Standardized Testing Is Essential to Education

[frigidweirdo]

So I was a music teacher, and I believe you're a chef. Both of these disciplines (well, i can only imagine yours from what little I know about cooking) require both good knowledge AND good skills. And learning to synchronize those is the learning of a lifetime, IMO. Disciplines like these do not grow from cramming for a test. They grow slowly over time, like a healthy tree, growing up and branching out as more knowledge and skills are acquired. THAT is what a test cannot measure....and it's the best kind of integrated learning.

Yep, a teacher often walks in a classroom and has no clue what they're doing. In places like China, they still have no clue when they're retiring, because they get told that good teaching is what we call "shit teaching".

 

[Woodznutz]

The left controls the puclic schools and test scored have declined. They want to cover that up

Lower test scores are an indictment of the educational system as well as the students. Everyone is a victim of liberal permissiveness.

 

[SweetSue92]

Yep, a teacher often walks in a classroom and has no clue what they're doing. In places like China, they still have no clue when they're retiring, because they get told that good teaching is what we call "shit teaching".

A good teacher has the foundational knowledge and skills in their content area, AND the ability to teach those to students at many different skill levels. And teaching is a completely different set of skills than just being able to do it.

Another example:

Many adults can read.

Not many adults can teach a class of first graders to read, especially given that some are at fourth grade level and others don't know their letters.

 

[frigidweirdo]

A good teacher has the foundational knowledge and skills in their content area, AND the ability to teach those to students at many different skill levels. And teaching is a completely different set of skills than just being able to do it.

Another example:

Many adults can read.

Not many adults can teach a class of first graders to read, especially given that some are at fourth grade level and others don't know their letters.

There's a good example of this. They got some of the top people in their fields to teach ghetto kids from London in the UK.

I think it was David Starkey, Historian, renowned in his field. He had lost the kids within about five seconds.

David Starkey teaching history to failed kids

Audio only, but worth listening to. Click on the white space where the normal video appears. Best wishes, Bob

community.sketchucation.com

He didn't have a clue what to do.

 

[Woodznutz]

Well then no need for medical residency. If the student can pass the test--which the OP says is the ONLY way to ascertain what a student has learned--then good to go.

Imagine passing a test on heart surgery and then cracking open a chest cavity and going at it. Well, there it is. Doesn't matter what the senior doctors observed during residency; the student passed the test.

I think you are conflating schoolhouse learning with life experience. Students don't have life experience yet; they are still kids. I have grad school student tenants that don't know how to flatten an Amazon box.

 

[rosends]

Tests are tools. They only have value if you know how and why you are using them so you choose the right one, use it appropriately and draw relevant conclusions from it. But since there are so many style, aims and methods, it is hard to make a general statement about all tests. What is important to note is that if we are talking about third-party standardized tests used generally by colleges to evaluate student knowledge, then there is real value not to the test part as much as the "standardized" part.

I teach English in a private school in New Jersey. A student in a rural town in Iowa also takes "high school English." because a college doesn't have (nor does it have the ability or interest in evaluating) each curriculum, it needs those diverse students to take the same assessment so that the students can be directly compared (false assumption, but the best one we have) with each other.

 

[frigidweirdo]

I think you are conflating schoolhouse learning with life experience. Students don't have life experience yet; they are still kids. I have grad school student tenants that don't know how to flatten an Amazon box.

Well, the problem with "schoolhouse learning" is that it's not the be all and end all.

So, other things are, and other things might be taught at school where you can't have a standardized test.

 

[sparky]

But you learned it. You can DO it. Maybe a test can't measure that, but you acquired the skills and the knowledge to accomplish.

I had some d*mn good mentors Sue......

~S~

 

[Woodznutz]

Well, the problem with "schoolhouse learning" is that it's not the be all and end all.

So, other things are, and other things might be taught at school where you can't have a standardized test.

The be all end all occurs in life after graduation, which sadly, even the best students are not prepared for by their schoolhouse education. In fact, life after graduation can be a very rude awakening.

 

[frigidweirdo]

The be all end all occurs in life after graduation, which sadly, even the best students are not prepared for by their schoolhouse education.

I was totally unprepared.

I went to Austria and taught there for 8 months and saw kids learning work skills from the age of 13, so at 18 they could walk into a job. I had no idea what I wanted to do at 28.

 

[Woodznutz]

I was totally unprepared.

I went to Austria and taught there for 8 months and saw kids learning work skills from the age of 13, so at 18 they could walk into a job. I had no idea what I wanted to do at 28.

I went from part-time work at a supermarket during high school to full time when I graduated. From there I went into the meat department as a meat cutter. Loved it, and the pay was pretty good eventually. College was out of the question.

Absolutely nothing I learned in school prepared me for life after school (except reading and math of course).

 

[Seymour Flops]

My kick-ass comprehension skills does not mean I should have became a doctor.

Nor an English grammar teacher, certainly.

Just kidding!

I hate it, but it "has grew" ubiquitous, so I guess it will become correct.

 

[frigidweirdo]

I went from part-time work at a supermarket during high school to full time when I graduated. From there I went into the meat department as a meat cutter. Loved it, and the pay was pretty good eventually. College was out of the question.

Absolutely nothing I learned in school prepared me for life after school (except reading and math of course).

Yep, same here. The difference was I didn't know what to do when I left school, I went to college because it was something to do. From there I ended up abroad earning almost nothing, but learned Spanish.

 

[initforme]

What about the students who randomly pick an answer, or dont try at all. Or purposely get problems wrong to spite others. Should those tests be counted? Should the school scores be downgraded because of that 5 percent?