Students and MAP Testing
Because of involvements in the St. Charles area business community, the company that employs me recently received a letter from the school district asking for incentive items for students who are preparing for MAP testing.
MAP (Missouri Assessment Program) testing is done at various levels throughout a student's schooling, and provides the state with the "report card" on how public schools are performing.
Unfortunately, when you view the MAP test scores, you'll wonder how on Earth we have so many students that don't score well.
Here's the dirty little secret: the students aren't graded on the tests!
Imagine if you will, you're a high school student, and you've been told that you are going to spend the next couple of weeks preparing for a week-long testing period in which you are not graded -- but the school district is. How will you feel about this?
Many students decide to sit it out, and unfortunately the result is the appearance of poor performance coming from the districts' report cards across the state.
I have an idea. GRADE THE STUDENTS ON THE TESTS!
If you really want to know what the students know (which I assume is the very reason why you're giving them these tests in the first place), quit telling them that they're doing it for their school, and begin a system by which they are graded for their performance on these tests!
In a world where we have eliminated Valedictorians and Salutatorians (we wouldn't want to impose competition or anything, would we?), and in this day of technological advances, surely there must be a way to get grades back to the students prior to the end of the school year!
If you want to know what students can do, you have to challenge them!
I know, it's a novel concept, isn't it?
MAP (Missouri Assessment Program) testing is done at various levels throughout a student's schooling, and provides the state with the "report card" on how public schools are performing.
Unfortunately, when you view the MAP test scores, you'll wonder how on Earth we have so many students that don't score well.
Here's the dirty little secret: the students aren't graded on the tests!
Imagine if you will, you're a high school student, and you've been told that you are going to spend the next couple of weeks preparing for a week-long testing period in which you are not graded -- but the school district is. How will you feel about this?
Many students decide to sit it out, and unfortunately the result is the appearance of poor performance coming from the districts' report cards across the state.
I have an idea. GRADE THE STUDENTS ON THE TESTS!
If you really want to know what the students know (which I assume is the very reason why you're giving them these tests in the first place), quit telling them that they're doing it for their school, and begin a system by which they are graded for their performance on these tests!
In a world where we have eliminated Valedictorians and Salutatorians (we wouldn't want to impose competition or anything, would we?), and in this day of technological advances, surely there must be a way to get grades back to the students prior to the end of the school year!
If you want to know what students can do, you have to challenge them!
I know, it's a novel concept, isn't it?
posted by Administrator at 9:20 AM
2 Comments:
How simple life is idiot. The damn tests are sent out to be scored. The tests are given in the spring, scored in the summer and results released from the state in the late summer, early fall. Now, think this through genius, if you give a test in the spring of a student's junior year, don't have it scored until the summer, where in the freakin hell are you going to apply a grade? This could be why the kids don't give a shit about the test. Why do you think the state board of education wants to switch to an end of course test...so it can be a part of the kids grade and provide the kid and teacher with some feedback that doesn't require a 6 month time frame. In case you aren't able to remember that not everyone is the same age, six months for a 40 year old is not proportionally the same as 6 months I wonder what your freakin MAP test score would be.
Did you actually READ the post? Or simply react?
Didn't I suggest that a test that CAN be graded be given, instead of tests that students don't care about?
We all know why the kids don't care about the tests. Unfortunately, it is people like you who want to just sit and argue and call names that don't find a solution to the problem, and instead allow these pathetic grades to be used in which to grade the performance of our school districts.
You're also probably one of the first people who criticize school districts based upon these test scores, aren't you?
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