Standardized tests aren't there to measure students, they are there to measure teachers.
Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
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Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
Reminds me of getting at least a small workshop in my house ASAP! Not the welding machines, I risk brning my house down myself, but at least a wood shop. Still remember the fun I had with my grandfather in his work shop (wood and later metal). Every kid should get that oppurtunity!
I live in a small cramped apartment, but I'd really like to do some wood works. So I bought some balsa wood and a few small tools to do some miniature models. It's not like doing real carpentry but will do until I get myself a shack to fit a band saw in.
Exactly. And since not everyone has the luxury of his private workshop, I really support that schools should provide that.
I'm only affraid that in a world where 8 year olds are still forbidden to use real sicorrs you're gonna have a rough ride in order to do so...
Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#63Don't be silly--we won't be eliminating standardized tests any time soon. You can't easily produce huge reports full of meaningless charts or fluff up politicians' resumes with rockets and robots. Standardized tests produce orderly, easily measured numbers that make for lots of easy bean counting.
Don't forget - realtors love to sell houses in towns with high standardized test scores. Why they can't just show a map of median household income (which is a pretty good proxy for standardized test scores) is beyond me.
1. Because school districts are not typically comprised of equal-value neighborhoods.
So a 'good' district will inevitably have 'poorer' neighborhoods whose houses are relatively more difficult to sell. It thus behooves realtors to pitch more-heavily on the upside of these houses to parents and would-be parents.
2. Because emotional decisions short-circuit logic.
The default emotional response to a lesser house is that it reflects lesser success on the part of the homeowner.
Saying "better school district" evokes the children and places a positive emotional spin on this: this house doesn't reflect poorly on you, it's a badge of honor that you sacrificed so your children could have the best you could provide.
Saying "on-average richer neighbors", while objectively a suitable proxy for "better school district" evokes a very different emotional response: not only might this house potentially reflect poorly on you, but it's surrounded by people who did better!
For anyone who can get past the emotional baggage, the second part is largely irrelevant. But they're the minority and weren't listening to anything the realtor had to say anyway.
Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#64I agree with the article and would go further. In the modern era of information availability and the incredibly high quality of online courses and resources, school is obsolete for all but the really dumb kids that just aren't motivated because their parents are stupid or on drugs.
In the modern era of more and more families having only one child, I don't think replacing school by online learning at home is a good idea. Children need to be exposed to other children, kids with diverse backgrounds if possible.
Also, there is a time to be free and focus exclusively on what you like, but I'd rather have kids exposed to a variety of disciplines first.
Perhaps more importantly, I would not trust most parents to provide a good learning environment to their children, especially in poor families.
And online learning might be the most efficient for some students but I expect that other students benefit a lot from the personal contact with a teacher. Ideally we should be able to give each student what works best for her.
Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's also explicitly stated in the fourth caution item. The author seems to be presenting the question as a boring context that students have to deal with, but there are plenty of tasks where some degree of self control is required to read and understand a few hundred words that aren't real exciting. To me, the big problem with testing is that it is not particularly adaptive. Students that demonstrate a reasonable le…
I agree, but assume standardized testing takes a full 2 days / year and you either do it every 4 years (3th, 9th, 11th) or every year. Well every year costs an extra 2 days on 3 / 4 years and assuming 180 school days a year that's (2*3/4)/180 = 0.83%. So, yea it's probably not that useful, but if you want to get upset over something focus on the terrible quality of textbooks or something that can have a slightly larg…
Good news is I'm not terrifically upset about it.
I did carefully leave "standardized" out of my comment. I have a problem with the whole process of present->practice->see what stuck. It has been the most practical method for teaching large groups of people for a long time, but I think there is a lot of potential in using adaptive testing to mechanize the evaluation and tracking of what students understand, which hopefully leads to students getting more and better personal attention.
Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is a reading comprehension question. Read the text provided: "To avoid crushing the glass slide when focusing, begin with the lens close to the specimen" The microscope lens should initially be placed close to the glass slide: C. To avoid breaking the glass slide when adjusting the focus.
