The Ambiguity of Teaching to the Test PDF Download
Are you looking for read ebook online? Search for your book and save it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Download The Ambiguity of Teaching to the Test PDF full book. Access full book title The Ambiguity of Teaching to the Test by William A. Firestone. Download full books in PDF and EPUB format.
Author: William A. Firestone
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135624208
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 311
Get Book Here
Book Description
Testing is one of the most controversial of all state and federal educational policies. The effects of testing are quite ambiguous. The same test may lead to different consequences in different circumstances, and teachers may use very different strategies to prepare students for tests. Although most experts agree that mandatory testing leads to teaching to the test, they disagree about whether it leads to meaningless drill, wasted time, de-professionalizing teachers, and demotivating students, or to more challenging and thoughtful curricula, more engaging teaching, increased student motivation, and increased accountability. To help sort through this ambiguity and provide a firmer basis for decisions, The Ambiguity of Teaching to the Test: Standards, Assessment, and Educational Reform offers a hard look at the effects of state testing, and thoroughly examines the ambiguity of test preparation and how test preparation practices are influenced by what teachers know and the leadership coming from the school and district. Drawing on data from a three-year study of New Jersey's testing policy in elementary mathematics and science, it helps to explain the variety of ways that teachers modify their teaching in response to state tests, raises important questions, and offers useful guidance on how state policymakers and local and district school administrators can implement policies that will improve educational equity and performance for all students. It also offers an in-depth analysis of classroom practices that should inform teachers and teacher educators whose goal is to meaningfully implement conceptually based teaching practices. This comprehensive look at the statewide variation in testing practice features: *a data-based, non-ideological treatment of how testing affects teachers, in a field characterized by ideologically driven beliefs and by anecdotes; *an extensive and well-integrated combination of qualitative and quantitative data sources that provide a statewide overview, as well as an in-depth analysis of teachers and classrooms; *a careful analysis of the variety of forms of teaching to the test; and *a multilevel exploration of how a variety of personal and leadership factors can influence teaching to the test. This is an important book for researchers, professionals, and students in educational testing, educational policy, educational administration, mathematics and science education, educational reform, and the politics and sociology of education. It will also prove useful for state policymakers, school and district leaders, and teacher educators and curriculum specialists who are making decisions about how to design and respond to new testing systems.
Author: William A. Firestone
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135624208
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 311
Get Book Here
Book Description
Testing is one of the most controversial of all state and federal educational policies. The effects of testing are quite ambiguous. The same test may lead to different consequences in different circumstances, and teachers may use very different strategies to prepare students for tests. Although most experts agree that mandatory testing leads to teaching to the test, they disagree about whether it leads to meaningless drill, wasted time, de-professionalizing teachers, and demotivating students, or to more challenging and thoughtful curricula, more engaging teaching, increased student motivation, and increased accountability. To help sort through this ambiguity and provide a firmer basis for decisions, The Ambiguity of Teaching to the Test: Standards, Assessment, and Educational Reform offers a hard look at the effects of state testing, and thoroughly examines the ambiguity of test preparation and how test preparation practices are influenced by what teachers know and the leadership coming from the school and district. Drawing on data from a three-year study of New Jersey's testing policy in elementary mathematics and science, it helps to explain the variety of ways that teachers modify their teaching in response to state tests, raises important questions, and offers useful guidance on how state policymakers and local and district school administrators can implement policies that will improve educational equity and performance for all students. It also offers an in-depth analysis of classroom practices that should inform teachers and teacher educators whose goal is to meaningfully implement conceptually based teaching practices. This comprehensive look at the statewide variation in testing practice features: *a data-based, non-ideological treatment of how testing affects teachers, in a field characterized by ideologically driven beliefs and by anecdotes; *an extensive and well-integrated combination of qualitative and quantitative data sources that provide a statewide overview, as well as an in-depth analysis of teachers and classrooms; *a careful analysis of the variety of forms of teaching to the test; and *a multilevel exploration of how a variety of personal and leadership factors can influence teaching to the test. This is an important book for researchers, professionals, and students in educational testing, educational policy, educational administration, mathematics and science education, educational reform, and the politics and sociology of education. It will also prove useful for state policymakers, school and district leaders, and teacher educators and curriculum specialists who are making decisions about how to design and respond to new testing systems.
