Standardized Testing: How Do People Really Feel?

1. Buck - A half St. Bernard and half sheepdog that was kidnapped and sold as a sled dog.

1.      Nurse calls office from hospital and schedules patient’s 1 or 2 week follow-up – Patient Access Rep schedules appointment, documents patient name, DOB, discharge date and phone number on TCM form, delivers information to designated clinical staff – Clinical staff member completes TCM call (by following steps provided on Epic tip sheets) within two business days of discharge.  Medical records are requested by office staff if patient was admitted to an outside facility.

It is the one time of year when it seems all teachers, administrators, and even students are stressed. Parents are enforcing their kids to get to bed at a decent time, eat a healthy breakfast, and to not forget their number two pencils. It is TCAP testing time. Standardized testing has been a norm for over seventy-five years in almost every first- world country. From state regulated tests, to the “college-worthy” ACT and SAT, standardized tests have become a dreaded rite of passage for every student.

What is standardized testing? Standardized testing is a test which is given to students to evaluate the knowledge which they know. Testing can be in all subjects and topics in education. In Minnesota there is the MCA ( Minnesota Common Assessment). The MCA can be taken from elementary to high school, and the students are tested on subjects they have learned from the past. In Minnesota the MCA is a test which the government requires students to take. On a national level there is the ACT and SAT. These are usually taken as entrance exams to colleges and universities. ACT and SAT are two different types of test they have differ in grading systems and some colleges take both or one of the two. Why are standardized test given? The test are given so people in charge can evaluate the performance of the student and school; also gage the knowledge of the student. But standardized test like the ACT can not be an effective way to improve instruction and performance because it is a competency focused test. The reason why standardized test are competence: They test students on how well they can eliminate the incorrect answers to find the correct one. This is an inefficient way because what if the test taker crosses out the wrong answer, this forces the taker to choose between two wrong answers. There's needs to be tested efficiently and accurately gage their knowledge.

Today, it can be observed that society has shifted education drastically from the time schools were constituted, to now. Throughout history, schools have gone from private, where only the elite can attend, to public schools where virtually anyone can attend. One of the factors that goes along with education is standardized testing. Frederick J. Kelly, father of the standardized test, once said, “These tests are too crude to be used, and should be abandoned.” Not only has this shift occurred within education itself, but it has occurred within the testing concepts found within standardized testing so much so that the founder of these tests has chosen to give up on it.

Throughout high school and college we will go through a vast amount of testing but why? Testing is used to show a person’s amount of knowledge on a particular subject. Usually it’s for one specific subject and not a majority of them, standardized tests administered in schools today include all testable subjects as in English, Math, Science, Writing, and Reading. However, before we can all take the next step and begin our college careers, we have to take one of two tests, the ACT or the SAT. These two exams demine the college you get into, the amount of scholarships you will receive, and even whether or not your will be accepted into said college, all determined by the score you receive.

Standardized testing is used throughout every grade in school today. There is a lot of controversy surrounding the use of standardized testing to access students’ progress. Many teachers feel that they must teach to the test and parents feel that their child is spending too much time testing and not enough time learning. According to a new study, preschools spend an average of 4.8 hours, third graders spend an average of 20.6 hours, eighth graders spend an average of 25.3 hours, and eleventh graders spend an average of 22.5 hours on testing (Layton, 2015). Although, some parents, teachers, and schools feel that standardized testing have a purpose and show the growth of their schools and classrooms, many parents and teachers are fighting to have standardized test limited or removed from schools, because they feel that standardized testing are becoming harmful to students.

The stress settled in once the word ‘testing’ echoed through the classroom. The students knew what it brought, and they knew how dreadful it would be; sitting in one room, hour after hour and day after day, silent and still, with only the sound of the clock resonating through their heads. Standardized tests are assessments that local and national governments may require their students to take. However, these tests do not properly evaluate their intellect, and only lead to tension and mental strain on a student’s attentiveness. Although many schools believe that these assessments are productive, it is proven that they are not beneficial to students because standardized testing leads to stress and anxiety, it is wasting valuable classroom time,