I saw that too. It doesn’t change the fact that understanding of the domain strongly biases the result of answering the question. What you’re saying is that it is possible to answer the question while staring bewildered at a device you have never seen or interacted with. What I’m saying is that it is much easier to answer the question if you have hands-on experience. And I think what the author is saying is that we s…
What you’re saying is that it is possible to answer the question while staring bewildered at a device you have never seen or interacted with.
Based on my life experience so far; this is one of the most important skills to learn.
What I’m saying is that it is much easier to answer the question if you have hands-on experience.
Of course; but that isn't the point of the test.
And I think what the author is saying is that we should spend more time giving kids microscopes and testing what they see with them.
Yes, but again this test is not about that. And if the author is arguing that practical experience should entirely supplant this sort of critical thinking then I entirely disagree.
Critical thinking is taught from a young age, in very subtle ways. The ability to approach a topic you know nothing about, dissemble it, and answer a question (either posed to you, or by you) is fundamental to all of our lives.
Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#67How Schools Kill Creativity (2006) http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_crea...
Summary: Around the world, our present education system was set up to meet the needs of the industrial revolution, it does not meet our current needs, and certainly won't meet our future needs.
Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
The writer's complaint is daft. The purpose is to test if you can read a passage and comprehend it. Has nothing to do with microscopes. From my understanding of cognitive science, the question asked is deeply flawed if you want to test comprehension without testing knowledge of microscopes. One approach to answering questions like this is to build a little model in your head of what is being described. You then answe…
> One approach to answering questions like this is to build a little model This test question isn't testing that. > What I’m saying is that answering this question well requires experience with microscopes or similar devices. It sure doesn't. It requires you to be able to read and comprehend text. That's it. The subject could have been Martian fizzbozzles instead of microscopes. > Being able to answer the question wi…
My HN friend, my argument was that the writer isn’t daft, and neither is his complaint, and I stand by that. My argument is that the writer raises interesting and useful questions, and I stand by that too.
As to the fact that the question doesn’t test internal modelling, of course it does. If you made it a question about something nobody has ever seen before, then it wouldn’t test knowledge of microscopes. But it does ask about microscopes.
Perhaps, in aggregate, the test covers enough subject areas that the students tested will be exposed to a roughly equal mix of things they have experience with and things they don’t. But as I noted elsewhere, the fact that it’s possible to answer this question from the text alone in no way changes the fact that it’s easier to answer the question with prior experience. And from that, I think it’s perfectly reasonable to ask whether this is a good question.
Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#69'We walked into an empty room that once was the metal shop. It was perfect. I could imagine it having tools and materials and workbenches. I could imagine groups of curious kids being active, social, and mobile. ' When I was in 6th grade, they let us use a spot welder and press brake. I still have the box I made out of folded sheet metal from that time. We also had to make a little container out of folded sheet metal…
My grandfather was a welder and had a workshop in the back of his house. He took pride in being able to build anything and not buy it from the store, if anything he owned ever broke he would hack it himself.
When I was a youngin, about 12, I used to watch him work for a few hours during the day then sneak back to the workshop in the middle of the night while everyone was sleeping. I would fire up the torch and start experimenting with all the scrap metals. Playing with a plasma torch at midnight with no supervision was probably very dangerous but it taught met the importance of being a builder in world of consumers.
Re: Kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests
#70'We walked into an empty room that once was the metal shop. It was perfect. I could imagine it having tools and materials and workbenches. I could imagine groups of curious kids being active, social, and mobile. ' When I was in 6th grade, they let us use a spot welder and press brake. I still have the box I made out of folded sheet metal from that time. We also had to make a little container out of folded sheet metal…
Part of this is just a reflection of the changing economy. Shop classes were funded when there was a demand in our economy for people who made things. Now that we've outsourced the making of things to China, there's no perceived need for learning how things are made anymore; they just get made , somewhere out of sight, and when they break we throw them away and buy new ones. This is a strangely infantile way for a so…
So how much demand is there in todays workplace for historians, geographers and spellers - but they still manage to find time on the curriculum