Question about testing

It’s not logic, it’s politics — but no, it’s not just Illinois. I tell the kids that I know it is stupid and it’s one of those things they have to endure, like times when they have to be quiet in a boring speech or play, but that those tests weren’t designed for them so they don’t mean anything.

I have been told that I am expected to have all my 5th grade LD students pass the 5th grade SOLs in reading and math. And I must follow the pacing guide published by the school system, so that they are taught all material. Never mind that my students test below grade level on individual achievement tests (which is why they are placed LD). And never mind that they need more concrete work and more practice to get the concepts.
They are still expected to pass those SOLs…

I am in Florida where we have a similar situation. Two years ago the powers that be said that all kids taking the test were required to pass to proceed to next grade in school. Only exceptions were those who had already been held back twice. Now my own LD son ended up passing the tests (with help of tutoring both at school and private) but many did not. In the end, the whole thing became more negotiable than official policy was.

My advice is to work on basics and don’t panic too much. When my son’s resource room teacher started panicing she started sending home tons of worksheets covering material at a much faster rate than even a regular student could manage. We talked and she admitted as much and stopped doing it.

The good thing about this policy is that it makes the schools accountable for LD kids. Prior to this change, kids who were identified as LD got even less help than other kids even though their needs were greater because they didn’t “count” in school averages. Suddenly, my son was invited to participate in extra tutoring.

Beth

Thank you for all the responses.

I think you hit the nail right on the head, Sue. Standardized testing is mostly about politics.

The other thing that is done on many of the standardized tests is that no modifications are allowed. On our state tests, modifications are allowed, so that the powers that be can measure what a child has learned. For example, the child can take the social studies part of the test in a small group or have it administered individually to him. And he can have it read to him and his answers scribed for him if that is what the PET decides is best. But on many of the national tests, that is not allowed, so nobody gets a true picture of what that child has learned in social studies. Figure that one out! I thought testing was about measuring what a child has learned, now how well he tests!

Sandy
www.ldperspectives.com

<<Is it just Illinios that makes kids take tests at their recorded grade level, no matter what level they are functioning at or is this everywhere. What is the logic in testing kids on material they never were and never will be exposed to? Who decided this? Is it from the federal level or is it state level? TIA!>>

Same thing in my state. I proctor our state mastery tests for a group of SPED kids at our school who also have a range of disabilities (EMR, LD, SED, OHI), and it is one of the most frustrating 2 wks of the school year to see these kids struggle during these tests, especiall kids who are functioning three to four years below grade level! I can read them the math parts of the test, but it doesn’t help much if they’re not able to understand the concepts in the first place!

Marilyn

The tricky thing is what happens when you start making exceptions and exemptions. First you exempt MR kids, because it just isn’t reasonable to ask them to do these tests. Then you exempt all special ed kids. The you don’t grade anyone who was absent from school that day. I hear stories of places where they were sending in test scores from less than half the school. Great way to raise scores and shove your lack of teaching under the carpet. As Beth points out, making the tests universal, period, gives a true picture of what is really happening and makes the school responsible for teaching all students. Those of you who are working with the small group who really cannot succeed on testing are left with an unpleasant chore, but the whole school population is benefiting from a return to focus on teaching.

But for some kids it isn’t just an unpleasant task, it is nearly traumatic. Can you imagine everyone filling in the little bubbles and you just sitting there. You don’t get it at all. The other kids will certainly see that you are sitting there like a dummy. I don’t have to exactly imagine this as my nephew experiences this. He might even go balistic.

Seems to me, kids weren’t tested quite as much as they are now.

If testing meant that the kids would really be taught then I wouldn’t mind so much. It might be worth it anyhow. However, what it really means is that kids are tested and often taught to the test. Kids aren’t really being taught all those research based methods for the most part. Schools can now only talk about test scores because that is just it in their minds.

Back in the 70s-80s, I remember teachers talking about teaching space studies, making robots, and space shuttles and the kids getting great learning experiences (this in NT kids) that were interdisciplinary, etc. I bet those same teachers can’t do that creative stuff anymore because it isn’t in the benchmarks. If kids can read better now than they could then, I’ll eat a million hats.

—des

I feel schools should definitely be accountable for special ed. kids, but I’d like to see all kids with IEP’s for academics be given an individualized achievement test like the WJ-III at the end of each year. That way, the child is tested for what he knows, and when it becomes too difficult, he reaches the ceiling and is able to stop. You can also go bakcwards to find the childs actual level if needed. This is the only fair way to assess kids who are below grade level, IMO.

Janis

NCLB Its for the kids! Sure, mine love sitting for hours. All of the students in our district are tested with the state standardized test. We can use accomodations listed in the IEP. With probably the most being a student who had the test read, and his answers written down.

