The Providence Student Union is a creative, energetic group. They are also very smart, and they figured out that it was wrong to use a standardized test as a graduation requirement.
PSU has created a series of fabulous demonstrations, and this guinea pig protest at the Rhode Island statehouse was one of their best.
These kids have convinced me that this younger generation is far smarter and wiser than previous generations. We should stop pushing them around and encourage their creativity.
I have posted about an accidental exchange between teacher John Ogozolek and Professor Laurence Steinberg, and it continued here.
And here is more of the exchange, posted as comments on the blog:
Laurence Steinberg writes:
“I’m the author of the Slate column Diane has critiqued. I think my argument is being mischaracterized both by her and some others.
“The object of my criticism is our schools, not our kids. Nowhere did I say that American teenagers are lazy. What I said is that they aren’t being challenged. That’s very different. As to the claim that the NAEP data aren’t to be believed, I’m willing to buy that, in part. But the data on the high proportion of high school grads who require remedial education in order to handle college, as well as the high proportion who drop out (often, for non-financial reasons, studies say) aren’t made up. And they drain our education budget. Plus, in addition to the NAEP, there are other sources of information that paint a similar picture, including PISA and TIMMS, as well as surveys conducted by Public Agenda and studies by Tom Loveless, John Bishop, and me (all of whom Diane used to commend). (Contrary to what many people think, other PISA participating countries are required to test the full range of students, not just their college-bound ones).
“And as to the anecdotes, that’s exactly what they are. It’s like denying that there’s an obesity epidemic because one knows a couple of thin people, or that there is climate change because it’s been a rough winter in the Northeast and Midwest. Of course there are good teachers, good schools, and good students in the United States. But when 85 percent of American students say they’ve never taken a very difficult class, and when two thirds of American students say school is boring, there clearly is a problem. To pretend otherwise is just plain wrong.
Laurence Steinberg
Professor of Psychology
Temple University”
John Ogozalek writes:
“Many years ago (25+) Dr. Steinberg wrote an op-ed piece for the Times comparing attitudes towards schooling in the U.S. versus cultural differences in Japan.. It was a fascinating article and I used the piece for years because my students were invariably insulted by what Dr. Steinberg wrote and it provoked great classroom discussions. (In fact, I used the article when I went for a job interview back in 1993. The upscale suburban school where I was interviewing wanted me to teach a sample class. That Dr. Steinberg lesson was so good that the principal offered me the job right on the spot. Thanks, Doc! Though, I decided not to take that job and ended up staying at my small, rural school, a decision I’ve never regretted.)
“The first time I used that op-ed piece my kids were so interested that I had them write letters to Dr. Steinberg. This was all prior to the advent of e-mail, blogging, and twitter. We’re talking the last century. And, the good doctor very generously replied in writing, making a point very similar to his comments above -that, yes, data does matter. I really appreciated Dr. Steinberg’s willingness to correspond with my class way back then and I vividly remember reading his comments verbatim and using his letter again and again to teach my kids about how social sciences work. Great.
“But then I picked up a copy of Dr. Steinberg’s 1996 book…”Beyond the Classroom” which expanded on that original Times op-ed piece. And, damn, there was my class -my students!- mentioned in a not so nice way.
“The kids had written letters that, in hindsight, I should have had them revise more and proofread. That was my mistake, my sloppiness -a lesson I learned as a new teacher many years ago. But, boy, the reference to my students in that book was sort of nasty and, if I remember right, kind of factually off base, also. Wow. Had Dr. Steinberg been a bit sloppy, too? I remember being pretty mad. I was hurt because our original correspondence had been so positive and friendly. And, these were great kids! But there we were, amid the ocean of data in that book… one of the few islands of real life people.
“I remember writing Dr. Steinberg repeated letters after that book came out hoping he’d revise later editions of his work. I think I had some of the kids write, too. But then I bought another copy and nothing about my class seemed to be changed. I kept writing Dr. Steinberg so much about the book that, if I remember correctly, he eventually threatened to TELL MY PRINCIPAL ON ME! (Which is still really funny because as union president I was such a pain in the ass to my principal back then that when I went to tell him he might be getting a call from a professor down at Temple University, he just sort of shook his head and said nothing. What next!)
