Everyone
can agree on the idea that we need to know if our students are learning at
school. Assessment is a tool that enables teachers, parents and other stakeholders
to plainly see what children know. The information obtained from assessment is
also essential for measuring student achievement and providing accountability
to parents and the community. The point of contention seems to be how to assess
what the student has learned in a way that is non-threatening and
non-discriminatory for the student, economical for the taxpayer and fair to the
teachers being evaluated on assessment results. Both standardized and
non-standardized assessments are tools for assessing what the student has
learned. Abundant research can be found to support or oppose the use of either
testing method. The ongoing argument as to which tool is best has been a
subject for debate for the last several years, especially in light of the No Child
Left Behind legislation enacted by President George Bush.
Proponents
of Standardized or norm referenced tests laud this test as a fair and objective
measure of student achievement. Generally, the tests are multiple choice
questions covering the same content and given under equivalent testing
conditions. In order for tests to be used for comparison purposes, the test is
standardized. Students who then take the test are compared to the sample group
or the norm. The results of a tested student can then be placed on the bell
curve and given a score. This score is then used to compare the student to
other students on the local, state or national level.
This
testing method is not without its’ drawbacks. Some teachers decry the test as
an imprecise measure of teacher performance, so they feel that they are
unfairly judged by the scores their students receive on the test. Test scores
don’t account for students who might be sick or have test taking phobias.
Teachers have also been accused of “teaching to the test” thereby taking away
time from other learning activities designed to increase thinking skills and
inspire creativity. Instead, teachers spend their time with rote learning
focusing only on curriculum appearing on the test. Instead of measuring what
students know — something that could be done with a localized assessment instrument
—SQLA (Standardized Quantitative Learning Assessments) can only tell us what
the students might know in relation to what the assessment decided,
independently, that it would assess. Albeit, the "score" a student gets
on a SQLA can only indicate, in numerical form, what the student scored on the
test, not what the student learned in the course." (Hayden, 2011)
Using
the self-determination theory (SDT) of motivation, Richard Ryan and Netta
Weinstein examined the effects of high stakes testing on the motivation of students."
SDT is a theory that focuses on intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. A key component
of SDT is the social context of motivation of which there are three main areas:
autonomy, competence, and relatedness. For intrinsic self-motivation, one must
exist in a context in which one feels autonomous, competent, and positively connected
to one's environment (classmates, co-workers, and community). Ryan and Weinstein found clear effects on
student motivation dependent on the characteristics of the assessments and
their purposes. Assessments used for informational purposes, such as formative
assessments used by teachers to improve their teaching, have a positive impact
on student motivation. Assessments that are "controlling," those that
put pressure on students to achieve particular outcomes by offering rewards or
punishments (that is, grades or passing to the next grade), have a negative influence
on student motivation and lead to the exertion of the least amount of effort required
to achieve the outcomes desired with an attendant decrease in performance.
(Hayden)
Some see the tests as discriminatory
because the test questions do not reflect the ethnic diversity found within
most schools. More than
half of the schools that did not make AYP missed because either the “all
students” group or two or more student subgroups did not meet achievement
targets. About one-quarter of schools
that did not make AYP, missed targets for one subgroup only. (Wolfe, 2011). The
pattern of targets missed by schools that did not make AYP has been stable over
the past three years. In addition, ESL
learners have to take the test in English even before they are competent
English speakers. Most disturbingly, high stakes standardized achievement tests
carry severe consequences to students, teachers and districts when children get
low scores.
Non-Standardized
testing reflects an individual student’s school performance and does not allow
for comparison to students in other schools. Generally, the tests are designed
by the teacher and students are assessed over a period of time. Quizzes, oral tests,
projects, portfolios and exams are an example of different types of
non-standardized tests. This type of testing allows for a great deal of
flexibility by allowing the teacher to write the test to determine what she
needs to know specifically about what the student knows. This type of testing
also allows a teacher to write the test and make it more amenable to her
students who may be culturally diverse, disabled, English Language Learners or
a child with other learning differences. Obviously, there is much greater
flexibility in testing conditions and the teacher could even reschedule the
test if her student was not well. One of the main criticisms of non-standard
testing is that these teacher graded assessments are subjectively scored and
could include factors like good attendance or class participation in the
scoring.
I
think that both types of testing, standardized and non-standardized, have their
place in education. It is useful for an educator to know where the class is as
a whole or in comparison to other classes of the same level. Standardized
testing accomplishes this task by providing those kinds of results. Non-
standardized testing sheds light on how the student is progressing from test to
test. It would be difficult to pick one or the other as the best method for
assessment. But what is certain is that the tests need to be created by a task
force that reflects the diversity of the classroom. Plus, the stress
surrounding high stakes standardized testing puts too much pressure on everyone
involved from the district officials and teachers on down to the student. It
would make more sense that districts not performing well on the standardized
test should be given more resources and a qualified staff person or persons to
help bring about improvement instead of firing teachers and closing schools. All that being said, I feel that
non-standardized testing is the best way for a teacher to evaluate her student.
I like the fact that a teacher can take into consideration things like class
participation, learning differences, or even good attendance, when scoring an
assessment. I value subjectivity. Yet I am well aware that all teachers are not
impartial and treat every student fairly, but I think it’s worth the risk to
allow the teacher to judge each student individually armed with the knowledge
that she has gleaned from her daily work with the student.
References
Feuer, M. J. (2011). Politics, Economics, and Testing: Some
Reflections. Mid-Western Educational Researcher, 24(1), 25-29.
Hayden, M. (2011). Standardized Quantitative Learning
Assessments and High Stakes Testing: Throwing Learning Down the Assessment
Drain. Philosophy Of Education Yearbook, 177-185.
Wolfe, F. (2011). CEP: About 50 percent of schools missed
AYP in 2011. Education Daily, 44(222), 3.