That image made me laugh and understand all at one time. Th logic of standardized testing confused many students and they feel like they don’t understand the questions. But when you try and use images like this, it allows laughter in the classroom and a calm setting to learning. Many times, as the teachers we need to make the learning process fun, active, and interesting great job. You seem to be an inspiring type of teacher, to have fun with your students. According to our text, “our struggling and disenfranchised students, they believe (and perhaps rightly so) their schoolwork is disconnected from the “real work” of supporting a family, pursuing aspirations, tackling complex problems, and navigating the world (Blankstein, Noguera, & Kelly,

Today is test day, an obstacle that in time will falsely decide a student’s future academically and morally. He has one chance to portray his academic performance in such limited time, having to forcefully disregard whether or not he is in fact emotionally prepped on the given day. There is an unnecessary surplus of students who share such experiences, who too have had their dreams and talents ripped by automated grading. This tale is nothing new, such senseless obstacles have troubled generations. Standardized tests are not a valid measurement of academic success and should be discontinued due to their one-size fits all curriculum, inaccurate performance judgment on a given day, and inefficient test taking times.

Countless Science Fiction media from works of literature to movies have introduced and reiterated the plausible future that awaits humanity were its rapid technological progression to continue. More often than not, the extraordinary circumstances depicted in such creations describe a population whose thoughts are controlled by a system in one way or another. Characters lack in personality, creativity and free will, capable only of regurgitating information fed to them and mirroring the other members of the work’s society as best as possible. As extreme as the human condition may be in these stories, the idea of unifying the way of thinking and establishing standards, I believe, is present

Students are overwhelmed with school, work, extra-curricular activities, family, etc. Perhaps standardized tests are a major contributor to students’ stress. A standardized test is any test scored in a consistent manner and requires test-takers to answer identical questions. Among the most common include the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) and the American College Test (ACT). According to the article “Standardized Testing Has Negatively Impacted Public Schools” from Opposing Viewpoints in Context, the beginnings of standardized tests occurred during World War I when the American Psychological Association developed a “ground-administered test” to eliminate inefficient recruits (Solley 3). Today, standardized tests are necessary for college admission. Just last month, in March of 2016, College Board, the non-profit organization responsible for administering the SAT, altered the format of the test. It is now formatted more similar to the ACT and includes an optional essay reducing the score from 2400 to 1600. Many advocates argue standardized tests accurately measure academic intelligence and hold teachers and schools accountable. In today’s society, standardized tests have become the norm, and unfortunately, people overlook their negative effects despite research substantiating arguments about their disadvantages. Standardized tests are disadvantageous because they hinder education and contain bias.

After watching the video on the MP’s in Abu Ghraib, I would have to say that the whistleblower acted in authority as an MP to report his cohorts. As for the 7 that were accused of the crime, they acted in social conformity. I feel like it was a think group gone wrong. the ringleader had a more powerful personality than the others, so he lead them along. I believe the thinking came from the idea that those people were the enemy and should be treated as if they were. Often times when people are exposed to traumatic situations they lose the ability to make choices on there own as well as the sense of what is right and wrong. I am not making excuses for their actions. However, I think in a case of war the whole idea of right and wrong could easily be lost. when people are dealing with trauma and they have no idea how to comprehend like In such case they follow the lead of the strongest personality to get them though.

What once began as a simple test administered to students yearly to measure understanding of a particular subject has, as Kohn (2000) has stated, “Mutated, like a creature in one of those old horror movies, to the point that it now threatens to swallow our schools whole” (p.1). Today’s students are tested to an extent that is unparalleled in not only the history of our schools, but to the rest of the world as well. Step into any public school classroom across the United States and it will seem as if standardized testing has taken over the curriculum. Day after day teachers stress the importance of being prepared for the upcoming test. Schools spend millions of dollars purchasing the best test preparation materials, sometimes comes at the cost of other important material. Although test

Tomorrow was the big day. The day that every student despised, but came every year. The problem that transcends national borders: standardized testing. Before I knew it, it was the final week, and time was running out. In my case, the Connecticut state test, the CMT, was in just two days. More than nervousness, there was a cloud of confusion surrounding this test for us students. Some said that preparation and study are necessary for this test, while most thought just the opposite. Some people were even saying that the scores for these tests somehow will affect our progress in school. Looking back, I don’t remember the test being all that hard, but it didn’t make sense to me. How could this one test, filled with questions that require shallow thinking and zero creativity, show the state the performance of my hard-working teachers, or the individuality and strengths of each student? Or on a larger scale, every student in the entire state?