A few weeks ago, I was spending a lot of time analyzing test data, specifically, the p values and pt. biserials of a set of English language arts tests for grades 3 through 11, in order to determine What Went Wrong.
In the preponderance of cases, of course, nothing went wrong. The items performed more or less as expected, with the correlations one might expect--i.e., high-achieving students got the easy questions and most of the hard questions right, while struggling students may have gotten the easy questions right, but pretty much got the hard questions wrong. And it follows that no wrong answer in these solid items attracted more students than the right answer.
But there were items with wacky data, items for which the high-achieving students picked wrong answers, or items with wrong answers that lured a higher number of students, leaving the right answer feeling like an awkward wallflower in a darkened gym at the middle school dance. My task was to review these items and figure out the big why. It is a testament to my thorough and absolute geekiness that I LOVE DOING THIS WORK. I could do it all day long, every day. Oh, my goodness. More fun than a barrel of monkeys. It was such a pleasure that I found it difficult to tear myself away at the end of the day (and honesty compels me to add that I did sneak back to it at night after my daughters were asleep).
Why, you may ask. Oh, for so many reasons! One being that it is fun to play detective, to deconstruct an item by conducting an investigative inquiry which concludes in determining the most likely source of the trouble, whether it be a stem of staggering verbosity, or a fundamental unsoundness in the premise of the item, or a bad practice (e.g., attempting to assess two or more skills with one item). It's like picking up a big tangled knotted mess of yarn and, starting with one end, delicately unraveling the knots and twists and then rolling the yarn back into a nice orderly ball. But with your brain. How often do we really have the opportunity to use our brains in this way, and truly, what can possibly be more satisfying that solving a problem?
Because assessment content development, as its own universe, is governed by its own rules, and--to me, in my ridiculous and relentless geekiness--these rules have a sort of simple elegance, the beauty of rigor and orderliness. (Were I to wax biblical on the matter, I would start talking about the necessity for doing things decently and in order.) So to use the data as a mirror to reflect the soundness (or unsoundness) of the item, diagnose the trouble, and then find a means of repair requires the use of a range of tools that include a knowledge of the rules (and knowing when it is acceptable to bend them) and of how students might interpret an item (which is not always how a test developer intends) and of the content area itself. And it also requires a bit of intuition, that ability to sense your way in the dark that just comes from thoroughly knowing something, in the same manner you could navigate your home with the lights off because you know where the couch is and where stands that big coffee table with the treacherously sharp corners.
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
An Angry Little Toot from a Lone Brave Whistle-Blower
The books I am reading right now are: Love and Will by Rollo May, Aretha Franklin's autobiography Aretha: From These Roots, and Daniel Goleman's Vital Lies, Simple Truths: The Psychology of Self-Deception. And I just finished Making the Grades: My Misadventures in the Standardized Testing Industry.
There may not, at first glance, appear to be any common ground (in the immortal words of Rev. Jesse Jackson) among these, but I will argue that as humans, we take ourselves wherever we go, and in so doing, we drag along the burdens of either consciousness or self-deception. As we choose. Sometimes one, sometimes the other, as best meets our needs and best fits our capacities at the time, the question of existence often being the same as that faced by Oedipus, (as Rollo May says): how much self-awareness can a human being bear? One hopes--I hope--that one may travel an upward trajectory in which one increases one's awareness of oneself and of the world, a trajectory that leads to some higher plane in which we can learn to live with truth.
We take ourselves to work, where we sometimes must walk a tightrope between our values and the need to earn a living. Most of us must make some compromises, must sell ourselves in some way. Some compromises are small and meaningless, but others may put our very integrity at stake. This is the real story of Farley's book.
Though the book is purportedly about the testing and test publishing industries, it is just as much about Farley, who presents himself as a whistle-blower, though one might be forgiven for the mean-spirited thought that Farley sure did take his time in finding the whistle, being as he kept on collecting a paycheck from The Great Satans for many years. And that perhaps this delay lends a bit of tarnish to his credibility.
