Test Protest

What can be done to change things please let me know. I agree things are not good for our children and it is making them feel frustrate. Our children are important and we need to do whatever it takes to make things better. Posted By:layers@12/6/07 11:40

I agree with the teacher on this matter and i want to know what can be done to change things. I am a mother and this way of teaching is not helping the children at all. I know other parents that feel the same way as I do and other teachers who are frustrated as well. Please let me know what can I do and others do to change things. Because unless there is a change it will get worse. Posted By:layers @12/6/07 11:24

NCLB took control of the classroom away from the teachers and gave it to the lawmakers. I wonder if the real intent is not NCLB but everyone left behind. Teacher are now busy only teaching testing skill which now take up at least half the school day. There is barely time enough to teach reading and math, most teachers are not taking time to teach science or social studies. We are falling further behind the rest of the world, maybe that was the real intent of the law. The law needs to be tossed out and the teachers need to reclaim the classroom and do what they do best, teach.

Kuddos to Mr. Wassherman, The NCLB law needs to be repealed for several reasons. 1. Too much empahsis is placed on tests. 2, Students with disabilities should not be tested and if they are their scores should not count against the school. It is absurd of the law to demand that the special education students take a test on their grade level when they are not able to perform on their grade level. 3. All non English speaking students should not be tested and if they are their scores sould not be reported. They should be given 3 years to learn the language before their scores are reported.
I agree that the education system seems to have become so obsessed with testing that most of the school day is spent in preparation for the almighty tests. Our country use to have a much better education system than they do today .We use to be able to teach a balanced curriculum and take adbantage of the teachable moment. I say the lawmakers need to stay out of the classroom and leave teaching to the teachers.

I strongly support this as well. I have been a special ed. teacher for some time. Our students do not learn or retain the same way mainstream students do. This law makes it mandatory for the students to be tested and they don't take it seriously so it is a waste of time for all of us. It proves nothing. Good for you Mr. Wasserman. I applaud and support you.

YES! You do have a voice Georgia! Good for you! I am a teacher who is sick and tired of politicians who do not know about education making educational decisions about our children. I always say, "Just because I know how to drive a car does not mean that I should be the President of Ford." Same with politicians who believe thye know about education because they were once students.

I would like to know whether parents can opt thier children out of testing and still receive a high school dipolma. I have a special ed child in high school and can find no resource education for her. She is disabled in processing large amounts of information (CAP) and cannot successful test.
I admire this teacher for taking a stand and have prayed for the end of NCLB which has ruined education.
A teacher in Georgia

The cultural arts are left behind. To learn to see and hear beauty is part of brain development. The arts, from music, ballet, visual arts, performing arts, are going away. Why are we living? When our culture leaves the arts behind, I wonder. We are only nuturing the greedy needs of the corporations. They want your children in a grey maze of doing, and not thinking for themselves. Without development of individual creative processes we have a backdoor censorship of the cultural arts. Remind you of the Germany and Russia of not that long ago?

I am a teacher and think testing is definitely important to provide a variety of information to teachers, parents and school administrators, but the law definitely has some fundamental flaws that need to be addressed. Teachers should not be blamed for the failure of children to learn anymore than a farmer can be blamed for losing some of a crop after a hailstorm. There are so many important ingredients that go into successfully educating a child and only part of that responsibility belongs to that particular teacher and that particular principal and that particular school district.
Teachers have a great responsibility to connect all these important content areas with the child???s mind, but parents also need to supply the nutrients of success at home. When teachers see this pattern of parental involvement and success year after year, it gets tiring to hear the politicians deriding their hard work while saying nothing to the parents of children who spend more quality time at school than at home.
Liza Zmolek Wright (currently teaching away from this mess in Switzerland)

