Tag: Common Core

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Domestic Policies Education News Politics

The Swift Fall of Testing – What Comes Next?

I’ve been in the education business for 31 years and I’ve seen many a fad come and go, from Teacher-proof curricula to shared decision-making to Differentiation to Cooperative Learning, Curriculum Mapping, Goals 2000 and various reading programs that focus on inventive spelling, phonics, whole language and learning vocabulary in context. Many of my colleagues didn’t believe me when I said that our present testing fetish would also shuffle off the educational stage at some point. What caught me by surprise was just how quickly that would happen.

The focus on testing and corporate-style accountability began with the publication in 1983 of A Nation at Risk, a report that essentially regarded the American education system as having failed our students, our economy, and our values. It repudiated many of the reforms that liberals had foisted on the system in the 1960s and 70s and said that if we didn’t correct those flaws we would fall behind other countries whose schools were beginning to produce students who knew more math, science and analytical skills. Conservatives adopted the report as the clarion call for privatization, a back-to-basics curriculum that stressed factual recall, and of course, tests to measure not just students, but teachers, with the secondary goals of loosening the grip that the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers had on school policy and defeating Democrats who relied on union support.

And they almost succeeded. The testing movement – which reached its pinnacle last year and is now under more assault than what we are using to fight ISIS – is in rapid decline. Last year, 44 states gave the PARCC tests which measure how thoroughly students have learned the Common Core Curriculum Standards. This school year 7 states, including New Jersey, will be giving those tests. The rest will be giving a test adopted by their own Education Departments. Further, some states, most notably New York, won’t be using the tests to evaluate teachers. The retreat is notable.

Is the assault over? Not by a long shot, but it is weakening. Conservative groups are still trying to get states to funnel money to Charter Schools, which, on average, do no better than public schools. Many charters do better within certain geographic areas, but much of that has to do with state governments that are abandoning public schools that are in poor urban centers. The fight to limit collective bargaining for teachers and other public workers reached its height in 2013 and has since paused, although the damage done to teachers’ pay and benefits has been significant. And although New York is backing away from using tests to evaluate teachers, more states need to follow them for the good of education everywhere.

The bottom line is that teachers are doing a magnificent job with the dwindling resources and increased scrutiny that came with the rise of the know-nothing conservatives. Aligning teacher evaluation with student test scores only illustrated that the overwhelming majority of teachers were effective. Clearly, the know-nothing’s intent was to use the test scores to fire teachers they thought were failing our students. That hasn’t happened because their assumption was incorrect. They won’t admit it, but it’s true.

The next fight will now be on the state level as we return to local standards and local tests. In the past, most states created tests where 90% of the students scored in the proficient range. That’s just not statistically feasible. We do need national standards and we do need to measure how students are learning. The reaction to the Common Core and PARCC will not make this possible, and that’s to the country’s detriment.

Have no fear, though: If history is any guide, this reaction will only last a few years and something else will come along and replace it. Will it be better or will it be worse?

My answer? Yes.

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Domestic Policies Education News Politics

CCRAP! More Testing Ahead

If you’re a regular American, you know, like the kind of person Hillary Clinton is trying to appeal to, you probably think that the PARCC tests are over and that the education system has moved on.

Not so.

This week marks the return of the standardized tests that no one likes, and are based on the Common Core standards that are unpopular across the political spectrum. And since the federal government has given schools until early May to give the tests, schools across the country will be testing for the next four weeks. Never mind that there are precious few weeks of instruction left in the academic year, especially in the South, or that Advanced Placement tests are administered during the first two weeks of May. PARCC tests must be given and school districts must stop everything in order to meet the testing mandate.

The effects on schools have been profound. Students have missed, and will miss more academic classes, extra-help sessions, Advanced Placement test reviews, band practices and basic skills instruction. In most schools, the tests are taken in the library, which makes that resource unavailable for part or all of the school day. In other schools, the entire academic day stops for the tests and some districts have prohibited homework for the duration of the administration. This is not efficient education.