“My wonderful wife remembers all the details of the “Dr. Steinberg affair” much better than me, God bless her. We were talking about it yesterday after Diane posted that great piece based on my original letter to her.
“For years, I kept my copies of Beyond the Classroom really WAY beyond my classroom, stored in a derelict farmhouse we have down the road on the family property. But then, we had to clean out that building and the books and most of the other stuff associated with the “Steinberg Affair” got chucked into a trash truck. Actually wheelbarowed in by one of the students I’d hired to help out. How’s that for irony? Sorry, doc.
“I had to move on. I have so many students I need to worry about every day…kids I care about. I barely have enough time to talk to all the wonderful people I see each morning….kids who are happy or scared or bored or just plain missing from my classroom….where are they? The only reason I have time to be writing this right now is that we have yet another snow day off….otherwise I’d be sitting in my classroom at this moment….6:30 a.m…getting ready for another day.
“I can actually laugh about my much younger self, the great and scary times I had as a beginning teacher and the way the world was back then prior to the internet. But here we are, Dr. Steinberg, still on opposite sides of the same divide.
“Data does matter but we’re not just numbers. We’re people and this system is dehumanizing us.
“To that end, Larry, I really would like to bury the hatchet from years ago. I’m sure you’re a fascinating, intelligent, great guy to talk to. I WOULD buy you lunch.
“But Diane Ravitch, as I wrote to her yesterday, deserves dinner at the best restaurant in town!
“Be well.
-John O.”
Michael Weston reports that Hillsborough County is field testing the PARCC tests, despite previous declarations by the Governor that PARCC was not wanted.
According to Weston, the local superintendent has never seen a test she didn’t love. She insists that teachers want and need more tests. Weston says, “Huh?”
“PARCC will replace the Stanford Achievement Test the district normally uses. The district can double-check FCAT results against the nationally-normed Stanford exam to see if scores match up. PARCC can serve the same purpose. In Hillsborough County, our children are special enough to be given extra exams. Our superintendent administers the Stanford test in addition to the standardized exams (FCAT) required by the state. Should the FCAT show a failing on the superintendent’s part, she has the Stanford results to slice, dice, parse and farce until she can show a favorable result. It’s for the kids.
“But wait! FCAT is going away. Common-core is coming. Common-core test XYZ will replace FCAT. PARCC will replace Stanford. Do I have that right? Yes.”
In Hillsborough County, you can never test kids too much or too often!
I received a letter from John Ogozolak, a teacher in upstate New York, where the economy has long been in serious trouble, with a paucity of jobs and economic opportunity.
I decided to share it, because like him, I too have wondered what message we give our high school students. The politicians and the media constantly tell them how dumb they are, how lazy and shiftless, yet they are our future. What kind of world are they graduating into? Will there be jobs? Will they have a chance? Will there be social mobility and opportunity? Or will they find themselves slipping down into the bottom end of the economy?
John’s letter arrived only hours after I read this column in Slate by Laurence Steinberg, who studies adolescents, declaring that our high schools are a total disaster, and our kids are learning nothing, based on the fact that test scores for seniors are stagnant.
I responded to Larry Steinberg, whom I knew years ago, and pointed out that the NAEP scores for seniors are meaningless. When I was on the NAEP board in the early 2000s, we devoted a full meeting to discussing the fact that high school seniors don’t even try on NAEP tests. They know the tests don’t count towards high school graduation or college admission; they don’t count for anything, and the kids don’t care about them. They doodle on the answer page, they answer in patterns (like checking off every A), or they leave pages blank. They aren’t dumb. They know what they are doing. They are asked to jump over a meaningless hurdle, and they treat it as a joke. But the adults take their tomfoolery as evidence that they are unmotivated, possibly stupid. I don’t think the kids are stupid. I imagine how I feel when someone calls me on the phone and starts asking questions; usually I hang up, or I say something uncooperative because I don’t like to be interrupted for no reason to fit into someone else’s plan. I expect that the seniors feel the same way.