Good for you! I feel very strongly about this matter. Asking students of different abilities to meet the same standards is not realistic. I have concerns about the validity and reliability of the test instrument. I also believe that setting tougher standards in the name of improving schools is effectively closing off intellectual inquiry and undermining enthusiasm for learning and teaching. Furthermore, Standardized testing cannot measure creativity, it cannot measure the ability to think, and it is designed to compare a child???s progress to the progress of other children instead of focusing on individual progress. This test is doing nothing to improve the quality of my children???s education and all this ???test prepping??? is actively interfering with what should be taking place in the classroom. There is no plan in place to ensure success in the classroom for students who perform poorly on standardized tests. Energy is directed at helping students score better on the test instead of performing better in the classroom. Students gain a sense of their abilities through their results on these tests, even though the tests are shown to be invalid for predicting future achievement or success. Legislators are looking for results and could honestly care less if my child actually learned something in the classroom. They continue to impose more and more stringent requirements which ultimately create less retention and much frustration.

Wow!!! I am impressed. I really am. My hat is off to this teacher. Sometimes we let people who have no idea about teaching make laws that are rediculous. NCLB to schools would be like everyone in America having to wear the same shoe size...whether it fit or not. Special education students with severe disabilities are also required to take these exams. Teaching used to be fun for the teachers and the students. Now it seems to be drill, drill, drill. I believe in accountability....bottom line, Principals know what teachers are not doing their jobs.

All throughout my school days I felt cheated by the system. I felt cheated because I worked hard for my grades but oddly enough I now find myself holding the exact same High School diploma that a kid who has been passed along in the system from year to year now has. The unwillingness of schools to fail students who do not know the curriculum is a fundamental part of No Child Left Behind I think. The standardized tests I took were not 'high stakes'. They were in fact meaningless because there was absolutely no power behind them. If the tests now actually force teachers to teach their students something to get funding rather than just passing them along (devaluing my diploma in the process) then it is a good thing. Students who do not know the material need to be failed, teachers who do not know how to teach their students need to be fired and schools that chronically fail students need to be closed. Teachers who fear they will lose their jobs should be afraid. They need to know that they actually have to do their jobs. I have seen way to many comments on this subject that begin "I am a teacher so I know what I am talking about" No, the real statement should be "I am a student and I know how you have failed me in the past by treating school as a day care center rather than a house of learning and I know that this has got to change"

All throughout my school days I felt cheated by the system. I felt cheated because I worked hard for my grades but oddly enough I now find myself holding the exact same High School diploma that a kid who has been passed along in the system from year to year now has. The unwillingness of schools to fail students who do not know the curriculum is a fundamental part of No Child Left Behind I think. The standardized tests I took were not 'high stakes'. They were in fact meaningless because there was absolutely no power behind them. If the tests now actually force teachers to teach their students something to get funding rather than just passing them along (devaluing my diploma in the process) then it is a good thing. Students who do not know the material need to be failed, teachers who do not know how to teach their students need to be fired and schools that chronically fail students need to be closed. Teachers who fear they will lose their jobs should be afraid. They need to know that they actually have to do their jobs. I have seen way to many comments on this subject that begin "I am a teacher so I know what I am talking about" No, the real statement should be "I am a student and I know how you have failed me in the past by treating school as a day care center rather than a house of learning and I know that this has got to change"

All throughout my school days I felt cheated by the system. I felt cheated because I worked hard for my grades but oddly enough I now find myself holding the exact same High School diploma that a kid who has been passed along in the system from year to year now has. The unwillingness of schools to fail students who do not know the curriculum is a fundamental part of No Child Left Behind I think. The standardized tests I took were not 'high stakes'. They were in fact meaningless because there was absolutely no power behind them. If the tests now actually force teachers to teach their students something to get funding rather than just passing them along (devaluing my diploma in the process) then it is a good thing. Students who do not know the material need to be failed, teachers who do not know how to teach their students need to be fired and schools that chronically fail students need to be closed. Teachers who fear they will lose their jobs should be afraid. They need to know that they actually have to do their jobs. I have seen way to many comments on this subject that begin "I am a teacher so I know what I am talking about" No, the real statement should be "I am a student and I know how you have failed me in the past by treating school as a day care center rather than a house of learning and I know that this has got to change"