Meanwhile, in New Hampshire where the GOP had its first substantive discussions about presidential policy, Ted Cruz is promising to obliterate the Common Core, Chris Christie is blaming his predecessor for the standards, Bobby Jindal is running away from the standards despite  promoting them two years ago, and Jeb Bush, who supports the Common Core, is not mentioning that fact because the GOP base hates them. Hillary hasn’t said much, but she can bide her time and let the Republicans fight amongst themselves.

My sense is that the Common Core standards will survive because most educational publishers and programs, such as the AP, have modified their curricula to mirror the standards. In and of themselves, the standards are beneficial and having national benchmarks will allow us to compare our students across the United States and with students from other countries. State standards might reflect local priorities, but we live in a global world and economy. Students need to be proficient in specific content and academic skills and, quite honestly, not all states are proficient at delivering them.

In addition, not all states and localities can afford to implement programs that students need. Federal involvement in education is a point of contention in many areas, but without equality of resources we can’t have equality of outcomes. And that’s what we desperately need.

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Domestic Policies Education News Politics

Salting the PARCCing Lot

Educators, are you getting excited? No, not about the next snowstorm, which looks like a whopper, but about the PARCC tests? You’d better be, because they are on the way and the impact will be measurable and unpredictable.

For those non-educators, the PARCC tests are the standardized tests that students in grades 3-11 will take in two administrations; March and April/May. They are tied to the Common Core Curriculum Standards and claim to be the newest, latest, greatest, most bestest tests to evaluate teacher performance and to prepare our students for further leaning, college, and the working world. Parents, teachers, administrators and politicians have debated whether these new tests, and the Common Core, are appropriate or will even measure what they purport to measure. Some states adopted the Common Core and the tests, then un-adopted them.

The bottom line, though, is that they are almost here.

I’ve taken some sample tests, and so can you. Go ahead and give it a try. Notice what students are being asked to do and how they are being asked to do it. My assumption is that it’s different from what you were asked to do in school. This is the point: The standards and tests are asking educators and students to approach education from a different perspective. In some ways, it’s a more productive, intuitive approach, and in others, it’s downright confounding.

One of the main issues in New Jersey and, I suspect, in most other states, is the availability and reliability of the school’s technology. All of the tests are taken on computers and all of the students will probably log on to their school’s systems at the same time. This will probably cause some networks to slow down and/or crash. Also, many schools do not have enough computers for all of their students, which will result in significant disruptions to the school schedule as students will need to test in shifts.

And as much as adults like to fool themselves into thinking that children are all adept at using computers, the facts are that many students can’t keyboard quickly, do not understand how technology works, or how to manipulate the screens as these tests require. There is a section of the high school language arts test where students will need to read and manage three sources on three different windows with three different scroll bars and write an essay using all of the readings. That can be a challenge. For younger students, actual keyboarding will be a problem. There are no computer bubble sheets or booklets on these tests. A slow typist will have trouble.

The actual testing, though, is still only part of the issue. These tests will be used to evaluate teachers, which is, and always has been, a terrible idea. Using any high-stakes test, especially one given for the first time on unpredictable technology by students who haven’t had a full school year of Common Core instruction, is folly.

Besides, the tests really are only high-stakes for the teachers, not the students. How’s that for sound policy? If a student decides the test is too difficult or they can’t type or didn’t eat a good breakfast that morning, then a teacher could get fired. This is what you get when know-nothing politicians decide, without significant teacher input, what’s best for education.

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Domestic Policies Education teachers

The New Smart

Yes, I know it’s the holiday break and students and teachers across the country are off, but really, this is just the calm before the storm. There are only two more months until the new PARCC tests are administered. Then there’s a 6 to 8 week break. Then more PARCC tests will be administered.

