Testing, Testing, and More Testing
March 4, 2009
Dear School Board Members:
At district schools across San Diego, students of all ages are overwhelmed by the number of standardized tests they have to take in a school year. Some of these standardized tests are not mandated by the state, but are created by and implemented through the district. Elementary students in grades 1 through 6 take a variety of district tests including, but not limited to, an on-demand writing assessment, three Literacy benchmark tests, one Math inventory test, three Math benchmark tests, and three Science benchmark tests each school year.[1] These standardized tests are often developmentally inappropriate and take away from instructional time for the express purpose of serving as an “early-warning” system to identify students who may perform poorly on the federally-mandated standardized tests. We believe that there are better ways to identify and support at-risk students than simply increasing the amount of tests they take. Therefore, we are proposing the following reforms to district assessment and reporting practices for Kindergarten through Grade 6, along with our rationale for each:
Challenge: District standardized tests are using excessive amounts of instructional time, are developmentally-inappropriate for many students, and are measuring surface-level understandings.
Recommendation: Eliminate district-level standardized tests and replace them with more developmentally-appropriate assessments. Students will be given one-on-one, teacher-administered performance assessments addressing grade-level standards three times a year during the time normally allotted by the district for parent-teacher conferences (45 minutes per student). Please refer to the attached document for examples of first grade and fourth grade performance assessments.
Rationale: The Educational Testing Service estimates that, on average, students spend about four full instructional days completing district benchmark and diagnostic tests. Combined with state-wide testing in grades 2-6, this amounts to approximately 5% of the school year.[2] We believe that this is an inappropriate use of valuable instructional time. In addition, standardized testing can be especially damaging to our youngest students. According to the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI), there are several reasons to avoid testing young children, including the potential for increased pressure, lowered self-esteem, harmful tracking and labeling, limited educational possibilities, and lowered expectations. In addition, the ACEI states that standardized tests are often invalid or unreliable for assessing a young child’s academic achievement due to age-related factors such as the students’ inability to understand the significance of the testing, short attention spans, tendency to mark favored items rather than correct answers, and difficulty following multi-step directions.[3] Beyond the challenges of validity and test administration, standardized testing asks kids to recall “facts and skills in isolation, seldom requiring students to apply what they know and can do in real life situations,”[4] often to the detriment of their overall educational development.
Challenge: Teachers are not provided with adequate professional development to learn how to select and implement proper instructional practices, to engage in creating meaningful assessment tools, and to interpret assessment data for the purposes of informing instruction.
Recommendation: In order to adequately prepare teachers to administer the one-on-one performance assessments described above, additional professional development will be necessary. Before the school year begins, time will be dedicated to grade-level meetings during which teams will create long-term plans of when each standard will be addressed. This will ensure consistency and equity among the classes in each grade. In addition, continued teacher training will be scheduled throughout the year on district minimum days to help teachers learn how to provide equitable experiences for their students to demonstrate their proficiency level, and to have adequate time to interpret and discuss assessment results.
Rationale: In a joint position statement from the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) and the National Association of Early Childhood Specialists in State Departments of Education (NAECS/SDE), “Professional development is key to effective child assessment.” This professional development helps to build what the Associations call “assessment literacy,” which is the “knowledge of assessment principles, issues, and tools.”[5] This knowledge helps teachers understand how to select and implement various forms of assessment that will best meet the needs of their students.
Challenge: Families are upset over, confused about, or completely left out of the current practices used to measure and communicate student progress.
Recommendation: Traditional parent-teacher conferences will be replaced by student-led reflections of his or her work. During normal conference times, students will come to school with their parents to discuss their educational progress. In the meeting, the teacher will lead a conversation in which the student displays and evaluates evidence of his or her work in relation to the state standards using the performance assessment format described above. Then the parents, teacher, and student will work together to set individual goals for the next grading period (see attached document for an example of a goal-setting form). Involving the parents in these meetings will promote a clearer understanding of their child’s educational development. If the parents are unable to attend the conference, the assessment and goal-setting portions of the conference will still be conducted with the student, and the results will be sent home or communicated during a separate meeting with the parents. The focus of future meetings will be on the student’s progress toward meeting his or her own goals.