I agree with Janis. The Woodcock Johnson or some other diagnostic test would be a much better way of checking the progress of students with serious delays. There are other tests to use for MR and severely disabled kids. You could actually get data you could use to tell whether those kids are progressing. However, IMO it isn’t going to happen. It would be too expensive. (Actually this was done in some private schools I have worked at.) You also don’t hurt kids who are far behind with individual testing.

I feel the idea that testing is harmless, and that kids are hurt doing this is unproven. I think the onus of proving this is on the heavy testers. Let them show us it does no harm.

>NCLB Its for the kids!

I think it’s for politics. Perhaps some people who advocate it seriously are interested in children. I have read some people’s analysis suggesting that perhaps the real reason for NCLB is a bit more dark. For example, by 2014 or so, 100% kids have to be on standard. If kids are not there are draconian measures placed on the schools, including vouchers enabling students to go to private schools. Since 100% could never reasonably be met, then the goal of NCLB is to end public schools. I might even agree if I thought we could reasonably fund such a thing. But NCLB has not, and probably never will be funded adequately. And no funding is ever going to provided to put all kids in private schools even if it were a good thing.
(Then we run into the same problem of figuring out if these schools are really teaching, wouldn’t we?)

> All of the students in our district are tested with the state standardized test. We can use accomodations listed in the IEP. With probably the most being a student who had the test read, and his answers written down.

Yes, but to some students the accommodations are not reasonable. Only 5% of a school can be excluded, so that kids are getting tested with Down’s syndrome, etc. The charter school I worked at had a Downs’ kid in a regular grade who read on a primer level. The testing makes no sense. It wouldn’t matter if my nephew got the test read or anything else, he goes nuts under such a situation. He isn’t alone. Also if the test is for reading comprehension, does it prove anything if an ld kid is read to. No, because then it is “listening comprehension” not reading comprehension, so you end up testing something else. The only modifications that make much sense are time and room modifications. You could place some kids in a room by themselves and give them 3 weeks and it wouldn’t help.

I also think it discriminates against any school willing to take and work with lower income kids. Of course we don’t want excuses, but these kids are often years behind, even as they enter school. What we need is more funding for Head Start and other programs that reach these kids.

I stand beside the opinion that *if* something were actually done, ie the schools actually did remediate children that were behind. But there’s no funding for it. It’s an unfunded mandate, the only part of which the schools understand is test test test. The no. of schools actually accomplishing anythign else, well I don’t see it.

Some schools have done great things but it has never had anythign to do with testing. Marva Collins had her grade school kids reading Shakesphere. I think under NCLB she could not have done that as it is not on the state mandate.

—des

Someone, I think Beth, mentioned that now there was tutoring for the kids in the school her child is in. Oh that’s great, but how often is it? What’s the teacher’s knowledge and skill? * What approaches are being used? etc. For example if they are tutoring in reading and they don’t use
some proven technique they might as well let the kid go and play.

* I think the schools have zip understanding of teacher’s knowledge and skill because the meter they are using is the same one as it is for kids. TESTING. A teacher is only considered “highly qualified” if they have taken and passed upteen standardized tests. I think we can agree that testing doesn’t prove the quality of the teacher. There are former “Teacher of the Years” that flunked the teacher certification tests. There are PhDs who have flunked the basic skills tests. They’d rather have a college grad who had passed them then someone with 25 years experience who hasn’t. (I speak from experience.)

—des

Actually, Des, I’ve been in quite a few classes where I couldn’t do a thing other people were doing. Imagine being blind in one eye and totally lacking in depth perception, and being sent out onto a volleyball court or softball field without a clue how the game is played or what the rules are and having everyone yelling at you for some mistake, whatever the heck it was. Or imagine being barely able to print and being skipped out of a Grade 1 class into Grade 2 and being expected to know the date (against the rules for anyone to tell it to you) and having your work that you must hand in refused without it; and later being told to write a story and being kept after school for an hour because you can’t write. Not fun. Luckily I survived, and I’m not going to say that the school can’t have kids play volleyball or expect grade 2 kids to write just because I was the outsider in those places. My father was severely colourblind and got a lot of grief in his art classes, his work posted as examples of what not to do. I’m not going to say that schools can’t expect kids to do art because some are colourblind. I flunked sports tests and writing tests and my dad flunked art tests and my mom flunked singing tests (ouch is all I can say) and well, we just aren’t skilled in those areas. It would have been nice, a lot more educational, if there had been more support and more positive approaches to teaching before testing, and I’m not going to deliberately wish experiences like this on kids, but you can’t protect them from all negative experiences as they go through society. Sometimes you just fail at something, and learning to get past failure and work over or around it is a good skill. I still can’t play volleyball but taught myself to ski downhill, dad could never draw artistically but taught himself to do lovely neat electronic diagrams, and we just try to convince mom not to sing ever. I meet a certain number of young people with a real chip on their shoulders, who expect to get a free ticket through everything. They tend to flunk out of college quite fast and don’t do well on the job market either. Sometimes they turn around and try, but others I can’t help at all because nothing is ever their problem, the whole world has to change to suit them and sorry it isn’t going to.

