The government, parents, and teachers are trying all they can to come up with a successful solution. They all give our children the best education possible, but there are many different ideas as to how this should be accomplished. There have been many debates on this topic. Many claim “grades are statistically the most reliable predictor of future academic success” (Penn). The problem with standardized testing is that it does not agree well with education.
Rating education, strictly by the numbers is the wrong way to measure a process as complex as learning; therefore, standardized tests are unfair measurements of student’s intelligence and academic performance and should be reconsidered. A standardized test is a test that is administered and scored in a consistent or standard manner. A series of multiple choice questions are filled out by thousands of students each year and are graded using scanning machines. Who knew that such an important test would be graded by a machine? These given tests are designed in such a way that the questions, administering process, and scoring procedures are all consistent and are administered and scored in a standard manner.
Standardized testing is also beneficial when it comes to testing a group as a whole to see different statistics within the group. Like the MEAP and ACT tests, standardized testing can be used to see where schools as well as individuals stand in their learning and teaching processes. On the other hand, standardized testing has many disadvantages in society. One disadvantage to standardized testing is that, when used as the main teaching objective, students miss out on part of their education. Standardized tests are incredibly narrow when it comes to what is tested, that any diverse, in-depth or broad teachings are lost.
Grades given by the teachers in classroom are subjective while Standardized testing is objective in nature. Generally computers or the persons who do not know the students are involved in the scoring procedure. These tests are developed by experts and questions involved in it are means to remove bias.In Standardized testing
Preparing Teachers of English Language Learners: Abstract This proposed study will identify a framework for educators to provide high quality education to English language learners. ELLs are those students who are not yet proficient in English and who require instructional support in order to fully access academic content in their classes. Unfortunately many educators are not well prepared to face this challenge. This report will assist in the development f teacher education programs and the professional development specialists of ELL in providing the knowledge and skills that educators need about second language acquisition, development and challenges. The participants in this study will include fifteen principals and thirty teachers from schools that have exemplary served these student’s needs by using effective strategies, thus improving test scores and academic performance.
Many times we’ve heard people say that they choke or freeze up in test-taking situations. So is there any surprise that test results aren’t able to make as accurate of an assessment as we’d like to think? The results of the test often come with a margin of error, and results can be cloudy. In knowing this, we have to then ask ourselves what is the true motive behind standardized tests? Is the goal to assess the knowledge and skill of the student taking the test, or is it a way to grant or deny funding from the government?
It is known that standardized tests are not perfect indicators of knowledge for all students and can have a measurement error. Teachers using grades as a criterion for identifying underachievers based on the first description also ignores many problems found in both school curriculums and classrooms. For example, there are many assignments given in a class that do not accurately judge whether a student has mastered the assigned curriculum. Another issue with using classrooms grades as a guide for determining underachievement is that many gifted students will never be discovered if the underachievement begins at an early age in school. The second description above mentioning predicted achievement and actual achievement is a difficult definition to use, though it may be very accurate given enough data.
Not a lot of people realize that children are passed to the next grade level no matter how they are doing academic wise only socially. Automatic advancement to the next grade level must be eliminated from our schools. Many people may say that gifted children could be an exception to the rule about advancing grade levels in school. The reason why people might think that these children can be an exception is because the children might know material that the other classmates are learning. If this is the case the teacher can tell if gifted children are helping their fellow classmates with the homework or work that is being taught.
A student should never act dumbfounded by how poorly their final grades turned out to be considering the amount of information provided by the instructor in order to help aid the student in time of need. Weisenfeld states, “Many, when pressed about why they think they deserve a better grade, admit they don't deserve one but would like one anyway.” Assuming the students already foresaw the outcome of their grades,
For centuries, numerical and letter grades have been used by educators to evaluate comprehension amongst students. In today’s progressive era, some educators, administrators, parents, and students feel that this is an erroneous and inappropriate way to determine what students have learned. Citing negative effects such as anxiety and stress, those who argue for the abolishment of grades favor narrative evaluation, pass/fail, or honours/pass/fail systems. However, I strongly disagree with the philosophy of doing away with grades. Grades are a time effective, accurate way for an educator to inform a student of accomplishments and communicate strategic and tactical areas the student should focus on.