Gleaning Facebook: The Test That Shall Not Be Named

The Test That Shall Not Be Named Fortnight at school begins this morning. Best wishes to students and teachers. For the first time in a "Fortyear" I am not having to endure these incredibly boring and stressful days at school. Retirement has its blessings.

Comments

Jane Jameson
Retirement is not for the faint of heart! You will find something to occupy your time and interest.

Jody Brock
Unfortunately our children are having to endure what bureaucrats deem necessary.

George Barton
Is this the test where the teachers in Atlanta cheat so the children will pass, and they will get a bonus, or go to jail if they get caught cheating?

Laurie Craw
I'm not up on the issue of testing TS. What is different now from when we oldsters were in school? I vaguely remember the occasional standardized test.....

Terrell Shaw
Mounting soapbox...

When we were kids, Laurie, we took nationally normed achievement tests. Today the tests are criterion-referenced. They are based specifically on the Georgia Performance Standards for each grade level. Students who score 800 or more "meet" standards. 799 or less and they "Do Bot Meet" standards (Shame dispair, and misery). 850 and more they "Exceed standards" Teacher evaluations are based, in part, on how students achieve on the five subject-area tests.

Students must "Meet", supposedly, to advance to the next grade level. In reality the Reading test must be passed in third, and the Reading and Math in the Fifth. Fourth grade is not a "must pass" grade so fourth gets somewhat neglected like other "Non-critical" years.

Of course the home lives of the kids, relative native-intelligence, class size, charter/private school raiding of a community, etc. are not factored. When you take those things into consideration, public schools at least match and often surpass private schools on the TTSNBN, and, as a bonus, the kids may actually learn to respect a variety of races, religions, and socio-economic levels.

It takes a very dedicated teacher to jump through the bureaucratic hoops, make sure the GPS standards are mastered, and still teach the important stuff: how to work in a group, how to really use the language (speaking, listening, reading, writing), how to shake hands, what a republic is all about, how to find your passion and live it, to respect yourself and others, to really look at a rock, or leaf, or butterfly, and discover something for yourself, and of yourself, etc.

Down from my soapbox.

Jane Jameson
Your students were very fortunate to have you teaching them.

Ralph Noble
One more for me, with new CRCT coming out next year and bound to worse, just another reason to retire.

Stacie Hembree Buffington
Kyle says he has been thinking about The Test That Shall Not Be Named AKA Lord Voldemort Be Dead. Lol

John Countryman
May they die an ignoble death on the sharp point of reason!

Jane Jameson
I am thankful I no longer must be subjected to those exams! Terrell, I am grateful for you as a teacher who taught children like my grandchildren. You have a gift.

Alice Jeffries Keel
Can we say "read aloud"? - from a nameless accommodating person.