. Just like Wall Street. They want to be able to say at cocktail parties and dinner parties that “my school” got higher test scores than “your school.”

 

Why have you stayed this long, I asked her. I love the kids, she replied. She said someday she hopes to work for a nonprofit that won’t require her to sacrifice her ethics and principles.

 

*I thought this story was a real scoop, but then Kate Taylor of the New York Times beat me to it with this story.

Categories Charter Schools, Common Core, Harlem Success Academy, New York City, Teachers

Montclair, New Jersey: 42.6% of Students Opt Out of PARCC Testing

By dianeravitch
April 6, 2015 //
45

The final figures for opt outs were released in Montclair, New Jersey. 42.6% of students did not take the PARCC test.

 

That is quite a protest against Common Core and high-stakes testing, against the Bush-Obama agenda.

 

The opt-out totals were most pronounced at Montclair High School, where 68 percent of students refused to take the test. In contrast, at the low end of the scale, only 7.5 percent of students at Watchung Elementary School chose to opt-out of the PARCC.

 

 

Categories Common Core, New Jersey, Opt Out, Resistance, Testing

Can Your 3rd Grader Read 300 Words a Minute?

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2015 //
38

Kevin Glynn, who blogs as Lace to the Top, teaches elementary school. In this post, he describes the extraordinary demands of the third grade Common Core in Néw York.

“Can your 8 year old read 300 words per minute? Mine can’t. In fact, I don’t know anyone who can. Yet, that is exactly what Common Core state tests require.

“In looking through samples of Common Core state tests on engageNY for third graders, I find myself once again puzzled by what they are asking our children to do.

“The typical Common Core passage is 600 words in length. During the first day, (of a 3 day test) students are required to read a minimum of 5 passages and answer 30 questions. Students have 70 minutes to complete day one of the test.

“If a student spends only 1 minute reading and analyzing each of the 30 questions, they will have to read passages that are 2-3 years above grade level at a pace of 75 words per minute. Some would argue that is not too difficult a task and at first glance, I might agree.”

He then demonstrates the absurd expectations that guarantee most children will fail.

Categories Common Core, Testing

This Is Genius! Listen to This Student

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2015 //
6

This is a video of a spoken word poem by student Ryan Lotocki. It is genius. In fact, the poem is titled “This Is Genius,” and it shows all the different ways that students excel. Not just on a standardized test, but in living good lives that engage their interests and passions.

 

Can we show this to a joint meeting of Congress, or at least to the committees now rewriting No Child Left Behind? Or how about our state legislatures, who assume the power to decide that teachers by the test scores of their students?

 

Students have power. They are the primary victims of the disruption and distorted values that NCLB and Race to the Top and uninformed politicians have made of our education system.

Categories Accountability, Common Core, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), Race to the Top, Students, Testing

Peter Greene on the Demolition of Education in Arizona

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2015 //
22

Peter Greene read an opinion piece defending Common Core in a major newspaper in Arizona. With a bit of googling, he discovered that the writer–Rebecca Hipps– lives in Washington, D.C., and works for an organization that sells Common Core teaching materials. What surprised him even more was that with the author’s concern for the state of public education, she said nothing about the punishing budget cuts that have decimated its schools (as well as higher education, which Governor Doug Ducey seems to want to get rid of along with public schools). Greene calls his post “Razing Arizona,” which is a clever pun on the name of a popular movie called “Raising Arizona,” by the Coen brothers.

 

He writes:

 

Arizona has cut public ed spending steadily since the late oughts, and they rank 50th in college per-student spending. It’s a wonder that Hipps did not bring this up, as it would seem that Arizona is a poster child for spending bottom dollar on education and getting bottom dollar results.

 

Greene points out that legislators are responding to public criticism by making it illegal for educators to engage in public discussion or debates:

 

At least Hipps is able to speak out at all. Arizona’s teachers, superintendents, principals and school board members have spoke up about the slash and burn methods of their state leaders, and the state leader response has been to float a law that will require them to shut up.

Arizona lawmakers have attached an amendment to Senate Bill 1172. It prohibits “an employee of a school district or charter school, acting on the district’s or charter school’s behalf, from distributing electronic materials to influence the outcome of an election or to advocate support for or opposition to pending or proposed legislation.”

 

On the one hand, it’s a good idea that Mrs. O’Teacher not give her class an hour of self-directed worksheets while she stuffs envelopes for the new ballot initiative. On the other hand, there’s that whole First Amendment thing. And the law is so broadly worded that I imagine a citizen asking a school district employee, “I’m really worried about the new proposed law cutting all money to public schools. Will that hurt our programs here,” and said school employee must reply, by law, “I cannot share any information about that with you.” Other critics of the bill fear that it would even prohibit any discussion of educational programs that directly affect children with those children’s parents.

