The Schools Our Children Deserve By Alfie Kohn

The use of standardized examinations have long been debated in American society. In fact, the last several years have seen an immense shift from the prioritization of standardized testing to more holistic measurements of student achievement. Despite this shift, many school districts across the nation and college/university entrance requirements still place a significant, if not pivotal, emphasis on test-taking and standardized exam results. Throughout this paper, I will explore 1) the history of standardized testing, 2) arguments for and against its practice, as well as 3) situate the consequences of its use in one of the three philosophical goals of schooling. All of this will subsequently paint an investigation into the purpose of schooling in American society.

Albert Einstein once said, “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it’s stupid.” Recently, there has been discussion about whether the method of standardized testing is best for our education system. There are a lot of flaws that come with the system of testing. Opposers argue that with all of the flaws, the testing significantly holds American citizens back from greater potential to success. Standardized testing weakens America’s education system, because it can cause teachers to “teach to the test”, does not truly measure intelligence or abilities, and cannot always reflect what a student has learned.

In fact, one student, when asked about standardized testing, mentioned that “testing felt like such a waste,” and that the material covered on the exams “felt really irrelevant and disconnected from what we were doing in class” (Rizga & Hernandez, 2015). Standardized tests do not allow students to freely express themselves and their intriguing, creative imagination, which makes it impossible for a student to show who they truly. Even researchers agree that “teachers and school administrators should resist the urge to rely too heavily on the results from state-mandated standardized tests or any one test” (Tienken, 2015).

As everyone knows, there are many trends and issues when it comes to education. First, let’s discuss the current issues in today’s society. Some of the issues receiving the most attention include fairness in education, and the use of standardized testing. Standardized tests are examinations that are scored the same way across the country. They are given to students yearly to decide if they are meeting objectives. A big stress has been placed on the results of these tests. This has effected what students are taught in class, therefore teaching shifts from traditional teaching to test preparation. However, there are people who support the tests' ability to evaluate students' and schools' effectiveness. Yet, testing also has a few downsides. Teachers feel pressure to have

While some view standardized testing as a bad measure of students academic ability, there are some good qualities the tests have to offer. Looking at a student's academic performance prior to testing, can tell a completely different story when standardized testing comes into play. After standardized testing hit an intercity school, author Almagor had conferences with parents, and what one parent had to say was shocking, ““I don’t understand,” her mother told me. “She does all her work in school. She does her homework. She does extra. I stay on top of her grades from the beginning. Always, she is getting As. Always, I think she is doing well.” (Almagor, 2014). Though turning in assignments and doing homework can look promising on an A-F grading scale, when putting students up next to tests a whole other story is told.

“Learning is about so much more than just filling in the right bubble...we’re going to work with states...to make sure that we’re not obsessing about testing...to make sure that our kids are enjoying learning, that our teachers are able to operate with creativity, to make sure that we are preparing our kids for a lifetime of success.” , says President Barack Obama in a speech calling for the reduction of standardized testing (Atkinson, np). Assessing the progress and abilities of students through standardized testing has been a growing debate amongst communities internationally. These tests have potential for having a huge impact on the future of a student’s education such as grade advancement or college admission. The question is: Should

When standardized testing wins the debate, defenders attain that this testing provides schools and parents relevant information about the learning process and academic achievements that each of their students is having. “Annual testing has tremendous value. It lets schools fellow students progress closely, and it allows for measurement of how much students learn and grow over time, not just where they are in a single moment” (Aldeman). This argument can seem very convincing; however, it is not enough possessing content and skills if they are not applied. Test scores can't measure performance or application of these measured skills. What´s important is to analyze, and know, how people use these skills daily, which is something impossible to

“We are raising today's children in sterile, risk-averse and highly structured environments. In so doing, we are failing to cultivate artists, pioneers and entrepreneurs, and instead cultivating a generation of children who can follow the rules in organized sports games, sit for hours in front of screens and mark bubbles on standardized tests.” (Darell Hammond) Standardized testing, or better known to us Virginias as SOL’s, is repressing knowledge of the students and degrading the effectiveness of an educator. Only basic, random learning is taking place, training kids to only want to learn what they are being testing on. No one is able to have an interest in anything except what is in the curriculum. Certain people that are not aware of hard work and dedication are making tests that aren’t even relevant to the interest or understanding of the student. The tests are not even clarifying enough to make simple to teach. There are so many discrepancies, we are not even educated enough to know the simple purpose of why is it mandatory we are tested. Standardized tests are not in the best interest of the student neither enhancing the education of the student, giving ambition to learn in depth, are clear enough to cover the material, and nor is anyone observing the children to understand why it is so highly unfavored.

