On this link, there is a test question that hit the schools in New York State and the questions regarding that story.
Simply put, if you don’t take the time to do this test, ( 5 minutes) you should not have any say in education.
Once you see this, you cannot have any qualms as to why our children are failing….
- It is not the teachers.
- It is not the principals.
- It is not the school boards.
- It is the test.
Btw, what score did you get?
Why is this so?
Well let’s examine what happens when a state or a school district fails? Angry parents call their legislators. Legislators demand more tests. More tests cost more money. Legislators demand and get more money to make more tests to help analyze and to study the problem.
Our question is: who gets rich?
- A. The Governor
- B. Mark Murphy (Delaware Head of Department of Education)
- C. Principal Skinner (on The Simpsons and all like him)
- D. The Testing organization.
What score did you get?
If every student passed the first time with flying colors, … hmmm. I wonder how many tests there would be then? Hmmmm.
kavips 
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February 19, 2013 at 10:44 pm
John Young
Reblogged this on Transparent Christina.
February 20, 2013 at 9:50 am
Mike O.
Are we talking about getting low scores on standardized tests, or failing actual academic courses?
Because for low scores on DCAS, there is no coherent data for answering the question Why. How far back do you have to go, what data do you look at, to see why the student didn’t know the answer to a particular question? Cause and correlation are all mixed together at that point and there are no convincing answers.
But for the failing academic courses, it is much easier. The answer to “Why did this student fail” has an easy answer: “Because their grade was too low.”
To begin, don’t wait until they have failed a whole year to ask “Why.” Ask “why” after they have failed a single marking period or even a single test. Then, all the relevant data is clustered into the previous few weeks. You can review the practice and homework assignments one at a time until you find the source of the failure. You could even review the test with the student and ask HIM why!
Waiting for bigger more dramatic failures is too late.
This is why our Education Insight data system is D.O.A – because it doesn’t track daily classroom data. It only tracks the big failures.
February 20, 2013 at 1:39 pm
John Young
data integrity concerns? update: http://transparentchristina.wordpress.com/2013/02/20/so-last-night-i-went-to-tell-delaware-for-a-response-rate-update-and-this-happened-edude-netde-nocontrol/
February 20, 2013 at 2:26 pm
kavips
Mike, on this I believe we are talking about achieving getting higher DCAS scores over time, but dropping lower on the other national standardized tests, such as those being used for college entrance.
The conclusion drawn, is that we are “teaching to the test” because that is how “we” are being rated, and we are not, teaching our kids how to think on their own. Consequently they do poorer on other national tests relative to states just teaching the school subjects….
Or if you are referring to my headline, my point was that the tests are so stupid, (see the Hare and the Pineapple) that even kids taking them are going… “huh?” And if we had simply used test questions pulled out of the backs of textbooks, we would do much better…
As for analyzing over the course of the year, I would have to disagree our system is DOA. I think teachers do a great job of monitoring and informing parents if they see problems arising with each child. Sometimes unfortunately those problems are too big and too great, and cannot be rectified by just studying a little longer.
February 20, 2013 at 2:44 pm
Mike O.
I think teachers do a great job of monitoring and informing parents if they see problems arising with each child.
Yes, the efforts of individual teachers are always the bright spot, aren’t they?
But we also need to record the data and use it going forward. Daily classroom data contains a rich source of trends and patterns that can help every student, not just one. We shouldn’t leave it on the table unexplored. The mind of a teacher can be capacious but not as capacious as a modern computer.
February 20, 2013 at 5:25 pm
John Young
weren’t computers designed and created by capacious minds?
Is this a chicken and egg question?
July 7, 2014 at 12:35 am
All About Common Core, Charters, and Public Education | kavips
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