I often wonder why we have so little confidence in our young people, why we demean them so often, and why we never stop to think that they are products of our society, for better or worse. If we are disappointed in them, we should be even more disappointed in ourselves. They are our children. And let me be clear: I have met many high school students, and I have been impressed by their wit, intelligence, humor, courage, and passionate sense of justice.
Anyway, read Steinberg’s column, and contrast it with what John wrote. John is a teacher. He knows his kids. He sees them every day. He worries about their future, not because they are dumb but because our society offers them diminishing prospects and doesn’t tell the truth:
I teach 12th graders economics in what the New York Times described this past summer as the 4th poorest county in New York State.I start off the semester course trying to give the students a sense of what’s rich, and middle class and poor in this country. The kids read from Barbara Ehrenreich’s Nickel and Dimed and we discuss the growing gap between the rich and poor in this nation.I try to make economics REAL to these young adults while connecting their experiences to some of the important theories you’d find in a typical Economics 101 course in college. These kids are on the verge of walking out of the school and being faced with paying for college and making their way in the world.Then…..the students and myself get walloped at the end of the course with an asinine “assessment” created from a computer bank of outdated questions that someone in an office at the county BOCES prints out. We get a test just because some law says we have to. You couldn’t call it a standardized test. One version had misspelled words and even the same question repeated twice. But, of course, I couldn’t revise the test prior to administration……because I as the teacher couldn’t be trusted.
It’s truly sick, Diane. I’m not a believer in conspiracy theories but I have to wonder if there’s some grand scheme somewhere to numb high school students with mindless drivel and endless tests so that they don’t get around to asking the big questions….like why is their generation getting screwed. It’s frustrating to sit back and watch this educational car crash happen. I’ve sent letters to the Times, to the newspaper in Albany, my legislators….. I tried writing a blog but I don’t have the time really for its upkeep among other issues. I went to rallies and held up signs…..We still try to have some fun in class while learning. That’s about my biggest form of protest.
The heroes of the movement to reduce standardized testing in Texas is a group called TAMSA. The unwieldy title is Texans Advocating for Meaningful Student Assessment. They are better known as Moms Ahainst Drunk Testing.
They realized that Pearson had a lock on the Texas legislature as that body passed more and more testing requirements. The legislature cut $5 Billion from the schools’ budget yet managed to find nearly $500 million for a contract with Pearson. Give credit where it is due: Pearson hired Sandy Kress, architect of NCLB, as its lobbyist. Kress sends his own children to a wonderful school that does NOT give standardized tests.
So, I hereby honor the Moms of Texas, who beat Pearson.
Here is a letter about their activities:
“TAMSA deserves the credit for HB5 that reduced end of course testing by Pearson from 15 tests to 5.
Students in grades 3-8 take 17 of Pearson’s tests.
The TAMSA slideshow provides important facts about how the Pearson lobbyists were unmasked by the moms.
http://res.dallasnews.com/interactives/2013_December/texan-of-the-year/tamsa/”
Last week, the Gates-funded group Teach Plus put out a report saying that state testing didn’t take up all that much time, despite the loud complaints of parents and teachers.
The howls of outrage on the Education Week site caused the researchers at Teach Plus to take another look, and they discovered they were wrong.
Reporter Catherine Gewertz follows the story here.
She begins:
Remember that study last week that showed how district-mandated tests take far more time away from students’ and teachers’ schedules than state tests do? It turns out that it had a major error.
As soon as “The Student & The Stopwatch” came out Feb. 5, critics pounced on it for posting far too low a figure for the amount of time students have to spend on states tests in Illinois. You can see some of these attacks in the comments section of the blog post I wrote about it.
You might recall that the report examined a dozen urban districts, and some surrounding suburban districts, focusing on their relative burdens of state testing time and district-imposed testing time.
Gewertz pressed Teach Plus to make corrections.
A reader forwarded this excellent article that appeared in the Denver Post.
The author Robert Zubrin scanned the state’s tables ranking schools based in large part on test scores. And this was his amazing discovery:
“So, does this testing data, acquired at great expense in both money and class time, tell us which schools are doing their job and which are performing poorly? Not at all. Rather, what really jumps out of the data is the extremely strong relationship between school rank and student family income. This correlation is so strong that it is possible to predict the rank of the school in advance with fair accuracy just by using a simple formula that multiples its percentage of low-income students by 4 and subtracts 20….
