Testing, Testing, 1, 2, 3...
By Alfred S. Posamentier, Ph.D.
For many decades the United States
has been a world model for testing students to assess their
progress in what is hoped to be an objective process. Actually,
one of the first American tests, the New York State Regents
examinations, when they were first introduced about 140 years
ago, were originally intended as a device to rate teachers.
(Still today teachers compare their students' passing rate
with one another, as a measure of their own success as teachers.)
In the last twenty years many European countries have embraced
testing increasing more frequently to assess their students'
achievement. Some have even begun to use the American style
of "short answer
items"-previously unknown to the Europeans, who have always
used essay type items as a means of assessment.
Testing in the United States has
taken on a new dimension in recent years, encouraged by the
federal "No Child Left
Behind" law, and dramatized by some recent debacles in
the testing process. One such testing fiasco occurred in New
York State in June 2003, when the Math A Regents Examination
yielded some startlingly poor results. I was invited by New
York State Education Commissioner Richard P. Mills to join
a panel to study the Math A testing situation and offer some
recommendations. Our panel found the test to be flawed and
the math standards in need of revision, especially to provide
more specificity and clarity so as to make them more useful
to the teachers in the state. The standards are now being revised
by a committee on which I was also asked to serve.
These events have once more brought
to the fore the question of "to test, or not to test." The advantages of testing
are well known. Testing insures that all teachers will cover
the requisite material, and that there is some objective way
of assessing student achievement. The potential drawback of
a testing program (i.e. a standardized testing program) is
that there is a tendency that teachers will "teach to
the test," and thereby stifle their own instructional
creativity as professionals. Unfortunately, it is the rare
teacher who will ignore an impending test and provide instruction
that goes beyond the mere introduction or reinforcement of
facts to be tested, being guided by the standards, with the
confidence that this instruction will by itself result in good
test results.
To make matters even more restrictive, the New York City Department
of Education has mandated a uniform curriculum and materials
for most schools to use in mathematics and literacy. Mindful
of the need to provide guidance to a largely inexperienced
teaching force (e.g. more that half of the math teachers in
New York City have less than 5 years of teaching experience),
and to bring uniformity to a system that has a significant
number of students who transfer schools, this sort of mandate
also stifles teacher creativity, in part because it is misinterpreted
(or misused) by some inexperienced supervisors. Unfortunately
these factors contribute to the problem of teacher retention,
which research shows is largely a function of satisfaction
in the workplace rather than salary (although this latter factor
should by no means be minimized).
Our country operates on a merit system that requires an objective
way to assess student achievement. Career decisions are made
on the basis of student achievement, and colleges accept the
highest achieving students first. Thus, an objective testing
system is required. The trick in providing such a program is
to make it so that teachers are not motivated to teach to the
test, and that they are encouraged to use their creativity
as professionals-each using their skills, knowledge, and personality
to provide a rich learning environment that goes beyond the
mere recollection of facts. To achieve this is no mean feat!
If standards are written clearly-and, in particular, unambiguously-and
test makers hold themselves to the nature of the standards
and their intent, rather than trying to write creative test
items, we have a real chance to realize a fair testing program
that encourages teachers to use their special talents to maximize
student achievement.
Such a transition is not easy. For one, it will require that
all tests be administered at appropriate times-pedagogically
speaking-and not when it is convenient for the administration.
That is, the practice of giving standardized tests in March
so that scoring and analysis can be conveniently done before
the end of the school year must be modified. Given the state
of technology today, we must be able to score and analyze test
results more rapidly than the 3 months currently allotted for
this. The goal of attaining pedagogically proper student assessment
must be a combined effort by all parties involved: the state
and local authorities, and the teachers and supervisors. Done
right, we can once more become the educational model for the
rest of the world.#
Alfred Posamentier is Dean of the School of Education at
the City College of New York.
