Think Bigger!!

As we quickly approach the next chapter of our education, student teaching, we have a lot to think about.  One of the topics that always seems to be the invisible elephant in the room is high-stakes assessments.  I have a feeling that this is present no matter where you are at in your education or in your career as an educator.  Whether you support them or are against these tests, I think it is easy to say we need to improve these tests because, in my opinion, we are failing our students. I recently read this article and watched a video Standardized Testing: The Monster That Ate American Education.  I found this article very interesting and it makes a valid point.  We are teaching our kids not to be critical thinkers.  We are closing schools because they are not performing well enough on these tests.  These school usually have a high population of poor students or students with disabilities.  So, if students are repeatedly performing horribly on tests we just close the school?  How does that make any sense?  To me, it does not.  I feel as though we need to step up to the plate for our students and fight for them.  Something needs to change.  What do you think?

 "If we think about what our needs are for the twenty-first century, and not just how do we compete in the world but how do we live in the world, how do we survive in the world, we need a generation of people who will succeed us who are thoughtful, who can reflect, who can think," says Ravitch. The question is, does testing really provide us with a measure of how well students utilize higher-order thinking skills? If not, perhaps it's time to reconsider the use of standardized tests as a monolithic means of evaluation in K-12 education.