It must also be said that Farley does not appear to best advantage when he writes about how he copied other workers' scores to get out of doing the work himself, or about spending most of his workday surfing the Internet, or about his hand-rubbing glee in charging exorbitant fees as a consultant (though maybe my pointing out the latter is evidence of envy on my part, as I cannot help but wonder how he managed to pull this off, as I have been a consultant in this industry for 8 or 9 years, and though I do support my little family, our style of living cannot be described as high off even a tiny hog). (Not to mention the subtle sexism in Farley's thinking that is revealed in his writing. Look at how his view of women is first invariably filtered through the lens of whether or not he finds them attractive. In his mind, women--no matter how accomplished or intelligent--are reduced to decorative objects because of course, a woman's main value has to do with whether you enjoy gaping at her. Then consider the adjectives and nouns he uses when writing about women. He says he traveled with "a gaggle" of women. Oh, please. Yes, we of the feminine persuasion are all just clacking geese, you know how ladies love to gab. Sigh.)
Reading Farley's book raises as many questions about him as it does about the industry he intends to expose. If it were so chock-full of despicable practices, why did he remain there for 15 years? How did making such a sacrifice of his own values and beliefs affect him? What exactly was going on in his mind as he participated in these ethics violations? While working in that industry, what efforts did he make for reform?
It seems that Farley wants to rail against this industry-wide malfeasance without taking any responsibility for his own role in it, but as it do say in the Bible, one cannot touch pitch and not be defiled.
This is a dilemma in which you might say I have a deep and abiding interest. The spirit of full disclosure compels me to state that I worked at CTB McGraw-Hill from 1993 to 2001, since which time I have been a content development consultant for a variety of test publishers, school districts, and one state department of education. Having worked with most of the major test publishing companies, I can say that I have seen a good share of corporate culture, and the more I see, the more I am glad I work for myself. Anyone who has ever worked in a corporate setting is probably familiar with at least some of the horrors Farley describes. People who are like the walking dead, who are so eccentric and odd-mannered as to seem unemployable, catch-22 mandates handed down from upper-level management, meetings that seem designed to showcase pomposity and vanity and futility.
But the shenanigans of wrong-doing in hand-scoring that Farley reveals, the behind-the-scenes falsification of scores, the pressure to score in one direction or another as the wind from on high changes, demands from psychometricians to increase the number of scores at a given grade point level, hand-scorers who were the dregs of society--these I did not see. Pressure to work faster, for higher productivity, yes. Unreasonable demands, yes. Obsequious sucking up to district or state officials, yes, yes, yes. Lots of co-workers with their little quirks, oh, yes.
As there is in the world, there is much that could and should be improved in this industry. On all sides, and probably in every department in every test publishing company. If Farley says that what he describes in the book was his experience, then that was his experience, I will not dispute that, though my own experience has been different. I agree completely that tests today are being used for purposes for which they should not be used. I agree completely that there is more to learning than can be measured by a paper and pencil test (or a keyboard test). I agree completely that one of the unintended consequences of the No Child Left Behind legislation has been the unleashing of unprincipled money-sniffing dogs into the industry (no offense to literal dogs), and the muck they try to pass off as genuine content--well! I have seen some awful terrible bad no-good things, is what I am saying.
And yet, testing is never going to disappear. Nor should it. The example I always give when a stranger tries to hold my feet to the fire is whether you would want to undergo an invasive medical procedure at the hands of a surgeon who had never submitted to (let alone achieved a passing grade from) any kind of examination as to his or her knowledge and skill. Let's face it, we don't even want to take our cars to mechanics who are not certified in some manner.