In the dark ages when I was young, we had a school and testing system that was very different from the present American one. We did *not* have the quizzes every week and constant grading of every letter you write that is common now; it was much more restful that way. We did however have huge high-stakes testing every year. Three sets of major exams per year, starting in Grade 4, regular school classes stopped and everyone in the gym for two to three hours of major essay exams twice a day for a week or so. The December and March exams were more or less for practice, 10% of the final. The final June exams counted for 80% of the final mark in the course, talk about high-stakes. Also individual oral French exams, given by an outside expert, starting in Grade 3. The funny thing is that *fewer* kids failed under that system; 90 to 95% of every class passed every year. And there was no huge number of student breakdowns, in fact most of us were ridiculously healthy and quite oblivious to stress. So I am extremely dubious about huge scare tactics about the supposed “dangers” of all testing. (Yes there’s bad testing and there are bad applications, but that is a different issue.)

The return to major school testing is very recent, in most places in North America in the last five or ten years. Before that there was a twenty to thirty year gap from the 1970’s through the 1990’s where most schools set whatever standards or non-standards they felt like, and schools were subjected to continuous pressure to inflate grades. Education is a long-term process, and the teachers have to be educated too, so the effects of new testing policies are barely beginning to be seen. I believe that the long slide in reading and math is slowing or stopping — somebody here should have data on that — and there are occasional signs of light where there is a small increase. It will take another five to ten years of a serious education policy to really turn things around.

Des, I looked at the anti-testing site you quoted, and well, it was very long on diatribes and very short on facts. There may be some facts in there but after hitting five links and finding nothing but “testing is bad” repeated in every possible phrasing, I got tired of hunting for a rationale for the belief.

>Actually, Des, I’ve been in quite a few classes where I couldn’t do a thing other people were doing.

I don’t have to imagine this, Victoria. I was there. My experiences were pretty similar.

>hour because you can’t write. Not fun. Luckily I survived, and I’m not going to say that the school can’t have kids play volleyball or expect grade 2 kids to write just because I was the outsider in those places.

No— we aren’t/wouldn’t expect to have schools where everyone did what everyone could do as that would eliminate the whole curriculum.
But even though you (and I and our parents) failed a lot of things, we still did manage to get thru.

>In the dark ages when I was young, we had a school and testing system that was very different from the present American one. We did *not* have the quizzes every week and constant grading of every letter you write that is common now; it was much more restful that way. We did however have huge high-stakes testing every year.

I did have the Iowa tests circa 1888. :-) See they have been around awhile, but they weren’t high stakes. We weren’t prepped for them, and were told basically we couldn’t fail them. I did have quizes and pop quizes, midterms and finals. I’m assuming lots of the grade came from papers, midterms, finals, class particiation, etc. I mean all the things a grade reasonably comes from.

>And there was no huge number of student breakdowns, in fact most of us were ridiculously healthy and quite oblivious to stress. So I am extremely dubious about huge scare tactics about the supposed “dangers” of all testing. (Yes there’s bad testing and there are bad applications, but that is a different issue.)

Yes but you just said it wasn’t high stakes testing. There are stories about the testing in Japan. And England has moved away from the high stakes single test. Do we really want to get to that situation?

And then I’m not saying that the testing is extremely harmful (may not be great) for all the kids, but that it is very bad for some of the kids.
It would be ok if we could exempt such kids, etc. But that’s not allowed under the NCLB where they are testing fragile kids like my nephew, kids with Down’s (I think it is ridiculous though I doubt they are hurt by it), mentally ill kids, etc.

> I believe that the long slide in reading and math is slowing or stopping — somebody here should have data on that — and there are occasional signs of light where there is a small increase. It will take another five to ten years of a serious education policy to really turn things around.

Or at least it looks like it is stopping. I know that school districts are fudging data and cooking the books. We know that happened in Texas.

>Des, I looked at the anti-testing site you quoted, and well, it was very long on diatribes and very short on facts. There may be some facts in there but after hitting five links and finding nothing but “testing is bad” repeated in every possible phrasing, I got tired of hunting for a rationale for the belief.

