I am not a big fan of standardized testing. But as long as they remain a part of my job, I have to participate in the ritual. This post is not to credit or discredit the practice of standardized testing, but rather to focus on the way the results are reported.
I think we can all agree that as parents, one hope is that
our children show academic growth each school year. Of course for that to happen, the child needs to be ready
and willing to learn and to have the needed support from home, as well as the
care and guidance of a good teacher.
As teachers, our goal is the same, to grow each child from where they
were in August to somewhere higher when they leave us in June.
Academic growth can be measured in many ways. Everyone needs to remember that standardized
tests are only one measure. Sometimes
the statistics of these tests are reported in a manner that does not accurately
portray the growth of the students.
From year to year, the percentage of students who ‘pass’ or
‘meet goal’ is generally reported to parents and newspapers in percentages for
the current school year. They are reported by grade level, stating what
percentage of that grade met goal for the current year. For example, here is a fictitious
report for a group of 6th grade students over 3 years:
REPORT 1
In 2010 - Grade 6 reading – 94% met goal (Graduating
class of 2016)
In 2011 - Grade 6 reading – 92% met goal (Graduating
class of 2017)
In 2012 - Grade 6 reading – 87 % met goal (Graduating
class of 2018)
What this type of reporting does not show is how much a
student grew from the previous year.
Isn’t that what we
really want to measure?
Looking at this type of report, one would assume that the 6th
grade class is going down in their reading scores. ‘I guess the teacher is not doing his job,’ one might
assume. Nothing could be further
from the truth. The fact is, you
don’t know anything about how well a teacher is doing his job from the
information above. It reports on 3
different sets of students’ scores as they passed through the 6th
grade.
Let’s look at another way of reporting the same
information that follows individual students’ growth. Following is another fictitious
report for the same graduating class of 2018, as highlighted above in red, but
this time showing the history of that same graduating class of 2018 over 3
years:
REPORT 2
Graduating class of 2018–In grade 4 reading–70 % met goal
Graduating
class of 2018–In grade 5 reading –78% met goal
(7% increase from previous year)
(7% increase from previous year)
Graduating class of 2018–In grade 6 reading–87% met goal
(9% increase from previous year)
(9% increase from previous year)
Look at the scores in red. It still tells you that the 6th grade class of
2018 had 87% of the students meet goal.
In Report 2, you have a different look at these same statistics reported in a much different and more accurate way
to show student growth. The second
report shows you what percentage of students grew as they move from grade 4 to
grade 6. Suddenly you are saying
kudos to those grade 6 teachers for bringing the class of 2018 from 78% to 87%
meeting goal in one academic year. This is celebrated, not looked down upon as
a decline in the number of students meeting goal, as one may inaccurately
interpret in the first report. Accurate
student growth should not be reported the first way. It does not follow the same group of students and it can be misleading
either in a positive or negative way.
There are other factors that go into the reports too.
·
Every student score is reported,
including severely disabled students, medically fragile students, and students
suffering from emotional disturbances.
·
If a student is absent for the test (and
subsequent make up test), he is reported as not meeting goal, even if he is a
brilliant student.
·
If a student is present for the test, but
refuses to write anything, he is reported as not meeting goal.
Again, this knowledge provides you with more information and
facts when reading and reacting to the percentage of students meeting goal on
standardized test scores.
Another reason why this reporting is so crucial to be
understood correctly is because teachers in our district, and many other
districts are now being evaluated partially by student performance. All factors have to be understood if a
district is going to do this. For
example, in addition to the circumstances mentioned in the three bullets above,
at the time of testing:
·
a student’s parents may be going through a tumultuous
divorce
·
a student’s parent may be hospitalized for a
serious medical condition
·
a student may have just returned back to school
after a long absence, due to treatment for a serious medical condition
·
a student may have just gone through the death
of a family member, close relative, or family pet
These are not examples I just creating in my head. They are all real situations that I
have experienced with my students.
There are so many factors that affect student performance from day to
day. The days that standardized
testing are administered are no different. As a matter of fact, they are even more stressful for
students. Judging a teacher’s
performance partially based on standardized testing is a delicate issue. Of course the district and parents want
to be sure the teacher is doing his job and thankfully there are many ways to
measure that besides looking at standardized test scores. But teacher evaluation and performance
is really another post for the future.
It just bears mentioning in this post due to the connectedness of the
topic.
When browsing quickly at statistics in the newspaper, it is easy
to misinterpret or misunderstand the information. It is my hope that this post brings awareness to the
difference between the two ways of reporting scores. I must say, for this post, this is my three cents! As always, I look forward to comments
and anecdotes.
You are right on spot with this!
ReplyDeleteAll great points... I am not a fan of standardized testing, we watched a one of my daughter's teachers go from being an excellent teacher to very stressed out and "teaching to test" ... it was her first year teaching and I could tell she was being "coached" by someone. These were special ed kids and some had horrific family situations on top of that. Not so uncommon these days. I may be wrong but I don't think those things are factored in, and that seems totally unfair.
ReplyDeleteSue Given
Excellent article and important info to be shared. I'm certain many people, including me, have no idea how the statistics are gathered. Thanks for the education.
ReplyDeleteLinda,
ReplyDeleteThese days with the erroneous public perceptions about standardized testing, I really sympathize with our teachers. The notion that we could rank a class, a school, or a district against other classes, schools, or districts on the basis of aggregate test scores is patently absurd, yet people do it every day. The idea that Ridgefield might be thought #1, #4, or #7 within DRG-A is not only silly, given the miniscule differences between those schools, it serves to create false impressions used to advance agendas. If 90% of Ridgefield students are at grade level and 92% of New Canaan students are, that difference is statistically insignificant especially given the factors you mention.
Joe, I totally agree. 90% is great and should be celebrated, regardless if the town over is 92% or if the previous year was 92%. Another pet peeve (future blog post?) is that we are compared to the DRG schools BUT they have 45 minutes daily in middle school for reading and 45 minutes daily for writing, whereas we have 41 minutes daily to cover both. We should be comparing apples to apples and those apples should include instruction time. We have half the time the other DRG schools do!
DeleteGreat article. Having worked part time for a few years for my school district, the biggest difference I have seen in students who exceed is parent support. If the parents don't care about their children's progress, neither will the child. I believe there should be a weight put on these scores as to how much parents participate. Until then these scores will not reflect what the teacher is dealing with.
ReplyDeleteI have yet to meet a teacher who does not want their student to exceed. Teachers can only do so much.