See, we can construct this evil villain testing empire, we can make paper dragon cut-outs all we want, but how does that effect real change? What about starting where we are? For myself, I find that much of my work has been coming more from curriculum the last few years, partly because these particular clients are just plain charming and nice to work with, but partly because, given the choice, I would rather be working on the side of remediation and intervention. Not that I have stopped my assessment work. However, if I ever do feel about it the way Farley did--if it stole from me my integrity--I hope that I would not hesitate to leave it behind. I can't really know what I would do unless I find myself in that situation. Some sleepless nights would result, I am sure. Rollo May says that fate plus guilt equals no rest for the wicked. (My paraphrase.)
There may not, at first glance, appear to be any common ground (in the immortal words of Rev. Jesse Jackson) among these, but I will argue that as humans, we take ourselves wherever we go, and in so doing, we drag along the burdens of either consciousness or self-deception. As we choose. Sometimes one, sometimes the other, as best meets our needs and best fits our capacities at the time, the question of existence often being the same as that faced by Oedipus, (as Rollo May says): how much self-awareness can a human being bear? One hopes--I hope--that one may travel an upward trajectory in which one increases one's awareness of oneself and of the world, a trajectory that leads to some higher plane in which we can learn to live with truth.
We take ourselves to work, where we sometimes must walk a tightrope between our values and the need to earn a living. Most of us must make some compromises, must sell ourselves in some way. Some compromises are small and meaningless, but others may put our very integrity at stake. This is the real story of Farley's book.
Though the book is purportedly about the testing and test publishing industries, it is just as much about Farley, who presents himself as a whistle-blower, though one might be forgiven for the mean-spirited thought that Farley sure did take his time in finding the whistle, being as he kept on collecting a paycheck from The Great Satans for many years. And that perhaps this delay lends a bit of tarnish to his credibility.
It must also be said that Farley does not appear to best advantage when he writes about how he copied other workers' scores to get out of doing the work himself, or about spending most of his workday surfing the Internet, or about his hand-rubbing glee in charging exorbitant fees as a consultant (though maybe my pointing out the latter is evidence of envy on my part, as I cannot help but wonder how he managed to pull this off, as I have been a consultant in this industry for 8 or 9 years, and though I do support my little family, our style of living cannot be described as high off even a tiny hog). (Not to mention the subtle sexism in Farley's thinking that is revealed in his writing. Look at how his view of women is first invariably filtered through the lens of whether or not he finds them attractive. In his mind, women--no matter how accomplished or intelligent--are reduced to decorative objects because of course, a woman's main value has to do with whether you enjoy gaping at her. Then consider the adjectives and nouns he uses when writing about women. He says he traveled with "a gaggle" of women. Oh, please. Yes, we of the feminine persuasion are all just clacking geese, you know how ladies love to gab. Sigh.)
Reading Farley's book raises as many questions about him as it does about the industry he intends to expose. If it were so chock-full of despicable practices, why did he remain there for 15 years? How did making such a sacrifice of his own values and beliefs affect him? What exactly was going on in his mind as he participated in these ethics violations? While working in that industry, what efforts did he make for reform?
It seems that Farley wants to rail against this industry-wide malfeasance without taking any responsibility for his own role in it, but as it do say in the Bible, one cannot touch pitch and not be defiled.
This is a dilemma in which you might say I have a deep and abiding interest. The spirit of full disclosure compels me to state that I worked at CTB McGraw-Hill from 1993 to 2001, since which time I have been a content development consultant for a variety of test publishers, school districts, and one state department of education. Having worked with most of the major test publishing companies, I can say that I have seen a good share of corporate culture, and the more I see, the more I am glad I work for myself. Anyone who has ever worked in a corporate setting is probably familiar with at least some of the horrors Farley describes. People who are like the walking dead, who are so eccentric and odd-mannered as to seem unemployable, catch-22 mandates handed down from upper-level management, meetings that seem designed to showcase pomposity and vanity and futility.