Well I maybe read more of it than you did. There was quite a lot of data.
And some rationale type arguments using logic, which you are using on me as well (and I on you).

—des

>less for practice, 10% of the final. The final June exams counted for 80% of the final mark in the course, talk about high-stakes. Also individual oral French exams, given by an outside expert, starting in Grade 3. The funny thing is that *fewer* kids failed under that system; 90 to 95% of every class passed every year. And there was no huge number of student breakdowns, in fact most of us were ridiculously healthy and quite oblivious to stress. So I am extremely dubious about huge scare tactics about the supposed “dangers” of all testing. (Yes there’s bad testing and there are bad applications, but that is a different issue.)

I misrepresented you here when I said but that wasn’t “high stakes”. It was, but since it was given by the school directly there was still a matter of discretion that could be used. NCLB testing doesn’t offer discretion or anything close.

The other thing is taht the fragile kids weren’t in school back then. They were kept them home, institutionalized, or in a closet or whatever.

—des

Its the federal AYP guidelines. Schools can only exempt 1 percent of their population from standardized tests. Luckily my district is choosing who has a chance to pass the state tests at grade level, and just choosing to give the other students below level tests and counting them as failures. We can at least get some data from the tests, btw I am in TX. Where all this started. The politicians are so out of touch. Sorry.

Okay, y’all hit a major hot button of mine. High stakes testing has just finished its first year in Georgia…third grade only, I believe. I left NC just as it was beginning to have an impact, and had the general sped teacher perspective that testing was first, taking away from valuable testing time, and second, not relevant to my students, since they probably couldn’t pass the tests anyway. My conclusion was that high stakes testing was patently unfair for students with LDs.

However, I did have one student who tested at Level 4 in reading…if I remember correctly, that meant that he was ABOVE the expected level of competency. The only modifications he was provided, per state regs (and my ignorance) was extended time. That kiddo began testing at 9 in the morning and finished somewhere between 12 and 1 in the afternoon. Thank goodness I had some crackers in my room or we all would have been a mess by the end of testing. Needless to say, I’d been working on decoding and comprehension but had not worked hard enough on fluency!

Based upon his EOG scores, the perception of the school toward this student changed dramatically. He left the ranks of “one of those kids” and began to be viewed as a potential HS grad/college student. The EOG testing had a huge impact on the perception of the school toward my student. I’d tried to tell people he was smart, but all they saw was that he couldn’t read fluently and was in special ed.

FFW to today. I moved to GA, left the public school system, and am now tutoring. I am a HUGE proponent of high stakes testing at this point. I left the school system because my there was no way my LD students were ever going to be able to graduate from high school, and the expectation was that they’d drop out and/or get pregnant anyway, so why bother…their kids or my taxes, maybe? The initial impact of high stakes testing in Georgia is that the approach to struggling students is MUCH more aggressive. I’m getting parents of children in first or second grade calling me about tutoring because teachers are raising big red flags.

A majority of these students are probably NOT LD, but would appear to be so for the rest of their lives if they were not remediated. Previously I had a number of students who were just carried through until they dropped out or their parents transferred them to private schools. I love the fact that I am getting students who can be helped significantly because the intervention is early enough to avoid almost permanent delays due to lack of exposure to content area materials.

While I am sure that high stakes testing is inappropriate for a small percentage of students, I believe that it benenfits many more because it forces the schools to be proactive and does not allow students to be passed through without real learning occuring.

IN GA it is still an experiment and I’m sure that there will be backlash and ways around the testing, but right now I’m seeing many more positives than negatives from this type of criterion-based measure.

Stepping down now….

Karyn

Karyn,

I mostly agree with what you’re saying. I do see that people care about the special ed. kids for the first time since their testing counts.

But stepping into my mother role, I will tell you that I am not sure my own LD child will be able to pass those tests. Even the math is all reasoning and higher order thinking, it’s not really math at all. A child with a language based LD will have a heck of a time on the math (even read aloud) and reading comp tests in NC in 3rd and certainly by fifth grade.

I’m afraid I’m going to be forced into homeschooling before too long. At least I can also do my private reading practice if I do. But it makes me sick that these tests may cause us to withdraw her.

Janis

Karyn,
I agree with you also. I see for the first time that the students on IEPs are accessing the general education curriculum because the expectation is that they will pass the MCAS. This is a major change in thinking where previously the curriculum was “watered down.”
For my own son who is now in 9th grade, the recommendation was that he be in Level 3 courses (1 being honors and 4 being the lowest). My expectation was that he should be in Level 2 because he had to have access to the curriculum and pass the 10th grade MCAS (high stakes testing). They can’t sell him short now.
He needs the accommodations but he can do anything!
Karen