Monday, April 27, 2015

Final Field Trip Observations

This time we ventured to Shaker Heights Middle School. This observation was quite different from the other ones that I have done because the classrooms that we were supposed to observe were not able to allow me to observe because of standardizing testing that was going on at that time. So instead of talking about beliefs about a pedagogy like my usual rants consist of, I will tackle the idea of standardized testing and how it effects a child's goals.

It is no secret that the standardized tests are a way of measuring the goals of a student, teacher, and school. Now, I have a different take on standardizing tests because I do see a lot o food in them as well as the bad. As far as the bad ideas go, the tests do favor the schools that are richer and are able to support a curriculum that influences a student to critically think and not to memorize. This is a major problem for the inner city schools because they cannot keep up with suburban schools. This is a problem with how the test is made, and there are ways to design the test so that this doesn't happen. For example, the test can focus on critical thinking skills, and schools could then teach that fundamental concept to students.

The good that comes from the test is that it does allow for a distinguished difference in ability of students. For this allow me to expand my idea of standardized tests to the ACT and SAT too. These tests are used to give a students common knowledge base on core subjects. These test scores are analyzed by the colleges and organizations that students are applying to. Without these tests, I don't see a way to give that information to colleges, with the exception of mandatory essays that most colleges already require.

So the tests are bad in a way and good in a way.I do not have a problem with them as much as I have a problem with the system that they stem from. We should find a different type of tests for our students to take to level out the playing field for all kids, and that is the real challenge. Thank you once again for reading and feel free to research this to come up with your own ideas.

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