But the shenanigans of wrong-doing in hand-scoring that Farley reveals, the behind-the-scenes falsification of scores, the pressure to score in one direction or another as the wind from on high changes, demands from psychometricians to increase the number of scores at a given grade point level, hand-scorers who were the dregs of society--these I did not see. Pressure to work faster, for higher productivity, yes. Unreasonable demands, yes. Obsequious sucking up to district or state officials, yes, yes, yes. Lots of co-workers with their little quirks, oh, yes.
As there is in the world, there is much that could and should be improved in this industry. On all sides, and probably in every department in every test publishing company. If Farley says that what he describes in the book was his experience, then that was his experience, I will not dispute that, though my own experience has been different. I agree completely that tests today are being used for purposes for which they should not be used. I agree completely that there is more to learning than can be measured by a paper and pencil test (or a keyboard test). I agree completely that one of the unintended consequences of the No Child Left Behind legislation has been the unleashing of unprincipled money-sniffing dogs into the industry (no offense to literal dogs), and the muck they try to pass off as genuine content--well! I have seen some awful terrible bad no-good things, is what I am saying.
And yet, testing is never going to disappear. Nor should it. The example I always give when a stranger tries to hold my feet to the fire is whether you would want to undergo an invasive medical procedure at the hands of a surgeon who had never submitted to (let alone achieved a passing grade from) any kind of examination as to his or her knowledge and skill. Let's face it, we don't even want to take our cars to mechanics who are not certified in some manner.
See, we can construct this evil villain testing empire, we can make paper dragon cut-outs all we want, but how does that effect real change? What about starting where we are? For myself, I find that much of my work has been coming more from curriculum the last few years, partly because these particular clients are just plain charming and nice to work with, but partly because, given the choice, I would rather be working on the side of remediation and intervention. Not that I have stopped my assessment work. However, if I ever do feel about it the way Farley did--if it stole from me my integrity--I hope that I would not hesitate to leave it behind. I can't really know what I would do unless I find myself in that situation. Some sleepless nights would result, I am sure. Rollo May says that fate plus guilt equals no rest for the wicked. (My paraphrase.)
Poppycock, Folderal, Nonsense
. . . in the immortal words of Todd Farley.
About a week ago, someone sent me a link to an Op-Ed piece in the New York Times by Todd Farley, author of Making the Grades: My Misadventures in the Standardized Testing Industry.
Farley's experiences aren't unique. Like Farley, I am a writer who sort of fell into the test publishing industry by accident. Like Farley, I stayed in the industry long after I thought I would have gone on to what I thought would be my real career of writing novels or screenplays or something, anything.
Both of us started our careers in hand-scoring, so hand-scoring is what I will talk about, specifically the hand-scoring of open-ended test questions. Multiple-choice questions are simple to score, because there is only one correct answer. All multiple-choice test questions are machine-scored. The answer sheets or test booklets are scanned, the answer choices verified by machine, and the scores are then computer-generated. Sometimes there are mistakes in the programming that must be corrected, for example, the correct answer to a given question was actually C but was identified somewhere along the line as A. Sometimes there are mistakes with a student's name or identification number that lead to a mistaken score. Sometimes--and this happened with my daughter's third-grade California STAR testbook--the testbook or answer sheet has juice spilled all over it, and so a false score may be generated. Where humans are involved, there will be some error somewhere, it is unavoidable, let us simply endeavor to put checks in place to catch the errors and processes to correct them.
The scoring of open-ended questions is a horse of a whole nother color. By its nature, there must be some subjectivity. In support of standardization are an array of tools that include a scoring guide or rubric, sample student responses at each score-point-level, and anchor papers and rangefinders. A rubric lists the characteristics of the response at each score point, a sample response gives an example of what kind of response is expected, an anchor is a student response that embodies the score point level, and rangefinders show what may be expected at the high, middle, and low ends of the spectrum within a score point level.
