Assessment McKensie Price

CJ ZuppanErin Brown

Ashley Priddy Lillie Spinks

What is Assessment?Collecting information that measures and

evaluates a student’s knowledge. Involves making judgments of a student’s

level of learning. This is known as evaluation. Yields information about learningIs essential and critical for effective teaching.Role: to enhance learning

Flaws of Standardized TestingMost of all important assessment tools are in standardized test

format. Examples: SAT, ACT, GA High School Graduation Test, CRCT, etc. Similarities of these standardized tests are multiple choice.

While they do have a writing portion, the heart of the testing is multiple choice.

Our life’s are controlled by “A, B, C, D.”We may possess knowledge of the material, but these tests limit

our expression of that knowledge.They are summative judgments.Standardized Tests are used due to simplicity.

Benefit schools versus benefitting the students. Why are these advantages all school/teacher bases, versus

benefitting our students? Set our students up for success, not failure.

Classroom ObservationSubject: Science, Social Studies, Math, ReadingGrad Level: FirstNumber of Students: 23Student Demographics:

18 white, 5 African-American12 boys, 11 girls

Length of Observation: 75 minutesMajor Findings: Instructor has been teaching for

several years. Good interaction with students, allows student to student help, upper grade students help with learning process, school forms curriculum for teachers.

Relevance Assessment is an inevitable component of

education. However, standardized test are not the most effective way to test comprehension.

Students active involvement in learning serves as the instruction tool and assessments should be administered in a like manner.

Standardized test place a large amount of stress on teachers and students. This stress takes away from student’s ability to benefit from the material being taught.

Arguments

Measures Superficial ThinkingOften, students use superficial thinking while taking

standardized test. The students only memorize content material and soon forget it because they do not have to apply the information. Standardized test results have shown a positive correlation with a shallow approach to learning. Source Quote: “Group administered multiple-choice tests

always include a potentially high degree of error, largely uncorrectable by “guessing correction” formulae (which lowers validity).”

Example: In reading efficiency test, students tend to memorize the answers to the material versus reading and comprehending.

Question: How many of us have not studied or studied very little for a quiz/exam, guessed on a lot of questions, and have passed the quiz/exam?

Anxiety and Stress Anxiety and stress effects everyone’s life. Some individuals have

such great anxiety and stress issues that they suffer from panic attacks, heart attacks, and other medical issues. Many may have to take medication to control these negative effects.

As college students, we all stress to some degree about exams. Some individuals may stress much more than others. As adults, if we cannot cope with stress and anxiety, how do we expect a child to have the proper skills to deal with anxiety and stress?

Source Quote: “It is not an uncommon thing for students to get debilitating test anxiety. Debilitating test anxiety does not refer to the butterflies in the stomach or that moment of panic when the test is passed out. Instead it refers to the students who may freeze and cannot perform at all when faced with a test. Often times, this phenomenon is made worse when students think they will be punished in some way for a low score. High-stakes testing exacerbates test anxiety.”

Anxiety and Stress ContinuedSource Quote: “Standardized tests can

place a huge amount of stress on students and teachers alike. This can lead to negative health consequences as well as feelings of negativity directed at school and learning in general.”

Anxiety/Stress also plays an important with the next topic.

Emotional EffectsOne of the more devastating effects of standardized testing.Source Quote: “After doing poorly on a test, low-achieving

students become disillusioned and less motivated which leads to less effort to learn, starting a downward spiral that is very hard to break out of.”

Example: Seeing children receive test grades. Some may have done well and were happy, but there were several students who cried and got upset over poor grades. We witnessed students call themselves “stupid” and “dumb.” After receiving the poor test grades, those students seemed shut down for an extended period of time. We also saw students laugh, smile, etc. (these actions are considered bullying) the students who did poorly.

Question: Has anyone had this personally effect themselves? Has anyone seen this effect with their field placement classes?

Erikson: Industry vs. InferiorityAll 3 of these arguments can be tied to

Erikson’s Industry vs. Inferiority stage. Source Quote: “A child entering school is at a point in

development when behavior is dominated by intellectual curiosity and performance.”

Source Quote: “If children at this stage are encouraged to make and do things well, helped to persevere, allowed to finish tasks, and praised for trying, industry results. If the children’s efforts are unsuccessful or if they are derided or treated as bothersome, feelings of inferiority result. Children who feel inferior may never learn to enjoy intellectual work and take pride in doing at least one kind of thing really well. At worst, they may believe they will never excel at anything.”

Erikson: Superficial ThinkingTerms: Intellectual curiosity and performance,

never learn to enjoy intellectual work.Source Quote: “High-stakes testing affects the curriculum

being taught in schools, it affects how teachers teach their students, and usually affects how much meaningful learning takes place in a classroom.”

We are not directing teaching to appeal to our student’s curiosities, we are teaching them to appeal and benefit our schools and educational system.

Teach students in a way that the curriculum's material is actively engaging. Set students up to succeed.

Erikson: Anxiety and StressTerm: Child Entering SchoolGoing into any new situation is scary and is filled with

anxiety. We are forgetting about our student’s backgrounds and throwing them into a world of high demands and stress.

We do not know where this child comes from, who has raised him/her, discipline, etc. That child has been raised in this environment for their entire life leading up to schooling. Student could experience culture shock.

By doing so we are only setting our students up for failure. Student’s begin to stress and fear school, tests, etc.

Erikson: Emotional EffectsTerms: Children’s efforts are unsuccessful, feelings

of interiority, never excel.The previous two points form the result of negative

emotional effects.We are making a new experience daunting and scary.

We are not setting a child up to succeed due to poor

curriculums. If a child continues to fail at these tasks, could result

in low self-esteem, depression, etc. No child or anyone should ever have to deal with a

state of hopelessness and inferiority.

SourcesSnowman, McCown. (2009). Psychology Applied to Teaching.

(pg 483-558). 13th Edition.Kohn, A. (2000). Standardized Testing and Its Victims.

Education Week. Retrieved November 14, 2011. http://www.alfiekohn.org/teaching/edweek/staiv.htm

Margie (2011). Pros and Cons of Standardized Testing. Bright Hub. Retrieved November 14, 2011. http://www.brighthub.com/education/k-12/articles/16137.aspx

Young, Katie (2005). Standardized Testing. Retrieved November 14, 2011. https://www.msu.edu/~youngka7/cons.html

Pros and Cons of Tools for Doing Assessment. Retrieved November 14, 2011. http://assessment.uconn.edu/docs/Pros_and_Cons_of_Assessment_Tools.pdf