Author: William A. Firestone
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135624216
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 260
Get Book Here
Book Description
Testing is one of the most controversial of all state and federal educational policies. The effects of testing are quite ambiguous. The same test may lead to different consequences in different circumstances, and teachers may use very different strategies to prepare students for tests. Although most experts agree that mandatory testing leads to teaching to the test, they disagree about whether it leads to meaningless drill, wasted time, de-professionalizing teachers, and demotivating students, or to more challenging and thoughtful curricula, more engaging teaching, increased student motivation, and increased accountability. To help sort through this ambiguity and provide a firmer basis for decisions, The Ambiguity of Teaching to the Test: Standards, Assessment, and Educational Reform offers a hard look at the effects of state testing, and thoroughly examines the ambiguity of test preparation and how test preparation practices are influenced by what teachers know and the leadership coming from the school and district. Drawing on data from a three-year study of New Jersey's testing policy in elementary mathematics and science, it helps to explain the variety of ways that teachers modify their teaching in response to state tests, raises important questions, and offers useful guidance on how state policymakers and local and district school administrators can implement policies that will improve educational equity and performance for all students. It also offers an in-depth analysis of classroom practices that should inform teachers and teacher educators whose goal is to meaningfully implement conceptually based teaching practices. This comprehensive look at the statewide variation in testing practice features: *a data-based, non-ideological treatment of how testing affects teachers, in a field characterized by ideologically driven beliefs and by anecdotes; *an extensive and well-integrated combination of qualitative and quantitative data sources that provide a statewide overview, as well as an in-depth analysis of teachers and classrooms; *a careful analysis of the variety of forms of teaching to the test; and *a multilevel exploration of how a variety of personal and leadership factors can influence teaching to the test. This is an important book for researchers, professionals, and students in educational testing, educational policy, educational administration, mathematics and science education, educational reform, and the politics and sociology of education. It will also prove useful for state policymakers, school and district leaders, and teacher educators and curriculum specialists who are making decisions about how to design and respond to new testing systems.
Author: W. James Popham
Publisher: ASCD
ISBN: 1416601325
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 175
Get Book Here
Book Description
With public and political demand for educational accountability never higher, educators are under enormous pressure to raise students' scores on standardized achievement tests. Policymakers are backing large-scale, high-stakes testing programs as the best way to determine which schools are failing and which schools are succeeding, and the only way to ensure the quality of students' schooling. Nonsense, says distinguished educator and author W. James Popham. In The Truth About Testing: An Educator's Call to Action, Popham explores both the absurdity and the serious destructive consequences of today's testing programs. He uses actual items drawn from current standardized achievement tests to show what these tests really measure and why they should never be used to evaluate school quality or teacher ability. But, Popham insists, there's a way out of this measurement mess. And it's up to educators to take the first steps. Throughout this commonsense and conversational resource, the author appeals to educators to build their own assessment literacy, spread the word about harmful testing, and reexamine how they use test data in the classroom. He provides * Advice for distinguishing between sound and unsound large-scale tests. * Guidelines to help teachers maximize the instructional benefits properly constructed classroom tests can bring. * Evidence-gathering strategies for teachers and administrators trying to survive and thrive in an accountability-driven environment. The book closes with a series of action items for educators interested in ending the score-boosting game, halting the erosion of educational quality, and establishing the kind of testing that can improve student learning. Note: This product listing is for the Adobe Acrobat (PDF) version of the book.
Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309084539
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 132
Get Book Here
Book Description
In the United States, the nomenclature of adult education includes adult literacy, adult secondary education, and English for speakers of other languages (ESOL) services provided to undereducated and limited English proficient adults. Those receiving adult education services have diverse reasons for seeking additional education. With the passage of the WIA, the assessment of adult education students became mandatory-regardless of their reasons for seeking services. The law does allow the states and local programs flexibility in selecting the most appropriate assessment for the student. The purpose of the NRC's workshop was to explore issues related to efforts to measure learning gains in adult basic education programs, with a focus on performance-based assessments.
Author: Arlo Kempf
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137486651
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 250
Get Book Here
Book Description
Based on a large-scale international study of teachers in Los Angeles, Chicago, Ontario, and New York, this book illustrates the ways increased use of high-stakes standardized testing is fundamentally changing education in the US and Canada with a negative overall impact on the way teachers teach and students learn. Standardized testing makes understanding students' strengths and weaknesses more difficult, and class time spent on testing consumes scarce time and attention needed to support the success of all students—further disadvantaging ELLs, students with exceptionalities, low income, and racially minoritized students.
Author: Alfie Kohn
Publisher: Heinemann Educational Books
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 112
Get Book Here
Book Description
Kohn's central message is that standardized tests are "not a force of nature but a force of politics--and political decisions can be questioned, challenged, and ultimately reversed."
