Restricting the Vision

It started with a discussion about the value of Wikipedia in the classroom. I was talking with a group of K-12 teachers about using technology with their students. Some stated that the main reason they were apprehensive about using Wikipedia was that teachers weren’t sure that the information was accurate.

I pointed out that the use of Wikipedia is a great opportunity to tackle one of the essential questions of education: How can we tell if information is accurate? What is the truth? How do we know it is true?

Sara Armstrong and David Warlick in Redefining Literacy for the 21st Century ask similar questions:
--- What do you need to know, when most of recorded knowledge is a mouse-click away?
--- How do you distinguish between good knowledge and bad knowledge?
--- What does it do to the value of information, when everyone is a producer?
--- How do we address ethics, when we are empowering our students with such prevailing skills?

The conversation on determining the truth led to the question “How are students evaluated on whether or not they can determine the accuracy of information?” A teacher interjected that, for the most part, this undertaking isn’t done due to the prevalent philosophy of “If it isn’t tested, don’t teach it!” The prevailing consensus was that this philosophy is what they feel their mission has become. The discussion immediately turned to the value of high stake standardized testing, specifically the Illinois Standards Achievement Test (ISAT) and the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB).

When, in another lifetime as a Peace Corps Volunteer, I taught in a Ghanaian secondary school. In their last year at school, my Ghanaian students took the West African “O Level” and “A Level” exams, based on the European model of school examinations. Passing the tests with high enough scores allowed students to enter into the University. Therefore, everything was focused on the syllabus containing material to be tested on the exams. Teachers and students carried copies the syllabus with them. If it wasn’t in the syllabus, it was not to be taught and, more importantly, most students did not even consider learning such things. It was a portent of what high stakes testing is, I fear, now doing to our educational system.

Admittedly, NCLB has some good points. Before NCLB, too many kids were falling between the cracks. The publication of test scores spotlighted where school districts needed to target resources.

Teachers of course realize that timely, valid and rigorous assessment is necessary for improving instruction. One of the major problems with high stake testing is that the feedback is not timely (scores return many months after the testing; in Illinois, test data from exams taken in March 2006 won’t be released until 2007, months late) and has many other issues associated with it.

Another issue with NCLB is that, in my opinion, it is setting up the vast majority of schools for failure. Consider the following U.S. Dept. of Education NCLB definition of success: “Above all, they must lead to all students achieving at grade level or better in reading and mathematics by 2014.” The definition of “achieving at grade level” is usually determined by a mean proficiency score (perhaps plus and minus a standard deviation) of the students at that grade level. Therefore, NCLB is basically insisting all (repeat: all = 100%) of our students to be average or better.

This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t insist on and doing the best we can to help each child learn and develop to the best of his or her potential. But we teachers know that not every child is the same, and that the large groups of children we teach possess a huge range of abilities, with all the consequent emotional, familial, and societal baggage that kids bring with them. NCLB insisting that by 2014 A.D. one hundred percent of students will achieve at grade level or better is reminiscent of the imaginary town named “Lake Wobegon from the radio series A Prairie Home Companion, where, according to Garrison Keillor, all the children are above average". [ Cited from Wikipedia ;-) ]

A note of good news is that the NCLB Act must be reauthorized in 2007. Grace Rubenstein in Edutopia Magazine reports that the federal government is already rethinking some provisions; for example, they are allowing some states to pilot growh-based accountability models based on individual student growth which compare the scores of the same students as they progress from grade to grade. She also suggests that pressure from over 80 organizations to change assessments, professional development, sanctions and funding may help Congress reform NCLB.

Along with these other NCLB issues, the consensus of the group of teachers involved in the original discussion was that one of the biggest problems of NCLB testing is the dumbing down of the curriculum (remember: “If it isn’t tested, don’t teach it!”) This laser-like pedagogical focus on state tests and scores detracts from some of the fulfilling rewards of teaching and learning (do you recall that old phrase “intrinsic motivation?”.

The teachers’ concerns of the effects on students and the curriculum they teach is mirrored in a review of the research on standardized testing. Large Mandates And Limited Resources (p. 12) states that it causes :

--- “… focusing on content that is specific to the particular test used for accountability, rather than trying to improve achievement in the broader sense…”
---“…(engagement) in intensive test preparation activities, and to devote less time to untested subjects…”
--- “(restriction) from a rigorous academic curriculum…”
Is this the kind of education we want for our children?

David Warlick said in his article This is the Testing We Should Be Paying Attention To "The message is clear. If we want to go back to the basics, then basic is what we’ll get, and that is clearly not enough for the 21stcentury experience. If we do want citizens who are prepared tocontribute and prosper in an information-driven, technology-rich world,then it is time for education to re-invent itself."

“If it isn’t tested, don’t teach it?” In my opinion, I’m sorry to say that this is the path taken by most school districts in addressing NCLB tests. And yet research has shown that “students’ scores on standardized tests of basic skills improve dramatically when urban teachers in disadvantaged schools assign work that demands complex thinking and elaborated communication about issues important in students’ lives.” In other words, teach to students’ passions, teach them the skills they need to be successful in the 21st century and not to the tests and students will do just fine. Other research points out that engaged learning approaches help children learn more than traditional approaches. I don’t think we can emphasize this enough to teachers, principals, subject matter coordinators, curriculum coaches, and superintendents.

There is more to learning than math and reading (the two scores that mean almost everything to NCLB). Please read Sara Armstrong’s and David Warlick’s article The New Literacy in which they advocate the four E’s which evolved out of the three R’s. In an outline form the four E’s are
---Exposing Knowledge
---Employing Information
---Expressing Ideas Compellingly
---Ethics

A bright spot on the horizon, according to Grace Rubenstein in Edutopia Magazine , is that "The Partnership for 21st Century Skills, for one, posits that the law would work well if only states used better metrics -- new measures of essential skills, such as critical thinking and media literacy, instead of decades-old arithmetic tests. Test what's most important for kids to learn (and that's skills, not content), reasons Ken Kay, president of the organization, and that's what schools will teach. The coalition of business and education leaders is working with West Virginia and North Carolina to create methods of measuring and promoting crucial skills, and Kay expects more states to join the effort this school year." Arthur Levine in Nov/Dec Teacher Magazine insists (when using our national economy as an example) "Jobs that are available require the highest level of skill and knowledge ever in U.S. History. So teachers now have the job of educating all student to new and higher levels."

Besides these crucial skills, what about great lessons mankind has learned over the centuries? Because they won’t be tested on some standardized test, will we not let our students see bigotry through Scout’s eyes in To Kill a Mockingbird or through a study of the Civil Rights Movement? Will we not let our students learn of the extremes of mankind’s nature through Anne Frank's writings? Or will we not let our students experience both sides of a conflict through the book My Brother Sam is Dead? Will we let them not contemplate their fate, as Robert Frost did in The Road Not Taken? Will we not let them investigate the nature of science through a debate on whether or not Pluto is still a planet? These, and many other things like these, may never touch our students' souls because of “If it isn’t tested, don’t teach it!”

As things stand now, I fear our collective vision of what education is truly all about is being restricted.

In a related vein, please read How to Bring Our Schools Out of the 20th Century, Time Magazine, Dec 18 2006