It sounds like a complicated process, and it is. And it's not without its ridiculous moments. And I have to say that though I found much about handscoring interesting, the work itself was tedious and the routine unbearable. But it's not the Orwellian circus of nonsense Farley describes. Or maybe it is at the company where Farley worked; it wasn't at CTB McGraw-Hill when I worked in hand-scoring there.
I am only about a quarter into the book, so maybe there will be some sort of Aristotelian discovery on Farley's part. At this point, he sounds like one of the disgruntled hand-scorers, and there were some of those, people who just never got it, never were able to internalize the scoring criteria and constraints, the ones whose scores had to be checked and re-checked so often that eventually they were let go. He says that he failed to qualify as a scorer for a writing test, which does make one wonder whether this type of work simply was not a good fit for him. Not that I can vouch for what happened at Pearson, as I've not worked there.
I will also say that--although I do not at all see myself as a flag-waver for the test publishing industry, and that I have my own strong feelings about the mis-use of tests and what seems to me to be an abuse of tests and how they are used and what they symbolize and how the data are manipulated--sitting in the mocking judgment seat is generally easy to do. I have plenty of ridiculous stories of my own. We humans are ridiculous, it's in our nature, and thank God that we are, it makes the world so much more entertaining.
And this book is just that--entertainment, a joke that is masked as an indictment of the industry. For myself, I'd be a lot more interested in a thoughtful exploration of the subject, one that takes into account the need for measurement in teaching, and the demand for standardization (because that seems to be the only way to ensure any kind of fairness or equity), and how we could possibly balance these kinds of standardized measurements with classroom performance and evaluations from teachers.
CORRECTION: I mean "Folderol." Geez. And to think I won first place in the 8th grade spelling bee. What did I tell you? Human error.
About a week ago, someone sent me a link to an Op-Ed piece in the New York Times by Todd Farley, author of Making the Grades: My Misadventures in the Standardized Testing Industry.
Farley's experiences aren't unique. Like Farley, I am a writer who sort of fell into the test publishing industry by accident. Like Farley, I stayed in the industry long after I thought I would have gone on to what I thought would be my real career of writing novels or screenplays or something, anything.
Both of us started our careers in hand-scoring, so hand-scoring is what I will talk about, specifically the hand-scoring of open-ended test questions. Multiple-choice questions are simple to score, because there is only one correct answer. All multiple-choice test questions are machine-scored. The answer sheets or test booklets are scanned, the answer choices verified by machine, and the scores are then computer-generated. Sometimes there are mistakes in the programming that must be corrected, for example, the correct answer to a given question was actually C but was identified somewhere along the line as A. Sometimes there are mistakes with a student's name or identification number that lead to a mistaken score. Sometimes--and this happened with my daughter's third-grade California STAR testbook--the testbook or answer sheet has juice spilled all over it, and so a false score may be generated. Where humans are involved, there will be some error somewhere, it is unavoidable, let us simply endeavor to put checks in place to catch the errors and processes to correct them.
The scoring of open-ended questions is a horse of a whole nother color. By its nature, there must be some subjectivity. In support of standardization are an array of tools that include a scoring guide or rubric, sample student responses at each score-point-level, and anchor papers and rangefinders. A rubric lists the characteristics of the response at each score point, a sample response gives an example of what kind of response is expected, an anchor is a student response that embodies the score point level, and rangefinders show what may be expected at the high, middle, and low ends of the spectrum within a score point level.
It sounds like a complicated process, and it is. And it's not without its ridiculous moments. And I have to say that though I found much about handscoring interesting, the work itself was tedious and the routine unbearable. But it's not the Orwellian circus of nonsense Farley describes. Or maybe it is at the company where Farley worked; it wasn't at CTB McGraw-Hill when I worked in hand-scoring there.
I am only about a quarter into the book, so maybe there will be some sort of Aristotelian discovery on Farley's part. At this point, he sounds like one of the disgruntled hand-scorers, and there were some of those, people who just never got it, never were able to internalize the scoring criteria and constraints, the ones whose scores had to be checked and re-checked so often that eventually they were let go. He says that he failed to qualify as a scorer for a writing test, which does make one wonder whether this type of work simply was not a good fit for him. Not that I can vouch for what happened at Pearson, as I've not worked there.
