5 Reasons to Reduce Standardized Testing
From the desk of Hope…
5 Reasons to Reduce Standardized Testing
1. Learners need a substantial amount time to practice and apply the content in which they are learning. The young man learning to be a postal worker spends most of his time sorting mail and rehearsing his mail route to get ready for his first day on the job. On a personal note, my son learned how to play and improved his basketball game by spending many, many hours in the gym practicing basketball. Too many of “practice hours” are being used for testing hours. I fear we would all be outraged if we knew the truth about the amount of school hours spent on taking tests. The Texas Senate recently voted to significantly reduce standardized testing which cut the end of year exams for graduation from fifteen to five.
2. An unintended consequence of too much testing may be we are teaching learners that school is about preparing for a test. Learning is far, far more than preparing for a test. Learning is about building background knowledge, asking questions to dig deeper into curiosities, writing as a deep level of comprehension, collaborating, learning from one another and this list could go on and on. My fear is that our nation’s children are no longer curious about the world they live in, rather busy spending their time preparing for the next day at school – and the upcoming test.
3. Teachers are frustrated. It takes a courageous teacher to speak out against “the system”. Trust me, I have done this speak-out thing before and it seemed to get me on the road to nowhere. Many times teachers feel the need to “do as they are told” and stow away the stress and anxiety that comes along with complying to initiatives with which they have questions/concerns about. Educators are experiencing relentless pressure to show their effectiveness through test scores. Don’t misunderstand me, educators should definitely be held accountable. The teaching of our children is too important to be left unmonitored. The stress of this era of increased testing, however, is clearly taking a toll on teachers.
4. Many times the test scores are filed away in file thirteen. In other words, many tests are being given and the results never considered; never shown to parents or students. Sound crazy? It happens on a regular basis. The best kind of “test” informs instruction. For example, formative assessments are a form of “test” that considers learning while students are in the act of doing, similar to a basketball game and the coach calls a time out because he sees something he needs to teach or feedback he needs to give to get his learner/s (players) on track. This type information is not filed away in file thirteen. Rather, it is used to adjust instruction. I would argue that any test that does not inform instruction should be reduced or even eliminated.
5. Are American students good at taking tests or good at what it is going to take to: do life, have a thriving career, solve real world problems, lead our nation, compete globally, care about one another? Americans are deeply concerned about their present and future in a time of economic uncertainty. It is important for us as educators to send students from our schools who can think critically and work well beyond what a test can measure. Our youth needs to be fully prepared for our global competitors and increasing standardized testing is not the answer. Investing in a strong high quality educational system would be a monumental step in the right direction.
Bonus: Reducing standardized testing will save our educational system billions of dollars.