The No Child Left Behind project started just before I graduated high school. Though my class was required to take the exams, we were not expected to pass them. Since then, my youngest siblings have taken the journey through high school not learning the key essentials of survival after high school but just to memorize certain random information to spit out on a test to advance to the next level only to forget the information later. I still keep in touch with several of the teachers I had in high school; some of my teachers have been teaching for over 20 years and their response is in unison with this teacher. It is not about how the children test, some test better than others. The focus should be on what will get them into college and formulate their minds to challenge the world with the innovation they have inside. Structured, compreshensive exams should not be the only determinant and should not be overbaring as it prevents children from thinking out of the box forcing them to become "doers" instead of "thinkers". On average, only about 10% of each organization are "thinkers", the remaining 90% are "doers".

I am a student in speech/theatre education in Kansas. I am fairly disturbed by comments that imply that students learn by taking tests. There are several pertinent and valid studies that show the standardized tests that NCLB uses are only measurements of how well a student can take a standardized test. I am fortunate enough to have the chance to observe in public schools. Every single one of the teachers I have observed have had nothing but negative things to say about the fact that they have to spend more time teaching the students HOW to take the test than what is on the test. I agree that a majority--most of the students in public schools, those who do not have the advatage of upper-middle class students (the money and the parental attention)--are being left behind. I recently read an article that pointed out a real problem with this system. A visiting teach asked a group of fourth graders what they do to comprehend what they are reading. None of them were able to name a single strategy they had learned. The problem is the visiting teacher knew the regular teacher had presented that material successfully. This suggests that students are not really learning the material, but only learning how to guess the right answer.

I am an example also. I was raised in a middle-class, two parent home, very WASP. I personally have a hard time with algebra. When I took the standardized test used to measure how much I have learned in college, I had no clue how to perform the mathmatical problems. Dispite that, I scored extremely well on the test. I made educated guesses. I personally feel cheated. I know that the students may not feel that way now, but I can only imagine how they will feel when they get in the real world and need that information.

The issues of testing, accountability and achievement are much more complicated than the average person realizes. Despite the innumerable studies that document the negative social, emotional, and academic side-effects of "high stakes testing" many states continue to use tests in ways for which they were not designed. If your child comes from the middle class, s/he will probably have on problems. This is not so for hundreds of thousands of other children. There are alternatives to the tests as we know them today. However, these alternatives are not politically expedient.

While I respect the right that we have in America to voice our opinions, most pundits who share their "wisdom" on educational issues (1) have no experience in schools, (2) have no training in education, or (3) have no understanding of ethnic/cultural/linguistic groups other than their own. Though some commentators have good intentions far too many are merely spouting sugar-coated ignorance, racism or elitism.
Dr. HL.Smith
Professor UTSA

I'm a teacher in New Hampshire. There is no "the test". Every state is different.

Every child is different. Every child can benefit from the experience any test can bring, and the teacher can help the child cope with "negative feelings", which often come from the viscissitudes of life, Teaching children to cope with these stresses is part of our job. This one has failed his kids.

I am so unimpressed by the emotion-fired rhetoric that states "We are leaving out a huge majority of children." What constitutes a huge majority? A teacher demonstrates that there is no such thing as failure, only unlimited opportunity, that comes through struggle and victory.

This guy has left his kids behind in the brave new millenium, to politicize one wasted opportunity they had to shine, learn and grow. My job is not to prevent my kids from having experiences, even negative, but to teach them how to grow from them. You only lose when you don't do...they all lose, Mr. Wasserman.

I'm a teacher in New Hampshire. There is no "the test". Every state is different.

Every child is different. Every child can benefit from the experience any test can bring, and the teacher can help the child cope with "negative feelings", which often come from the viscissitudes of life, Teaching children to cope with these stresses is part of our job. This one has failed his kids.

I am so unimpressed by the emotion-fired rhetoric that states "we are leaving out a huge majority of children." What constitutes a huge majority? Who's being left out, if the teachers love the kids enough to teach them that there is no such thing as failure, but unlimited opportunity?

With an attitude like this, this guy should be left behind. Tests are merely one tool to teach. The brave new millenium is using them as a tool to subvert education.