.2 Testing and Accountability

Let's look at testing. Typically we have post-hoc documentation. That is a fancy way of saying that we don't find out if people were successful or fail until after everything is done. You get the best evidence of how well you the kids do after the final examination and they are no longer there. I know what you learned and what you didn't learn, but you're no longer here, so I can't teach you the things you didn't learn. Isn't that a dumb system? I would rather have a final examination that would come about 3 weeks before the end of the term. Find out then what you haven't learned, and have another shot at teaching you the things that you haven't learned. I think that'd be a better system. Post hoc documentation of failure is not so good.

There is a confusion of test scores and standards. The score you get on the test isn't necessarily reflective of the standard of your education. There may be a whole lot of reasons why you get a low test score that are irrelevant. In the same way, when a student gets a high score because they cheated, that's not a very high standard either. So you have a lot of reasons why test scores do not necessarily reflect standards in education. You want students to feel responsible for their education

Students should decide what kind of grades they want to get - what's important for them. There was this one women that I worked with for a whole year to make sure that she got a B instead of an A and was still comfortable with that. And after a whole year of doing the best I could, the "worst" I could get out of her was a B+. She was so compulsive about getting A's that it just didn't feel right unless she was doing destructive, compulsive kinds of things. And to get her to loosen up was almost impossible. Let me tell you about a student I knew at Stanford University - a women who every quarter was sure she was failing everything - and then at the end of the semester she would get all A's. You'd think that the next quarter she'd know that she was doing well, but no, she was still as frantic:

"I'm failing everything" ..And then she'd get A's. Now that just sounds slightly amusing until you realize that after she graduated from Stanford University with Phi Beta Kappa honors, she never made her life work. Why? Because she never had confidence to know when she had won. She was Phi Beta Kappa, but her life didn't work. She never could estimate how well she was really doing. Now is that a high standard? That's lousy. That's stupid. So let's not confuse test scores or grades with high standards. It would be a higher standard for Nancy to get a whole pot full of B's and have a successful life. You need to know how hard to you need to work to get

the result you want or need to get. And if you consistently get results that surprise you , something is wrong. Either something is wrong from the teacher's side - not telling you what the expectation is - or something is wrong from the student's perspective - not knowing how hard to work or what's been learned.

That's bad stuff-not to know when you've learned what you need to learn. Teachers need to spend more time helping students become comfortable to know what they need to know.

In this class I try to do that by giving you sample quizzes, interactive questions, a detailed syllabus and clear requirements - to give you feedback in terms of knowing what you know. It's a very important thing. This is not just one of those little sidebars; it's very very important. Let's not confuse test scores with standards.

Let's also not confuse test frequency with standards. Right now, we live in a time where everybody is testing everybody all the time. Testing. Testing. Testing. As if giving more tests is a higher standard. Baloney. The fewer tests I give the better, so long as those tests give me feedback to know how well my students are doing and give students feedback to know how well they're doing. More testing is a waste of time. You want to have a minimum number of tests with maximum of feedback.

	If a student gets an A is that always a higher standard than getting a B?	Answer Here
	Mr. Allen teaches an eleventh grade American History class. The school system that he works for insists that he give his final examination at the same time that the rest of the district does. Mr. Allen wants to be sure that any gaps in the curriculum are filled in before the final examination and still have time to reinforce the points that some students missed before they move on to another class (or fail this one). What is one way that Mr. Allen can accomplish both goals before the end of the term?	Answer Here