Schooling Tactics “You come to school to learn”: nearly every child across the country has heard this saying at least once in their life. It may be true under certain circumstances, however, it may not be as true as we think. John Holt, a former teacher and education therapist wrote “School Is Bad For Children,” where he expresses his beliefs of the educational system and the negative effects he has found that school has on children who are in the school system. He begins building his credibility by presenting personal beliefs and professional insight while keeping a serious tone yet, at times, he appears to be slightly defensive. (Thesis Statement)

Don’t you want to decide your own future, and not let anyone else tell you on what you should be doing? In John Holt’s essay “School is Bad for Children”, he argues that instead of traditional schools we “let the child learn what every educated person must someday day learn, how to measure his own understanding, how to know what he knows and does not know”(Holt). In response to his argument Amy Chua the author of “Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior” would agree that the child should learn what every other child learns in school, but would say that children are rebellious and careless and because of that the parents have to look over them and make sure they are getting “A’s” in every subject. Therefore, Amy Chua would disagree with John Holt’s ideology that he wants children to be able to go outside and learn what they are interested in, and many other ideals which are shown in his statement and would support her response using her personal experiences, which will be expanded upon.

Why are students put through countless standardized tests and benchmark examinations? The common answer to this question proves to be calculating college readiness and progression of students. Students need to be tested to see if they are understanding lessons and retaining knowledge, but the magnitude of this process has become unreasonable. Not only are these tests given too often, but they also lack the ability to measure true knowledge. Standardized tests cause stress for students and misinterpret students that are poor test takers. They forget about creativity and other essential skills, only focusing on a the same material for all students. The constant standardized tests students take have become not for educational purposes. Instead, students in all grades are evaluated by standardized tests for political, administrative, and economic reasons. Testing in America should be decreased by looking to create exams that better resemble thinking today and by implementing a portfolio based system.

Diane Ravitch once said, “Sometimes, the most brilliant and intelligent minds do not shine in standardized tests because they do not have standardized minds.” A standardized test is a test that is scored in a “standard” or consistent manner, which makes it possible to compare the relative performance of individual students or groups of students. Standardized testing is a trend that has grown significantly over the last decade. These tests were intended to assessing children’s knowledge on grade level material in comparison to other children across the United States; instead, they are adding pressure to elementary aged school children, causing stress and anxiety. Are these tests serving their purpose in evaluating children’s intelligence? Are they worth the toll they are placing on young students? While standardized testing many help to compare what elementary students have retained from what their teachers have taught, they do not accurately reveal one’s intelligence. Testing should allow inclusivity of children’s differences; yet there is so much about an individual that standardized tests can’t even begin to scratch the surface of.

The word achievement can be defined as the successful execution of an act. In learning, achievement is the furthering of one's knowledge, typically through an instructional environment provided to the learner; such as public schools. In the large majority of public school systems today, the quality of a student's academic performances and the ability of the teachers who instruct these students are based on the highly controversial yearly standardized testing structure. This structure requires all test-takers to answer a fixed amount of similarly based questions to provide what many presume is an accurate measure of that student’s in-school achievement. However, many others believe these methods are inconclusive and unfair when determining an individual's expertise in a specific area. An award-winning author, Jeannie Fulbright, was once quoted saying “If the purpose of learning is to score well on a test, we've lost sight in the real reason for learning”. In this quote, Fulbright conveys her displeasure with the current standardized testing methods in place. She is not alone in her distaste with this most common evaluation of young learners. This approach is widely criticized due to the level of stress it places on students, as well as it’s forcing of educators to concentrate on keeping pace with a curriculum centered around a test rather than their pupil’s comprehension of a topic. In view of the basis of these opinions against yearly standardized testing, the procedures in

“The average student in America’s big-city public schools takes some 112 mandatory standardized tests between pre-kindergarten and the end of 12th grade” (Strauss). These statistics show that on average students take eight standardized tests every year, spending twenty to twenty-five hours each school year testing (Strauss). “By contrast, most countries that outperform the United States on international exams test students three times during their school careers” (Layton). Students throughout other countries are able to test better than children in the United States, with just over thirty-seven times less the amount of tests. What causes these outrageous different results between United States students and students from other countries? This is one of the many questions faculty members and parents ask themselves. How are they supposed to positively change standardized testing for all of the future children in America and prepare them for what lies ahead? Standardized testing has become extremely flawed over the years, so new guidelines need to be introduced to find a more beneficial way of testing children’s knowledge.

A decrease in the amount of standardized testing is necessary to boost student morale and the amount of information that is retained by students. Continuous testing is making students increasingly lose their self-esteem, mostly due to the lack of reward for studying for a test they do not do well on, and feel that they have “...wasted their time” (Wilson). The copious amounts of testing also decreases the amount of information that is retained by students. The fact of the matter is that students care more about getting a good grade on a test than actually learning any new material. In recent years, as the amount of standardized testing increases, the information and formatting of classrooms is being structured around tests. The fact of the matter is that “...if there is something that is interesting, compelling, useful, or otherwise favorable to the development of a student’s understanding of the world, but it is not going to be on the standardized test, then there really isn't any incentive to cover this material” (Kohn). The main argument against a decrease in standardized testing does have merit; how are the schools and the government going to be able to measure if and to what extent students are actually grasping the material? Research actually does show that standardized testing results in successive higher testing scores because “teachers and administrators re-align their lessons and curricula to better match the test objections” (Camacho, Cook). However, these tests