“In short, what we have managed to learn is that the children of doctors and lawyers do better on standardized tests than the children of day laborers and welfare recipients. This raises an interesting question: Why are we funding this program?
“At a time when school funds are scarce, why are we wasting tens of millions of dollars per year statewide, and close to 20 percent of classroom time, on a testing program, only to find out nothing that we didn’t know before? Does anyone actually believe that Evergreen students do better than Jefferson students because of the superior quality of the staff? If we switched school staffs, but kept the students in place, would the high scores move with the staffs or stay with the students? So, do we punish the teachers at the lower ranked schools because they are willing to take on the tougher jobs?”
Ty Alper is a law professor at The University of California in Berkeley, one of the nation’s most prestigious law schools. He is running for school board in Berkeley. As he thought about the challenges of teaching today, he realized that his child’s kindergarten teacher was teaching some of the same skills he was teaching:
“Brook Pessin-Whedbee teaches five-year-olds at Rosa Parks. I teach law students in their mid-20s. As a kindergarten teacher, Brook teaches her students how to collaborate in the telling of stories, so they develop not only oral language and story writing skills but also the ability to form partnerships and work together. As a clinical law professor training and supervising law students in the complex representation of clients facing the death penalty, I teach my students how to collaborate in the telling of stories — stories of our clients’ lives, of unfair trials, of prosecutorial misconduct, etc. Brook and I have the same goals: to improve our students’ oral and written skills, and to teach them what it means to work productively as part of a team.”
He doesn’t think that the work they do can be measured by standardized tests. He is right.
Ty is a graduate of the public schools in Berkeley, so is his wife. Both his parents worked in public schools.
I bet he would be a great addition to the Berkeley school board.
Not long ago, I posted a news story about the problems with Common Core testing in Nashua, New Hampshire, where teachers reported serious flaws with the Smarter Balanced Assessment.
Here is the letter from John Nelson, the principal of Fairgrounds Middle School, which contains details about the problems, as reported by teachers.
FROM: JOHN NELSON
RE: SMARTER BALANCE TEST
This communication is to share the sentiment of the FMS staff as it relates to the Smarter Balance Test. As you know, our staff used the December Early Release to take this test with the goal that it would provide us with some insight how we might incorporate the “common core” and the format of the Smarter Balance Test into our instructional practices. We believe that we successfully incorporated the NECAP Test format and GLEs into our teaching practices, especially in our “Bell Activities. “
Although a few staff members shared that they believed that our test scores would improve over time, I was surprised with the responses from the FMS teachers when we gathered to debrief after taking the test. I was hopeful that we would have teachers sharing test vocabulary, ideas for test taking, and strategies to help prepare our students for the 2015 Smarter Balance Test. Instead, teachers shared frustrations they had when they were taking the test and disappointment in test format and the difficulties they had trying to use their computer to take this test.
The comments shared below come from successful dedicated veteran teachers. I have much respect for this staff and I not only appreciated the honesty of the staff in their response to the Smarter Balance Test; but, I am hopeful that the Nashua School District will accept these responses in a positive way and not look at the comments as “negative” or “unprofessional”. The FMS staff collectively believe that the Smarter Balance Test is inappropriate for our students at this time and that the results from this test will not measure the academic achievement of our students; but will be a test of computer skills and students’ abilities to endure through a cumbersome task.
Listed below are some of the concerns that were shared by our staff:
*I feel sad for the students who have to take this test — not many will be successful.
*Much is said about “depersonalizing” information as part of a learning strategy. This is not how students learn.
*There is too much “stuff” going on the screen at once. It is difficult to move the icons where you want them. Students don’t know how to use the “mouse” everything for them is “tough screen”.
If you leave the screen for a short period of time the information on the screen will be gone when you return. “I tried the grade six-grade math—it was humbling. It was scary.
*I had technology problems. If kids have these problems they’ll just quit.
*Double-wide monitors would help. I am a huge fan of concept maps but notepad does not let you do that on Smarter Balance. You can’t even copand paste from the notepad into the test.
*This was more of a test on the computer skills than on the math concepts. If I was a student I would just pickout an answer and move on.