Rationale: We believe that this type of conference format will allow for a more authentic, personalized, and developmentally-appropriate setting in which students are able to demonstrate their knowledge. It will also allow teachers to better differentiate instruction for each student based on the personal goals set by the student, parents, and teacher. Furthermore, it provides students with an opportunity to look at their own work with a critical eye.
The National Coalition for Parent Involvement in Education (NCPIE) states, “Teacher outreach to parents results in strong, consistent gains in student performance in both reading and math. Effective outreach practices include: meeting face to face, sending learning materials home, and keeping in touch about progress.” In addition, NCPIE asserts that “students with involved parents, no matter what their income or background, and more likely to: attend school regularly, have better social skills, show improved behavior, and adapt well to school.”[6] We believe that it is the right of all parents to be properly informed about their child’s education at all grade levels, and that parent involvement should be encouraged in all areas of education, including assessment.
In conclusion, we believe that these three recommendations will greatly benefit the entire San Diego school community by decreasing time spent on district standardized tests and improving the formats for assessment and communication of student progress. We look forward to discussing this proposal in greater depth with you in the near future.
Sincerely,
Sam Gladwell Janna Steffan
[1] Source: San Diego Unified School District Testing Calendar. http://www.sandi.net/indices/staff.htm
[2] Source: Educational Testing Service Online Q & A “Log On. Let’s Talk.” http://www.ets.org
[3] Source: Association for Childhood Education International. “On Standardized Testing: A Position Paper of the Association for Childhood Education International.” http://users.stargate.net/~cokids/Standard.testsNOT.html
[4] Source: North Central Regional Educational Laboratory. “Critical Issue: Rethinking Assessment and Its Role in Supporting Educational Reform.” http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/methods/assment/as700.htm
[5] Source: National Association for the Education of Young Children and the National Association of Early Childhood Specialists in State Departments of Education. “2003 Joint Position Statement on Early Childhood Curriculum, Assessment, and Program Evaluation.” http://naeyc.org/about/positions/cape.asp
[6] Source: The National Coalition for Parent Involvement in Education. “A New Wave of Evidence: The Impact of School, Family and Community Connections on Student Achievement.” http://www.ncpie.org/whatshappening/researchjanuary2006.html
Dear School Board Members:
At district schools across San Diego, students of all ages are overwhelmed by the number of standardized tests they have to take in a school year. Some of these standardized tests are not mandated by the state, but are created by and implemented through the district. Elementary students in grades 1 through 6 take a variety of district tests including, but not limited to, an on-demand writing assessment, three Literacy benchmark tests, one Math inventory test, three Math benchmark tests, and three Science benchmark tests each school year.[1] These standardized tests are often developmentally inappropriate and take away from instructional time for the express purpose of serving as an “early-warning” system to identify students who may perform poorly on the federally-mandated standardized tests. We believe that there are better ways to identify and support at-risk students than simply increasing the amount of tests they take. Therefore, we are proposing the following reforms to district assessment and reporting practices for Kindergarten through Grade 6, along with our rationale for each:
Challenge: District standardized tests are using excessive amounts of instructional time, are developmentally-inappropriate for many students, and are measuring surface-level understandings.
Recommendation: Eliminate district-level standardized tests and replace them with more developmentally-appropriate assessments. Students will be given one-on-one, teacher-administered performance assessments addressing grade-level standards three times a year during the time normally allotted by the district for parent-teacher conferences (45 minutes per student). Please refer to the attached document for examples of first grade and fourth grade performance assessments.
Rationale: The Educational Testing Service estimates that, on average, students spend about four full instructional days completing district benchmark and diagnostic tests. Combined with state-wide testing in grades 2-6, this amounts to approximately 5% of the school year.[2] We believe that this is an inappropriate use of valuable instructional time. In addition, standardized testing can be especially damaging to our youngest students. According to the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI), there are several reasons to avoid testing young children, including the potential for increased pressure, lowered self-esteem, harmful tracking and labeling, limited educational possibilities, and lowered expectations. In addition, the ACEI states that standardized tests are often invalid or unreliable for assessing a young child’s academic achievement due to age-related factors such as the students’ inability to understand the significance of the testing, short attention spans, tendency to mark favored items rather than correct answers, and difficulty following multi-step directions.[3] Beyond the challenges of validity and test administration, standardized testing asks kids to recall “facts and skills in isolation, seldom requiring students to apply what they know and can do in real life situations,”[4] often to the detriment of their overall educational development.
