Tests that teach (and those that don’t)
Tests can be a valuable teaching tool “when used in combination with enjoyable, interactive projects that enable students to construct meaning actively (rather than learning it by rote),” according to...
View ArticleNew standards, tests may kill teacher ratings
New common standards, which will require new tests, may put the kibosh on value-added ratings of teachers, speculates WashPost columnist Jay Mathews. California will switch to Common Core Standards in...
View ArticleNYC test ban: birthdays, Halloween, dinosaurs …
To avoid distressing students, New York City’s education officials have told test-writers to avoid references to sex, drugs or alcohol, rock ‘n roll, Christmas, Halloween, birthdays, poverty,...
View ArticleNew standards, new tests — and new schools
“The standards-and-testing model of school reform is far from dead,” writes Paul Glastris in the kick-off to Washington Monthly’s look at The Next Wave of School Reform. Common standards and far more...
View ArticleMeasuring performance by results
Can School Performance Be Measured Fairly? asks the New York Times‘ Room for Debate. Testing Has Moved Beyond Filling Circles, responds Kevin Carey of the New America Foundation. Objective test scores...
View ArticleCollege for free in 10 years?
Will college be free in 10 years? Time looks at a future in which a four-year residential college is a luxury item for the few, while most learners pursue higher education online. As learning goes...
View ArticleConservatives can like the Common Core
Conservatives should support the Common Core standards, write Kathleen Porter-Magee and Sol Stern, who describe themselves as “education scholars at two right-of-center think tanks” (Fordham and the...
View ArticleTexas may cut tests, graduation reqs
Texas leads the nation in test-based accountability for public schools, but now legislators may ease rigorous graduation requirements, reports the New York Times. Currently, high school students must...
View ArticleTougher tests spur anxiety, opt-outs
New York’s new Common Core-aligned tests are bringing “protests and tears,” reports the New York Times. Complaints were plentiful: the tests were too long; students were demoralized to the point of...
View ArticleCheating is a valuable workplace skill
Homeschool your kids so they learn to cheat, writes Penelope Trunk on her homeschooling blog. What schools call cheating — getting the right answer from others — is “effective workplace behavior” and a...
View ArticleOn tougher test, NY scores plunge
Reading and math scores dropped sharply in New York because the new Common Core-aligned tests are much harder. In New York City, 26 percent of students in third through eighth grade passed the state...
View ArticleHirsch: If kids learn content, they’ll ace tests
Students will ace Common Core language arts tests if they’ve learned history, civics, literature, science and the fine arts, write E.D. Hirsch on the Core Knowledge Blog. But it’s a big if, concedes...
View ArticleWe need more tests, but what kind?
American Schools Need More Testing, Not Less, writes Ezekiel J. Emanuel in The New Republic. Students learn more when they take frequent, short tests. A young neuroscientist named Andrew Butler has...
View ArticleWhy do Asian students rank high?
Asian students outscore Americans on international exams — and it matters, says Arthur Levine, the former president of Columbia University’s Teachers College, in a New York Times interview. He’s now...
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Getting started with core standards
Fordham’s Common Core in the Districts: An Early Look at Early Implementers examines how school leaders and teachers are implementing new standards “in a high-performing suburb, a trailblazer, an urban...
View ArticleWhy Common Core is doomed to fail
Common Core standards are doomed, writes Jay P. Greene. The political backlash “will undo or neuter Common Core.” With the U.S. Education Department, D.C.-based reform groups and state school chiefs on...
View ArticleCommon Core tests may not pass
The two Common Core testing groups — Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium and the Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) — made big promises when they bid for...
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Confused by Core tests
Kids have been field-testing new Common Core exams — and parents have been trying practice tests posted online. The verdict: The new tests are much harder — partly because of poorly worded questions....
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Why they cheated
A former math teacher at a high-poverty Atlanta middle school explains why the principal and teachers cheated in a sympathetic New Yorker profile. Students who’d passed a competency test in fifth...
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Test answers are in the (missing) book
Pennsylvania’s state exams can be “gamed” by a “shockingly low-tech strategy,” writes Meredith Broussard, a Temple professor of data journalism. All it takes is reading “the textbooks created by the...
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