Archive for ChristopherLehman SmartBlogs
New York is the first state to “align” their standardized testing program to what they believe to be the intent of the Common Core State Standards. Their 2013 test, designed by Pearson, was administered over three days in mid-April to grades 3-8.
Within the first two days of testing stories emerged that students were in sessions crying, leaving rooms ill, and not finishing.[…] Continue Reading »
Our nation is deep in a conversation about the role of standardized testing in our education system. Where are we now?
It is more than a decade since NCLB reforms gave us annual testing and required schools to publicly report their data. In general, individual state scores increased during that time (though this conclusion is not without controversy).[…] Continue Reading »
Like seemingly everyone I know, I have been struck with the oddest seasonal cold I have ever had. Now well into it’s second week of existence, the virus has been a roller coaster of feeling 100% okay one hour and then sweating, coughing, body aching my way through a read aloud with sixth-graders the next. It was so terrible the school’s assistant principal agreed I should go home with the sincere direction: “go get better.” It’s been a leaving work early, nightstand full of tissues, muscles on fire, kind of a cold.[…] Continue Reading »
I am no expert on bullying prevention. I am an educator who cares about children, a victim of bullying, and I’m sure I have been a perpetrator at times.
For me, seventh grade was the most awful year of my life. (Eighth, thankfully, was a positive one, by some saving grace.) In my home district, middle school was only seventh and eighth grade, and it was the first time every elementary-school student came together in one horrible mix of adolescent hormones.[…] Continue Reading »
Place an image in your mind of this: Standardized testing. Depending on where you stand your blood might boil with rage or a sense of accountability may rise up like a patriotic anthem, in either case you most likely picture students in rows, staring at pages of multiple-choice bubbles, attempting to avoid “distractors.” The two groups developing the assessments that align with the Common Core State Standards, SMARTER Balanced and the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, aim to dramatically overhaul that vision of testing.[…] Continue Reading »
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