I will also say that--although I do not at all see myself as a flag-waver for the test publishing industry, and that I have my own strong feelings about the mis-use of tests and what seems to me to be an abuse of tests and how they are used and what they symbolize and how the data are manipulated--sitting in the mocking judgment seat is generally easy to do. I have plenty of ridiculous stories of my own. We humans are ridiculous, it's in our nature, and thank God that we are, it makes the world so much more entertaining.
And this book is just that--entertainment, a joke that is masked as an indictment of the industry. For myself, I'd be a lot more interested in a thoughtful exploration of the subject, one that takes into account the need for measurement in teaching, and the demand for standardization (because that seems to be the only way to ensure any kind of fairness or equity), and how we could possibly balance these kinds of standardized measurements with classroom performance and evaluations from teachers.
CORRECTION: I mean "Folderol." Geez. And to think I won first place in the 8th grade spelling bee. What did I tell you? Human error.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Moral Failings
One of my many, many flaws is that I harbor a regrettable fondness for being right. I won't say that I told you this just recently, but:
When our kids are in school for 243 days a year, let's see how well they do.Teachers at the school say they notice a definite difference.
The Obama administration is pushing for longer days and more of them.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Why American Kids Fall Behind
Or maybe we should say, "Why American kids who are poor fall behind." There are many reasons, including the morally reprehensible way schools are funded, which inevitably leads to segregation by class and race and socioeconomic status. (Which adds up to the same thing, really.)
Yesterday I was reading Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, so I was thinking about how short the American school year is. It makes no sense that Americans cling to long summer breaks for children. There used to be a reason for a longer summer vacation. In an agricultural economy, those children are needed to help on the farm. However, I think we can all agree that that time is long gone for most Americans.
In most other countries, children have a longer day at school, and they attend school for more days each year:
What happens is that they lose some of the gains they made in the previous school year. When they return to school in the fall, teachers must waste time in review. Some don't, and then kids fall behind. The behinder they get, the behinder they get. Eventually, they get tired or overwhelmed by failure, and then they drop out. The drop-out rates for Hispanic and Black teen-agers is disproportionately high, which makes sense if you consider the disproportionate number of Hispanic and Black children living in poverty:
Here's a school where students spend more time in school. From ASCD.
2/22/12 UPDATE: Reportage from the NEA on longer school days.
Yesterday I was reading Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, so I was thinking about how short the American school year is. It makes no sense that Americans cling to long summer breaks for children. There used to be a reason for a longer summer vacation. In an agricultural economy, those children are needed to help on the farm. However, I think we can all agree that that time is long gone for most Americans.
In most other countries, children have a longer day at school, and they attend school for more days each year:
The accumulating data on comparative education, itself a relatively new preoccupation of policy specialists, point up two trends. First, compared with their peers in Asian and European countries, American students stand out for how little they work. Second, compared with Asians and Europeans, American students stand out for how poorly they do.In the United States, this difference does not handicap children of affluent parents, as these children continue throughout the summer with their tutoring and piano lessons and family trips and online learning and all that. But what about kids whose learning is confined to a school setting?
BOTTOM DOGS
As to the first: consider a list, garnered from a variety of sources, of the varying number of days in a standard school year. This list was hard to put together--which tells us something about the neglect of this subject in U.S. educational circles.
What happens is that they lose some of the gains they made in the previous school year. When they return to school in the fall, teachers must waste time in review. Some don't, and then kids fall behind. The behinder they get, the behinder they get. Eventually, they get tired or overwhelmed by failure, and then they drop out. The drop-out rates for Hispanic and Black teen-agers is disproportionately high, which makes sense if you consider the disproportionate number of Hispanic and Black children living in poverty:
Children represent a disproportionate share of the poor in the United States; they are 25 percent of the total population, but 35 percent of the poor population. In 2007, 13.3 million children, or 17.4 percent, were poor. The poverty rate for children also varies substantially by race and Hispanic origin, as shown in the table below[4].
