we are teachers: blog 
we are teachers' blog
teachers: your thoughts on the "no-child left behind" tests
by Golo Managing EditorPublished Jul. 21, 2008
Here's an interesting story on WRAL.com, in case you missed it.
The headline states that most area schools failed the "no child left behind" tests.
Here's the bulk of it:
"Less than a quarter of Wake County public schools met targets for student performance set by the federal No Child Left Behind Law, reflecting poor performance on the annual evaluation across the region.
Seventeen percent of Durham schools met the adequate yearly progress, or AYP, standard, and 33 percent of schools in Orange and Cumberland counties met AYP. Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools posted the highest achievement rate across the region at 59 percent of schools meeting AYP, followed by Chatham and Wayne counties at 53 percent and Johnston County at 50 percent."
What are your thoughts about this? Is there some insight that teachers can provide? Tell us! What's the real deal behind these tests?
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July 23, 2008 9:54 p.m.
1. I am a CTE teacher (Career and Techinical Education the course that you all forget about). I am tired of hearing teacher complain about dealing with test scores. now be clear, I am not for NCLB, but I am for developing better standards for evaluating teachers, and for evaluating students. CTE has been testing students for years and giving EOC (end of course), and openly discussing our success and challenges with others. So I get a bit impatient which teachers just want to do there thing with no standard or assessments.
2. Now the idea that NCLB developing a standard that everyone must pass. Again to be a bit hard, but life does not have 1 standard. We need some people to go to college, and we need some to stay home and work. How would you feel about UNC if everyone could get in. Would you still think as highly of its graduates. If every school was completely the same, what could we really be teaching?
GOLO member since September 17, 2007
July 22, 2008 10:00 a.m.
Denver -- I couldn't agree more with you. This has been a big discussion topic in my continuing education courses: why aren't teachers' voices being heard.
A few years ago, the National Teacher of the Year approached Margaret Spellings to discuss what a failure NCLB was. Her reply, then, and still, implies that teachers who dislike the policy dislike it because they are lazy and afraid of the results.
Still, when a group complains in a faculty meeting, I often direct them to the email addresses of legislators. However, some teachers have lost their jobs or lost support when they spoke out. Personally, I was reprimanded by an administrator for not appearing as a "cheerleader" for NCLB. It hasn't stopped my complaints but I choose my words more carefully now.
GOLO member since April 25, 2008
July 22, 2008 6:33 a.m.
I also agree that good teaching doesn't need tons of money. However, well spent funds for good books, newspapers, and technology certainly enriches the experience.
I noticed that your quotes discuss 4th grade in Idaho. I'm curious about the results as the years progress. 4th grade is often a good year for most districts, but the scores go down as the kids get older. Many students begin to hate reading and writing because of the practice tests week after week. Of course, these are just my observations from students' comments.
GOLO member since April 25, 2008
July 22, 2008 6:21 a.m.
Between 2003 and 2005 (latest data available):
–Fourth-grade reading proficiency increased by 11 percentage points
–Fourth-grade mathematics proficiency increased by 13 percentage points
–The Hispanic-white achievement gap in fourth-grade reading narrowed by 11 percentage points
–The Hispanic-white achievement gap in fourth-grade mathematics narrowed by nine percentage points
–The poor-not poor achievement gap in fourth-grade reading narrowed by six percentage points
–The poor-not poor achievement gap in fourth-grade mathematics narrowed by seven percentage points (Idaho Report Card)
•“Five years ago, when the state began testing students, only 29 percent of American Indian third graders [in Idaho] were reading at their grade level. The most recent scores show that half of all American Indian students are reading at grade level.” (Associated Press, 3/15/05)
Progress measured, and progress is what is
GOLO member since January 20, 2008
July 22, 2008 1:21 a.m.
But really, we should switch high achieving teachers with low achieving ones to see if the students would profit. Easier to move one teacher than a classroom of students.
Teachers are given impossible tasks, to parent, to nurse, to teach, to discipline, to do everything for everyone, be everything to everyone of her students. They stand alone in a room with a herd of wild things. Motivate them. Control them. Teach them. Mission Impossible -- and they take the task.
GOLO member since January 20, 2008
July 22, 2008 1:18 a.m.
Wonder what is on the math test that should NOT be taught, learned or tested? What would you have taken off the math test?
GOLO member since January 20, 2008
July 22, 2008 1:05 a.m.
http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1370.htm
This gives great insight on how one of our more prominent founding fathers intended education to be and how far we've gotten away from it in more of less the past 40 years. The following statement by Jefferson is almost prophetic when referring to federal and state educational regulations:
"If twelve or fifteen hundred schools are to be placed under one general administration, an attention so divided will amount to a dereliction of them to themselves. It is surely better, then, to place each school at once under the care of those most interested in its conduct." --Thomas Jefferson: Plan for Elementary Schools, 1817. ME 17:417
Don't think TJ would have liked NCLB very much at all.....
July 22, 2008 12:11 a.m.
GOLO member since December 24, 2007
July 21, 2008 11:52 p.m.
July 21, 2008 11:21 p.m.
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