These tests will wreak some serious havoc on school district calendars and teacher’s lesson plans nationwide. They will cause anxiety across the student population and will result in hand-wringing and head-shaking amongst the parents and caregivers. In many states, the tests will determine, artificially of course, who is an effective teacher and whether schools are doing all they can to teach students the 21st century skills they’ll need to succeed in college and work.

But the biggest effect of the tests is that they will redefine smart for a new generation.

Prior to the Common Core and the new tests, it was enough for smart students to be able to read, memorize, manipulate and give back facts on an examination. The educational model was based on teachers giving students information or coaching them through their learning as the local curriculum dictated. There were some major modifications in the 1990s and the first decade of this century, but most of them addressed how the information was imparted to students, such as cooperative learning, differentiated instruction and directed learning, that was based on the corporate model of education and teamwork that was then in vogue in the working world.

Even the modifications that teachers were legally required to implement to satisfy students who had classifiable learning disabilities, such as giving out notes, providing word banks, redirecting students who had trouble paying attention, or modifying test questions, were only meant to address content delivery. The skills that students needed remained the same.

That’s all changed now. The new Common Core standards require that students know how to read on a more sophisticated level and to master themes rather than discrete facts. They require that students explain how they arrived at an answer, either in written or verbal form, in order to justify and support their thinking. The new standards reward students who can analyze a reading excerpt, any excerpt, and identify the main idea and bias behind the writing. If a student can’t do these things, then they will not do well on the tests.

Many students who have been doing well in school will find that their skills are not valued anymore. Others who had trouble memorizing and recalling, but could spot larger themes and issues, will be rewarded. I suspect that this was the real intent of Education Secretary Arnie Duncan’s unfortunate remarks about why people are opposed to the Common Core. He didn’t help himself by saying that “white suburban moms who realize — all of a sudden — their child isn’t as brilliant as they thought they were, and their school isn’t quite as good as they thought they were.” The truth, though, is that many parents will find that their child doesn’t respond well to the new standards because they ask the children to manipulate information in different ways. Students will need to be taught how to do that, and once they are, many will succeed. For the first year, though, scores will not be what some people expect them to be. And even if the PARCC tests went away tomorrow, the Common Core standards won’t, so students would still need to master the new academic skills. We’re not going back to the old ways. Bank on that.

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Domestic Policies Education New Jersey News

Common Core: At Least the Website Works

I am nothing if not a good sport and an optimist by temperament, so when I read this NJ Spotlight article about a website full of great information and resources for teaching the Common Core Curriculum Standards, I took a look. The site, njcore.org, is well-designed, if a bit busy, and you can sign up to post resources.

If you teach Language Arts and Mathematics, there are probably some good resources for the effective teacher, but as a high school history teacher, there was nothing on the site. Nada. Zilch. Not even a pretense that teaching history is in any way important or even part of the curriculum. Perhaps more will be added later, but at this point, the state has no interest in engaging anyone who doesn’t teach the tested subjects. And that’s to be expected because it’s been clear for a couple of years that the NJ Department of Education is focused on testing to the exclusion of a rich, varied, integrative curriculum..

Clearly this is still a work in progress and there’s a distinct possibility that it will grow into a valued resource. It has a good deal of competition from other, more established sites and its success will be determined by how well it meets teachers’ needs. The comments on the NJ Spotlight article are negative so far, with this being the most telling:

So, I click on the link in the article, then I click on NJMC, I choose Mathematics, then Kindergarten, I click on Unit 1, then I click on SLO 1 Count by ones up to 10.
Then I click on the 3 lesson plans, choose the first one listed called “Subitizing ” (huh???) and Lesson Seed 7.EE.A.2.
It’s a lesson on area using the expression 25(x+10)-13a.
For Kindergarten?
Another lesson says there are 18 cookies in each batch requiring 2 cups of flower. How much flower for 12 dozen?
Kindergarten?
Stay tuned.
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