Children Under 18 Living in Poverty, 2007 | ||
| Category | ||
| All children under 18 | ||
| White only, non-Hispanic | ||
| Black | ||
| Hispanic | ||
| Asian | ||
Here's a school where students spend more time in school. From ASCD.
2/22/12 UPDATE: Reportage from the NEA on longer school days.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
High Jumper Opportunity
If you happen to know anyone who is a math/science teacher or designer of math/science curriculum and assessments, here's what looks to be a fantastic opportunity at Leapfrog.
The job responsibilities include:
The job responsibilities include:
I went to Leapfrog HQ once for an exploratory meeting. Although we didn't end up collaborating on that venture, I came away with a solidly positive impression of the Leapfrog universe and the smart, pleasant inhabitants.
- Write learning goals and content to align with product interactions for early childhood learning, with special focus on math and science.
- Advise producers, game designers, product designers, web developers and others on appropriate content, pedagogy and assessment strategies
- Review materials and product prototypes and make design recommendations.
- Collaborate with internal research deparment and external scholars on assessments of learning processes and outcomes, some grant writing likely.
- Maintain a library of learning resources, and external consultants.
- Stay current with trends in early childhood education; math-science teaching, learning, and assessment.
Friday, April 17, 2009
My Dream Project
Sometimes I amuse myself by thinking of fun little work projects I would like to do. My dream projects.
A few years ago, I read about a study in Florida which got me thinking about developing some kind of pre-testing curriculum. (Testing isn't going to go away. Nor should it, entirely. Whenever anyone waves the anti-testing flag in my face, I think about how none of us would like to the patient in an operation performed by a surgeon who had never undergone any tests of his medical knowledge. We wouldn't even want our cars repaired by technicians who hadn't ever been tested and certified. However, let us all agree there is room for reform in state and district testing, and leave it at that.)
So whenever we administer these tests, these tests on which some children score disproportionately lower than others, why not find better ways to prepare them? Not with test prep products, but with lesson plans that tell about the brain and how it works, and how we--we, all of us, all humans--gather and store and use information. Thereby making sure that the students understand that all humans have the same kinds of brains, brains that work the same way, and no one group has brains that are inherently better or less able to function than those of another group.
We could add a little writing exercise to the lesson plan:
A few years ago, I read about a study in Florida which got me thinking about developing some kind of pre-testing curriculum. (Testing isn't going to go away. Nor should it, entirely. Whenever anyone waves the anti-testing flag in my face, I think about how none of us would like to the patient in an operation performed by a surgeon who had never undergone any tests of his medical knowledge. We wouldn't even want our cars repaired by technicians who hadn't ever been tested and certified. However, let us all agree there is room for reform in state and district testing, and leave it at that.)
So whenever we administer these tests, these tests on which some children score disproportionately lower than others, why not find better ways to prepare them? Not with test prep products, but with lesson plans that tell about the brain and how it works, and how we--we, all of us, all humans--gather and store and use information. Thereby making sure that the students understand that all humans have the same kinds of brains, brains that work the same way, and no one group has brains that are inherently better or less able to function than those of another group.
We could add a little writing exercise to the lesson plan:
ScienceDaily (Apr. 16, 2009) — In a follow-up to a 2006 study, a University of Colorado at Boulder researcher and his colleagues found that an in-class writing assignment designed to reinforce students' sense of identity and personal integrity increased the grade-point averages of African-American middle school students over a two-year period, and reduced the rate at which these students were held back or placed in remediation.This follow-up just confirms the results of the 2006 study. This kind of writing exercise clearly has a positive effect on student performance. Why is it not common practice yet?
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