Overreliance on standardized testing sends a message to students that learning is remembering facts, and that intelligence is a function of how quickly people can do things. In schools around the country, the content and style of teaching are being placed in the service of the tests. (MLF)

Under North Carolina's ABC's accountability program, public schools are labeled "exemplary,""meets expectations,""adequate performance," or "low performance." Teachers are given $1,500 bonuses if their schools exceed expectations. A survey found that mandated tests increased student anxiety and negatively…

Presents a letter to the Governor of California from a teacher who questions the appropriateness of standardized testing and teaching to the test and who recommends that the Governor become a leader in protecting, empowering, and authentically educating today's students. Concludes by recommending several books on how to enhance students' health…

Considers the positioning of middle grade readers in standardized reading assessments, analyzing questions and tasks they encounter as they read and respond to standardized test items. Reading tests require children to show that they have understood and accepted a particular kind of positioning as readers. This analysis is contrasted with…

Three articles examine whether school choice will undermine the common culture. The first remembers the author's own historical and literary educational canon. The second worries more about the current crop of state tests than the effects of school choice. The third predicts that choice is less harmful to the culture than are the effects of…

Traces the history of standardized testing in the United States and reviews the differing views of testing advanced over the years. Illustrates some controversies and pendulum swings evident in two test uses, grade-to-grade promotion and college admissions. (SLD)

Indicates that writing Chinese is correlated to Chinese-American (CA) students' spatial skills and investigates whether writing Chinese would have the same relationship to mathematics skills. Suggested a strong correlation between writing Chinese and success on SAT-Math. Supports the cultural relativity theory of gender difference on SAT-Math.…

When used appropriately, standardized assessments can assist education reform by tracking individual or group progress and achievement levels and indicating college readiness. Credibility and validity can be improved by preventing student exclusions, using multiple indicators, stressing year-to-year performance, monitoring consequences, and…

Describes three areas in which the graduate community is vulnerable to substandard practice when using Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) scores in decision processes: percentile versus raw scores, cut-off scores, and summed scores. Asserts that the graduate community is generally unaware that raw scores on the verbal, quantitative, and analytical…

Background: A previous study (Stuart, 1999) showed that early phoneme awareness and phonics teaching improved reading and spelling ability in inner-city schoolchildren in Key Stage 1, most of whom were learning English as a second language. Aims: The present study, a follow-up of these children at the end of Key Stage 1, addresses four main…

In this paper, we examine the antecedents and consequences of timing in the transition from high school to college. Using the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88), we find that 16 percent of high school graduates postpone enrollment by seven months or more after completing high school. Delayers tend to have some common…

The No Child Left Behind Act specifies schools' responsibilities for including special education students in their overall assessment programs. These students must be assessed under a standardized test that is used for all students within a district--a test that is designed to show whether a student is meeting that state's standards for learning.…

Teachers face at least two dilemmas in our work to meet the academic needs of our students. The first dilemma is how to prepare our students to pass state-mandated tests without driving them away, given that many already see school as a place where they fail. The traditional "drill and practice" approach to remediation for low-performing…

Standardized tests are an essential part of the school equation today. Properly used, tests can measure improvement over time, inform the public, and tell us what portions of our population may not be receiving a good education. What we must not permit is the abuse of test results in high-stakes, standards-based accountability programs. Certainly…

Growth in Test of Cognitive Skills (TCS) scores and Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills (CTBS) reading, math, and total achievement scores from 3rd to 10th grade was studied in 328 public school students in a middle-class suburban community. Surprisingly, groups differing in ability and achievement in 3rd grade made parallel progress over time,…