*Too tedious—kids will get sick of it and just guess to move on. Kids won’t even get past the computer directions.
These are just a sample of the concerns that were raised at this meeting. We did shift to “what do we have to do from now until the spring of 2015 to prepare students. Sample answers include:
*Pay attention to the directions. Provide students with many opportunities to read directions for their assignments.
*You can’t just read this test and then respond. Students need to highlight and take notes—especially during the audio questions.
*Students need to learn to “read the question first”.
*Students need to be able to go back into the text passages to pull out data that will support their answers.
*Students need to read through the questions and all possible answers. Sometimes questions give the answers to other questions in the test.
*Kids need to know how to do “note taking”.
*We need to teach students “how to draw an inference”.
*Students need to learn how to write a transition sentence between two paragraphs.
*Students need to learn how to write using “the speakers” voice.
*Students need to memorize formulas in this test.
*Students will have difficulty writing in the boxes that expand because of the technology of the way the box expands.
*Students will have trouble reading and understanding the directions and what is being asked by the question. Is this test closely aligned to the “common core?” It is important that teachers know what the test will be assessing.
*I am concerned that the math test is not necessarily testing students’ math abilities since there is so much reading. This test seems to assess how well the students read the math questions more than their math skills. Thus, because of the amount of reading, I question the validity of our receiving a math ability score.
*When Measured Progress developed the NECAP there was a committee on bias to check for testing bias. Does Smarter Balance do the same? Also, math teachers were asked to evaluate the questions to eliminate unnecessary verbiage so that the Math was being tested.
*The opening pages of directions and computer information was ridiculous. I didn’t read it—I’m sure my students won’t. Suggestions: We should have posters made of the most important and often used keys to post in each math classroom. Students need to practice making equations in Word, including the fractions symbol. We need to teach students to distinguish between on correct answer and many correct answers. There are questions that tell the students to choose the correct answers.
*The test is difficult to navigate with so many keystrokes to juggle.
*The page layout makes it eye weary even though you can expand the screen and zoom in and out.
*The passages are lengthy and time consuming and made me consider just choosing “B” so I could move on. Some terms in the reading seemed out-dated—“Plumb crazy and millwright” for example.
I had to use multiple skills and at the same time multitask—id—the audio portions require me to listen and at the same time read possible answers while constructing a well written paragraph in my head.
*The test assumes the students are skilled in such areas as pre-reading and questions and if they are not, it assumes they will learn while taking the test to read the questions in advance of the reading.
*There wasn’t a flow or cadence to the questions. The type or style of questions changed from one to the next. The answers were not straight forward—for example on the math test they did not want the answer to the equation, they wanted to know if the answer was 2/3rd greater than what you started with. I understand this is import ant but this test will be exhausting for the kids.
*The idea of the best answer and then there being 2 or more good and appropriate answers. It felt like a trick. We’re going to look bad for a few years.
*I did 30 questions in an hour and then had to take a break. My eyes hurt and my shoulders felt strained. When I returned 5 minutes later the work was gone.
*Each question is totally different than the one before it creating confusion which creates more confusion for the test takers.
*Frustration level builds as your take the test creating mental despair—students will shut down.
Many of the math questions seemed to have no basis in the real world and skills that will never be used in life. Students will need to be taught the technology skills for the test.—scrolling through screens, highlighting, scanning the questions, touch typing, and more.
*The test does not encourage students to use writing webs, brain maps, organizers to assist with writing. Summary: In my opinion, this test is a sad indictment of how disconnected the people who design the test are from the typical students in the classroom. Assessment is necessary but it should be designed to be developmentally appropriate for the students being tested. Assessment should also all for different methods to demonstrate competency rather than one computer model. This test is designed for one type of student—the verbal learner with exceptional executive functioning skills.
*I took the Grade 7 Language Arts test which I believe is developmentally designed for adults, not seventh grade students. The questions were tedious and punitive. I’m not sure that any seventh grader in the St ate would be able to score well on this test. The worst part of this test was the directions. They were numerous and multifaceted. After observing middle school students take tests for over a decade, it is my firm belief that most kids will stop reading the directions because there are too many and they are far too complex. Students will fail this test and the test will destroy their confidence which is an important stage of their development. In addition, the results of this test will become a public relations night mare for the school and the school districts as children will fail in large numbers.