Challenge: Teachers are not provided with adequate professional development to learn how to select and implement proper instructional practices, to engage in creating meaningful assessment tools, and to interpret assessment data for the purposes of informing instruction.
Recommendation: In order to adequately prepare teachers to administer the one-on-one performance assessments described above, additional professional development will be necessary. Before the school year begins, time will be dedicated to grade-level meetings during which teams will create long-term plans of when each standard will be addressed. This will ensure consistency and equity among the classes in each grade. In addition, continued teacher training will be scheduled throughout the year on district minimum days to help teachers learn how to provide equitable experiences for their students to demonstrate their proficiency level, and to have adequate time to interpret and discuss assessment results.
Rationale: In a joint position statement from the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) and the National Association of Early Childhood Specialists in State Departments of Education (NAECS/SDE), “Professional development is key to effective child assessment.” This professional development helps to build what the Associations call “assessment literacy,” which is the “knowledge of assessment principles, issues, and tools.”[5] This knowledge helps teachers understand how to select and implement various forms of assessment that will best meet the needs of their students.
Challenge: Families are upset over, confused about, or completely left out of the current practices used to measure and communicate student progress.
Recommendation: Traditional parent-teacher conferences will be replaced by student-led reflections of his or her work. During normal conference times, students will come to school with their parents to discuss their educational progress. In the meeting, the teacher will lead a conversation in which the student displays and evaluates evidence of his or her work in relation to the state standards using the performance assessment format described above. Then the parents, teacher, and student will work together to set individual goals for the next grading period (see attached document for an example of a goal-setting form). Involving the parents in these meetings will promote a clearer understanding of their child’s educational development. If the parents are unable to attend the conference, the assessment and goal-setting portions of the conference will still be conducted with the student, and the results will be sent home or communicated during a separate meeting with the parents. The focus of future meetings will be on the student’s progress toward meeting his or her own goals.
Rationale: We believe that this type of conference format will allow for a more authentic, personalized, and developmentally-appropriate setting in which students are able to demonstrate their knowledge. It will also allow teachers to better differentiate instruction for each student based on the personal goals set by the student, parents, and teacher. Furthermore, it provides students with an opportunity to look at their own work with a critical eye.
The National Coalition for Parent Involvement in Education (NCPIE) states, “Teacher outreach to parents results in strong, consistent gains in student performance in both reading and math. Effective outreach practices include: meeting face to face, sending learning materials home, and keeping in touch about progress.” In addition, NCPIE asserts that “students with involved parents, no matter what their income or background, and more likely to: attend school regularly, have better social skills, show improved behavior, and adapt well to school.”[6] We believe that it is the right of all parents to be properly informed about their child’s education at all grade levels, and that parent involvement should be encouraged in all areas of education, including assessment.
In conclusion, we believe that these three recommendations will greatly benefit the entire San Diego school community by decreasing time spent on district standardized tests and improving the formats for assessment and communication of student progress. We look forward to discussing this proposal in greater depth with you in the near future.
Sincerely,
Sam Gladwell Janna Steffan
[1] Source: San Diego Unified School District Testing Calendar. http://www.sandi.net/indices/staff.htm
[2] Source: Educational Testing Service Online Q & A “Log On. Let’s Talk.” http://www.ets.org
[3] Source: Association for Childhood Education International. “On Standardized Testing: A Position Paper of the Association for Childhood Education International.” http://users.stargate.net/~cokids/Standard.testsNOT.html
[4] Source: North Central Regional Educational Laboratory. “Critical Issue: Rethinking Assessment and Its Role in Supporting Educational Reform.” http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/methods/assment/as700.htm
[5] Source: National Association for the Education of Young Children and the National Association of Early Childhood Specialists in State Departments of Education. “2003 Joint Position Statement on Early Childhood Curriculum, Assessment, and Program Evaluation.” http://naeyc.org/about/positions/cape.asp
[6] Source: The National Coalition for Parent Involvement in Education. “A New Wave of Evidence: The Impact of School, Family and Community Connections on Student Achievement.” http://www.ncpie.org/whatshappening/researchjanuary2006.html
