Today marks the start of our statewide testing program. Do I have anything against testing? Nope. Since the first classrooms there have been tests- ways to evaluate a student’s progress. So I have no problem with testing kids- in fact, it is my job, in part, to test. Are we testing too much? No comment. While I have been known to complain a little (OK a lot) about the number of minutes of instruction lost to miscellaneous tests. I have also discovered some value in them. I now have a much clearer picture of exactly how my class is doing- not only how I would assess them, but also how the little old man in the ivory tower looks at things & sometimes we don’t always see eye to eye. The public seems to want to hold everyone (except themselves in most cases) accountable – unfortunately schools can’t always fix societies problems & as we compare our education system to other countries we tend to leave out the fact that we educate everyone. Most countries after a while only use resources to educate the most promising… to us everyone is promising and that may be why our test scores just don’t match up. Then again this is just my opinion- or something.
“I know what I know, if you know what I mean” – Edie Brickell