Patrick Wall, over at , formerly Gotham Schools, just weighed in on the testing situation in New York. Not a pretty picture, he concluded, based on an online critique by teachers in a new site dedicated to “Testing Talk.” The English Language Arts exam—now a devoted Common Core handmaiden—had just graduated to the level of “soul-crushing.”
Wall observed that the educators who migrated to the online forum ”represent a tiny fraction of the state’s educators.” Of course, most teachers are too busy prepping their students to register protest online. No matter. He dutifully recorded the comments of a sampling of educators, with an emphasis on the grades beyond three, the border of early childhood.
He did mention a third-grade teacher, who noted that students faced “obscure vocabulary and unapproachable plot line,” excerpted from a mid-20th century text. A good number of teachers pronounced the tests “especially arduous for English-language learners and students with special needs”—a veritable “endurance test,” in fact. And others took issue with the pace, that sense of “racing against the clock to finish.”
By the time Wall had gotten around to posting, “Testing Talk” had attracted 150,000 hits and 300 comments, a tally he got from Lucy Calkins, the founding director of the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project, and the site’s creator. The purpose, she maintains, is to hold test-makers accountable to test-takers. “There have been billions of dollars and millions of hours of children’s and teachers’ lives that have been invested in these new tests,” she said. “My goal is to help educators be part of the process of making better tests.”
Better tests. Ah, there’s the rub. And what about Pearson, the test-maker, and their five-year $32-million contract with New York State?
Wall gives just a nod to the mounting concerns among parents of children in the early grades: kindergarten through third grade. At the end of his piece, he tosses in a mention of a , a K-5 school in the heart of progressive Park Slope.
Where has he been? The opt-out movement has been rapidly gathering steam in the earlier end of the education spectrum, as I observed not long ago at , followed by the New Yorker’s Rebecca Mead, whose son is a at the Brooklyn New School.
Wall also neglected to mention the parents in New Jersey, who just introduced to the state assembly a . Here’s the summary, straight from what we hope will be statute:
This bill provides that a school district may not administer a commercially-developed standardized assessment to students enrolled in kindergarten through the second grade. The bill would not preclude a classroom teacher or a board of education from developing, administering, and scoring an assessment in kindergarten through the second grade.
I’d include third grade in that ban–and beyond. But it’s a good start. Take that, Pearson, and Lucy Calkins.
I can’t believe that our government has allowed for millionaires, like Pearson, to continue to make millions off of the sweat and tears of our children and teachers. Why didn’t the State use the $32,000,000 directly to help our children? I’m so disappointed in our leaders.
Shame on us all. We have allowed big business to buy education and who suffers our beautiful children. As I visit schools, I am saddened by what I see. Preschool and Kindergartens have become first grades. They are filled with worksheet that do not produce what children need – hands on language experiences. The early years are a time for children to imagine and play. They need to learn to share their ideas, develop the conventions of language and interact appropriately with their peers. When I visit classes, the centers are gone and children are at seats working on their sheets. How does this facilitate their cognitive development? Along with this, teachers at all grade levels no longer have time to do project based learning or read good stories to their students. Who then is modeling curiosity or the joy of reading quality literature to our children? Who is teaching them about character, voice, and suspense? Surely it’s not the many parents who now have to work all day and then come home to a myriad of responsibilities. Schools once were a place that parents could count on for their children’s learning and developing a sense of citizenship. Now they can only count on schools to be a place where the child can become an average test takers. What is most frustrating is where is the evidence that these tests are really measuring our children ability to be better learners. There is absolutely none.
We should be outraged by this. Yet, many teachers and Administrators are often afraid to speak up. The results is that big business is steam rolling school folks. I am not sure why we have allowed it to get this far but we have. While some speak up, thousand more need to join and get parents to support teachers. Parents have real impact because their government officials are afraid they won’t vote for them. Fortunately, parents are beginning to realize this since they are seeing their children suffering. Parents are beginning to stand up to Pearson and others who hold the children hostage. But it is not enough fast enough. Too many elementary and secondary students have been discouraged, embarrassed and stressed by the testing. All of us need to contact our local officials and call for a halt to the testing and let Pearson go back to England where they have also ruined that educational system.
Build a better test????? NOOOOOOOOO no more tests thank you very much.