[Phys-L] Re: Ambiguous Question

[Rick Tarara <rtarara@SAINTMARYS.EDU>]

But thinking skills have been on the decline for some time now, well before
the rash of 'high-stakes' testing.  Basic skills have been on the
decline--as almost anyone who has been teaching for any length of time can
attest to.

The first two lines of JC's post sound like a politically motivated
statement to me.

Just HOW then do we ASSESS that the schools are doing their jobs and just
how do we deal with these schools if in fact they are NOT.

I'll be the first to get on the side of teachers here--what they have to
deal with from students and parents is phenomenal, but then our friends the
lawyers (sorry Jack) have seen to it that the schools don't really have any
power to maintain order and discipline, and forget about respect and
civility.  BUT, in the end, if the school systems are to serve the society,
they do have to adequately train students in basic skills, and give those
WILLING to learn the opportunities to hone their thinking skills.  I, for
one, think it entirely appropriate that there be some 'high-stakes'
evaluation of at least those basic skills (reading, writing, and
'rithmetic').  Exactly what is the best way to do this--we HAVE tested for
centuries now--is open for discussion, especially who should be tested at
what level.  [Testing the mentally retarded (sorry--the cognitively
challenged) who happen to be 13 years old with standard 7th or 8th grade
tests when they are struggling to handle _some_ 2nd grade material is
INSANE--but often done.]  Exactly what to do when schools 'fail' such
testing is also open for discussion, but I have yet to hear viable
alternatives for making sure that basic skills and basic information is
being effectively taught in our public schools.

Rick

*********************************************************
Richard W. Tarara
Professor of Physics
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, Indiana
rtarara@saintmarys.edu
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----- Original Message -----
From: "John Clement" <clement@HAL-PC.ORG>
To: <PHYS-L@LISTS.NAU.EDU>
Sent: Friday, November 18, 2005 9:38 AM
Subject: Re: Ambiguous Question


> A big IF.  High stakes testing has only one purpose.  It is designed to
> punish the workers to make them work harder.  That strategy has never been
> successful.  You can't just increase the speed of the assembly line and
> punish the workers when they can't handle it.  This exactly what is
> happening in education.  The requirements are increasing without any
> regard
> to what can be done, and the workers are not being trained to work better.
>
> As a result the quality of education is actually going down because the
> students in many schools only get to read teat review booklets rather than
> books.  And this is happening more in the lower schools.  The prestigious
> schools laugh at the tests and continue to do education.  Of course the
> upper schools only have that position because they have high scoring
> incoming students.  Mostly they do little different from what the lower
> schools are doing.
>
> Shayer and Adey showed that if you plot output scores vs intake scores all
> schools in England fall on the same line.  Great Britain tried high stakes
> testing, and it created a teacher shortage with no significant progress.
> Why do we have to repeat a failed experiment?  Shayer & Adey also created
> "Thinking Science" which moves schools up compared to their cohorts.  TS
> improves student thinking.  But to achieve this teachers had to be
> carefully
> trained to use the materials.  This involved long term inservices over 2
> years and school monitoring.  Also it involved commitment by the school
> and
> all science teachers to use the materials in a coordinated fashion.
>
> High stakes testing is not getting schools to do this.  Instead principals
> are mandating review workbooks and really stupid scripted lessons.  In
> addition they cheat.  The thinking skills of students are decreasing as a
> result.
>
> John M. Clement
> Houston, TX
>
> > If we value high stakes testing and want it
> > to
> > be improved, work on State Departments of Education to use the model used
> > in
> > a few states and get them to use the resources in their state classrooms
> > to
> > develop quality testing programs internally.
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