As a new teacher, I'm also new to the pressures of standardized testing. This past week, my third graders took their ELA exams, and next week they will take the Math portion. Three grueling days each week equals one tired teacher, and 23 wildly worn out kids. By Friday afternoon, we were wiped. And now I'm gearing up to do it all again with math.
My feelings about these tests are mixed. On the one hand, assessment is an extremely valuable and necessary practice in education. On the other hand, these particular assessments are long, confusing, and draining. I find myself wondering...how will this be useful to these kids in the future? Is this somehow preparing them for "real life?" Does a score of 1, 2, 3, or 4 truly capture the magical spirits of these kids that I love so very dearly? Will the scores be fair? Will they make me look bad? Questions, questions, questions. Pressure, pressure, pressure.
And the very terrifying fear that my purpose as a teacher hinges on these tests. Am I good enough? And now that we are done (with ELA), what do we do now? Start preparing for next year? And I have to literally remind myself that my purpose is much higher than these tests, reaches far beyond whatever numbers are assigned to my students. And I just have to wonder...what is our purpose? As a culture and society. Do we want to produce automatons that know how to answer multiple choice questions? Do we want to separate the 4s from the 1s? I guess I just feel like each year these tests get farther and farther away from the real purpose of education...learning.
No comments:
Post a Comment