 

And while I’m not concerned, exactly, I am curious– would this law also prohibit charter schools from advertising?

 

The law is clearly one more attempt to push educators out of the political world. No more informational letters to parents and voters. No more taking a public stand against assaults on school funding by the governor and legislators. Presumably no teacher or administrator in Arizona could write a response to Hipps’ op-ed– at least not with any indication that they were writing their response from the perspective of a public educator.

 

In their wisdom, legislators have decided that the biggest problem of public schools is not the lack of funding, but the surplus of discussion of their funding. Best to shut up the educators.

 

 

Categories Accountability, Arizona, Budget Cuts, Common Core, Education Industry, Funding

Magee Urges Opt Out, State Chancellor Tisch Accuses Her of Protecting Adults, not Children

By dianeravitch
March 31, 2015 //
25

The head of New York State United Teachers (NYSUT), Karen Magee, spoke bluntly in favor of a boycott of the state tests.

The chair of the State Board of Regents, Merryl Tisch, blasted back at Magee and accused her of protecting adults, not children. Of course, this is a favorite meme of the “reform” movement, that anyone who cares about teachers is ipso facto acting in opposition to the interests of children. Michelle Rhee called her group “StudentsFirst,” implying that those who teach children never put children first. Hedge fund managers put children first, not the people who teach them every day for about the same amount of money in a year that the typical hedge fund manager makes in a week. No one has ever explained how education will get better if no one wants to teach because of disrespect, poor working conditions and demoralization.

According to the article:

“I would urge parents at this point in time to opt out of testing,” Karen Magee of the New York State United Teachers said in an appearance on upstate public radio’s “The Capitol Pressroom.”

“They’re not valid indicators of student progress,” she added.

State Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch shot back that the tests “provide an important source of objective information.”

“It’s time to stop making noise to protect the adults and start speaking up for the students,” Tisch said.

Parents are leading the test boycott and opt out movement, not teachers and not their unions. Parents, we may safely assume, care more about their children than state officials do.

Parents get it. They see their children stressed out by constant testing. Their children bear the burden of knowing that their performance may cause their teacher to be fired. That’s a heavy burden. Parents understand that tests don’t teach children. Teachers teach children. Without teachers, there is no instruction.

Categories Common Core, New York, Teachers, Testing

Some Huge Flaws in Common Core Testing

By dianeravitch
March 31, 2015 //
48

Testing has begun in some states and will continue through April on the Common Core standards. Students in grades 3-8 and 11 will take either the PARCC or the SBA tests. The tests cover a full year of instruction aligned with the standards. But students have not had a full year of instruction in March! There are still another 3-4 months of schooling.

 

Typically, the testing will consume anywhere from eight to eleven hours. Most students will be tested longer than it takes to sit for the state bar exam. These are not the tests that we (the adults) took when we were in school. For most of us, our teachers tested us, sometimes weekly, sometimes at the end of the semester, but never for more than 45 or 50 minutes.

 

States can expect a big decline in proficiency rates. This may be due to the fact that the tests are given long before the students have “covered” the standards for the year. It is certainly due to the fact that the tests adopted very high cut scores (passing marks). For whatever reason, the testing consortia decided that their cut scores would be the same as the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Thus, “proficiency” would be set as high as NAEP proficiency. Understand that NAEP proficiency is not a pass-fail mark; it represents a high level of achievement. In only one state–Massachusetts–have as many as half the students reached NAEP proficiency. In most states, no more than 30-35% of students attain NAEP proficiency.

 

What does that mean for the scores? It means that most states can expect a majority of students to “fail” the Common Core tests. These results will be used by “reformers” to trumpet the “failure” of public education. This is ridiculous. If a teacher gave a test, and most of his/her students failed, we would say that the teacher set the passing mark too high or did not teach what she tested.

 

What should we say about tests that are purposely designed to fail most students? This is a failure, not of the students, but of the test-makers and politicians who commissioned the tests and chose a passing mark that was out of reach.

 

Even more peculiar is that test results are not returned until August, in some places later. The student has a different teacher. Worse, the teacher can’t see what each student got wrong. She can’t give students instruction tailored to their needs because the tests tell her nothing except a score. The teacher knows how Maria compares to other children in her grade across the state and nation, but she doesn’t have any new information about what Maria knows and doesn’t know. The test has no diagnostic value. If a test has no diagnostic value, it has no value.

Categories Common Core, Testing
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