This letter came from a mother and teacher on Long Island in New York, which has been a hotbed of resistance to the Common Core and the testing.
Newsday ran an editorial today saying that it is time to “Stop the testing tug-of-war.” The editorial insists that Common Core is needed no matter how many teachers and educators object. The editorial is accompanied by a cartoon showing a tug-of-war with Commissioner John King on one side and everyone else on the other. That is an accurate portrait. King sees no need to listen to educators with far more experience than his three years in a charter school. Nor does he care what parents or the public thinks because he rules as the King. He and the Board of Regents–with only a few honorable exceptions–forget that we live in a democracy. Newsday offers not a shred of evidence for its defense of the testing other than to insist that it is time to swallow this bitter pill. Why? Because they say so.
“Dear Dr. Ravitch,
Newsday, Long Island’s only newspaper, ran the attached editorial today. Below is my response. People have asked me to share my response with you. Many parents have said that my response clarifies many points that people have had a hard time finding amidst all of the muck that is being thrown around.
In response to “Stop the testing tug-of-war”
Upset is not the word. As a teacher, as a mother and as a taxpayer, I am filled with disgust. Let’s speak of facts from people who are in the system, rather than the hypotheses of those (the media and corporations) on the outside.
1. The “standardized tests” do not track year-to-year progress of a student. No teacher knows what students mastered, and what they did not. Last year’s assessment tested students on materials that were not available until after the assessment. It contained proprietary material that the test’s maker, Pearson, includes in curricular materials that it sells to school districts – giving purchasers an unfair advantage on the test. Next, the test’s outcome was predicted by the Commissioner weeks before the tests ever made their way to schools for administration. Finally, in the six years I have administered the assessment to my students, I have personally observed ten point swings between passing and failing – depending upon how the state wanted schools and teachers to be perceived by the public.
2. The state teacher evaluation system (APPR) will find few teachers ineffective because the majority of the score (60-80%) is derived from local measures – observation, lesson plans, parent communication, etc…. The state gave me a 1 out of 20 for my growth score for last year. If the state’s portion were used as my only evaluative tool, I would have been considered ineffective. I could accept a 1 out of 20, if the state could tell me what I did well, what I did not and which portion of that score was for my math instruction of 60 students, and which portion was for my English Language Arts (ELA) instruction of 30 students. No one has this information.
3. Standards-based evaluations have yet to be seen. During my years in business, I had objectives I was required to meet. Each year, I sat down with my supervisor and we discussed those I had met, those I had not, and how to improve. In this system, we give students assessments that have no standardized bar to pass. After they take the assessment, their teachers and parents never know what standards they have met, and which they have not.
4. The curricular materials were not available last year. This is true. This fall, the state released materials. The math modules available for my sixth grade class required me to spend two hours per day modifying them in order to eliminate spelling and grammatical errors, replace a 10-point font with a 14-point font that young children can read and see, as well as define ways to bridge gaps between what my students were able to do, and the skills they needed to have to get through the lessons. Furthermore, the first unit was comprised entirely of lengthy word problems that my students, who are reading several years behind, were unable to read.
As a mother and a teacher I ask for:
o Assessments that measure state standards, with consistent benchmarks for passing to track progress over time.
o Item analysis for parents and teachers so both parties know what students have mastered and what they have not.
o A state growth score that tells a teacher what his /her students mastered, and what they did not.
Until those three requirements are met, my own four children will not participate in the state’s fraudulent assessment system that drains valuable resources from cash-strapped school districts, promotes growth for corporations like Pearson and in its lack of transparency, erodes the teacher-student relationship.
Sincerely,
Melissa McMullan
6th Grade Teacher
JFK Middle School
http://www.comsewogue.k12.ny.us/webpages/mmcmullan/
https://www.facebook.com/MrsMcmullansClassPage
“No kind action ever stops with itself. One kind action leads to another. Good example is followed. A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions, and the roots spring up and make new trees. The greatest work that kindness does to others is that it makes them kind themselves.” ~ Amelia Earhart
