Today's
Guest Blogger, Glory, challenges
us to think about
the
purpose of evaluation and how it should be
used
to inform instruction.
Bridging English, ch.13
Sir Ken Robinson’s Talk and the accompanying RSA Animate
visual speak to the idea of changing educational paradigms. It’s an incredible distillation of some very
important ideas about education, and I think it’s a good starting point for our
discussion of chapter 14. If we are using only traditional methods of
evaluation, most of our students will be unable to reach the true goals of
English education. It is important to incorporate a “new paradigm,” that is, alternative
forms of evaluation, if we hope to guide students to true learning.
Image from NEA.org
http://www.nea.org/tools/fighting-stress-teaching-to-Test.html
Testing-Taming the Beast
More than twenty years ago, education researchers were
saying that America was obsessed with testing and grades. This obsession has
become the proverbial beast that we as educators now have to contend with. Our nation’s
educational system has become centered around testing, particularly high stakes
testing.
What does that say about the way
that we teach?
What forms of evaluation are most
beneficial to student learning?
How do we as educators “tame the
beast” of testing and evaluation, so that it can be used as a useful tool that
supports student learning?
Teaching to the Test
and Traditional forms of evaluation
Legislation like No Child Left Behind (NLCB) ties student
performance on standardized tests with incredibly high stakes for all of those
involved in education. Failure to have the required pass rates on Standards of
Learning (SOL) testing puts schools at risk of closure, and potentially could
even affect teachers’ salaries and job stability. It is really no surprise that
many teachers have felt the need to “teach to the test.” However, there seems to be no real evidence
that these tests measure more than the ability to take a test. More importantly, educational research has
told us that true learning is not generally taking place when teachers teach to
the test. With this intense focus on
standardized test prep, students are simply trained to become better test
takers and are not being taught to think creatively, or how to synthesize or
apply knowledge to help in the post school world.
Like standardized testing, many traditional forms of
evaluation may not support the true aims of learning. Relying solely upon
selected response questions that merely check for knowledge or good memory, or
using constructed response methods that are not written carefully in order to
measure the higher levels of learning that we should be striving for are big
concerns when using these traditional forms of evaluation. Teachers should use these methods only when
entirely appropriate, and then must devote time to the creation of quality
testing items which reflect the aims of our instruction.
Alternative forms of
evaluation and their impact on student learning
There are alternatives to standardized testing and
traditional assessment methods. The best of these can be grouped in a category
called “evaluation for learning,” as opposed to the traditional “evaluation of
learning.” When using evaluation methods such as reading and writing
portfolios, self-evaluation, contracts, and observation the evaluation itself
becomes a type of scaffolding for student learning. In addition to helping
students learn better, these alternative methods are beneficial to teachers, in
lightening their paper load.
How can we tame the
beast of evaluation?
Traditionally, when grading papers, teachers were usually
only evaluating the product of learning, instead of the process. All teachers,
but particularly those of writing, must focus evaluation on the process of
learning and creating, which is so important. When we assess students on how
well they are doing during each step of the learning or creating process, we
give value to it, and students will naturally take this process more seriously.
When our evaluation becomes a useful tool to help students learn, it becomes much
less of a “beast” to deal with in our classroom. If we focus on using good
evaluation methods to support learning, the standardized test scores will
follow.
Discussion Questions:
Before reading this chapter, had you planned to use selected
response evaluations in your literature evaluation? Has your opinion changed?
Why or Why not?
What do you think about holistic scoring of writing? Can you
see any potential obstacles in using this method of evaluation? Do you think
it’s fair?
Post Script on New Teacher
Stress
Because this entry focused on testing and the stress that is
associated with it for those in education, I thought I’d share this link, as
most of us may soon benefit from such advice.
I found it quite telling that such a document exists, created by the
American Psychological Association, no less.