Author: Jill Jeffery
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000396630
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 252
Get Book Here
Book Description
This book contributes to the innovation of writing education and research globally by providing crucial insights into how the structures and aims of literacy curricula vary internationally. It examines how nine education systems across five continents represent ‘good writing’ in curricula that shape students’ experiences learning to write in school. The book presents curricular analyses aimed at providing insight into how writing development can be better supported through innovative policy and research. The findings regarding international variation are presented under three broad dimensions: social and contextual factors that shape writing curricula; the discourses of writing reflected in curricula and official documents; and hallmarks of classroom practice, including the relationship with official discourse. Case study chapters present integrated inductive and deductive document analyses, findings of which are compared in a concluding, cross-case analysis chapter. Offering a detailed comparative analysis of writing research, International Perspectives on Writing Curricula and Development will be of great interest to academics, researchers and students in the fields of education, literacy and curriculum studies. It will also be relevant reading for policymakers and curriculum designers. Chapters 1, 7, 9, 10, and 11 of this book are freely available as downloadable Open Access PDFs at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
Author: Robert J. Wright
Publisher: SAGE Publications
ISBN: 1544304005
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 771
Get Book Here
Book Description
Grounded in the real world of public schools and students, this engaging, insightful, and highly readable text introduces the inner-workings of K–12 educational assessment. There has never been a time when it is more important for educators to have an understanding of testing and assessments. Accountability is now a fact of life for all public school educators, and testing is at the core of all educational assessment programs. It is no longer prudent or even possible for educators to ignore this national zeitgeist. Educational Assessment: Tests and Measurements in the Age of Accountability addresses all of the constructs central to understanding the design, construction and evaluation of educational measures. It goes on to provide students with insight into the link between today′s high-stakes testing mandates and the traditions of the past 125 years of "scientific" measurement in the United States. It addresses the problem of understanding and correctly interpreting test scores on local, statewide, national, and international assessments. It also addresses how certain issues such as institutionalized cheating, test preparation, and individual differences among students and their families influence test score outcomes. Key Features Covers traditional topics in an approachable and understandable way: Reliability, validity, performance assessments, standardized achievement tests, and many more topics are included. Analyzes and interprets "hot-button" issues of today′s complex measurement concerns: The score-gap, high-stakes testing, grade retention, drop-out crises, "academic redshirting,", diversity, family influence, and educational technology, are examined. Relates theory to practice: Each chapter includes relevant real-life examples and case studies to demonstrate how the technical-measurement principles impact those involved. Addresses the needs of diverse students: Issues related to students with special needs and the testing of English Language Learners are discussed. Intended Audience: Educational Assessment: Tests and Measurements in the Age of Accountability has been written to meet the needs of students in graduate programs of special education, reading, school counseling, school social work, curriculum supervision, or administration. Providing grounding in all aspects of measurement, this book is perfect for undergraduate and graduate courses such as Educational Tests and Measurements, Assessment in Education, and Student Assessment.
Author: Gail M. Jones
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
ISBN: 1461715474
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 189
Get Book Here
Book Description
To better understand how high-stakes accountability has influenced teaching and learning, this book takes an in-depth look at the myriad consequences that high-stakes tests hold for students, teachers, administrators, and the public. By focusing on these tests and spending large amounts of time on test preparation and driving teachers to teach low-level, rote memorization, schools are essentially wiping out non-tested subjects such as science, social studies, physical education, and the arts. Although testing is promoted as a strategy for improving education for all, research shows that testing has differential effects on students with special needs, minority students, students living in poverty, and those for whom English is a second language. The Unintended Consequences of High Stakes Testing unpacks the assumptions and philosophical foundations on which testing policies are based. The authors' arguments are grounded in extensive interviews and research. Through an examination of research, these authors show that high-stakes testing promotes students' dependence on extrinsic motivation at the cost of intrinsic motivation and the associated love of learning—which has tangible impacts on their education and lives. Features: -Examines how high stakes testing from the perspectives of teachers, students, and adminstrators. -Considers how testing impacts the curriculum including tested subjects such as reading, writing, and mathematics as well as non-tested subjects such as science, social studies, physical education, and the arts. -Documents how teachers and administrators engage in test preparation and discusses ethical and unethical test preparation practices. -Reviews the evolution of testing through history and how it mpacts the curriculum. -Examines the differential effects of testing on students with special needs, minority students, students living in poverty, and those for whom English is a second language.
Author: Phillip Harris
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
ISBN: 1442208112
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 207
Get Book Here
Book Description
Pundits, politicians, and business leaders continually make claims for what standardized tests can do, and those claims go largely unchallenged because they are in line with popular assumptions about what these tests can do, what the scores mean, and the psychology of human motivation. But what most of what these opinion leaders say-and the public believes-about standardized testing just isn't so. However, few members of the general public, not even concerned parents, have the time or the background to keep up with the latest findings of testing experts, psychometricians, and researchers. That's where The Myths of Standardized Tests comes in. In simple, accessible language, Harris, Smith, and Harris spell out the assumptions underlying standardized tests and point out what's true about them and what's just plain mythical. But they not only debunk common assumptions; they propose better ways to judge the success of our schools. They also offer readers suggestions for ways they can help reduce the burden of tests on their children. Appendixes offer readers contact information and suggestions for actions they can take to become part of the solution to the problem of overusing and misusing standardized tests.
