Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Craig Mollerstuen on March 10, 2011 at 5:14pm

"Assessment technologies" will enable be the new "standardized testing." They will allow greater correlation between learning and teaching, longitudinal tracking and give teachers a data centric view of a student's learning history.

Craig Mollerstuen

Parent

Anchorage, Alaska, USA

Permalink Reply by Zachary Watson on March 11, 2011 at 3:09pm

The idea of standardized testing will most likely never become obsolete.  Assessment technologies can provide more valuable ways to track student achievement, however when dealing with greater numbers of students standardized tests are just more convenient.  

 

Standardized tests do not truly show student abilities as stated, but in America its all about getting things done fast.  If every student had a portfolio to make and get graded it would take a long time.  What may happen is a slow merging of online submissions of student work/etc to be graded along with standardized testing, but that will be down the road.  

 

However, when dealing with specific groups of students these assessment technologies will come about quicker.  Ultimately its all about time and efficiency, and not actual quality.  

Permalink Reply by Siddhartha on March 16, 2011 at 7:38am

Today with faster technology injection into education, we can afford to customize it for each student. Uptil now, learning has been a linear process (classroom instruction, followed by periodic summative assessment).  But those inspired by “Star Trek”, would prefer to move education towards a 1-on-1 teaching/learning system, where study pace and material are driven not only by the teaching mandate but also by each individual student's grasp, potential and interest.

 

Now with intelligent middle-ware technologies to support the teacher, it should be possible for the teacher to base his/her instruction on formative assessment inputs and offer actual personalized teaching, monitoring each student’s progress/performance and addressing specific doubts/weaknesses on the way, thus enriching learning for each student. This learning process is rather cyclic in nature where initial instruction is followed by formative assessment, and formative assessment feeds back to further guided instruction. Assuming each class of students has a normal IQ distribution, a hardworking teacher would want to see that every student (even the last one in class) score respectably above pass marks in a standardized test, but with limited bandwidth (read: fixed curriculum and bounded time to teach the entire class), the teacher may find it difficult. A middle-ware system conducting regular formative assessment for each student, would give the teacher a holistic view on every students’ strengths/weaknesses, so the Teacher could concentrate on the differential (filling specific learning gaps as they become apparent). Such a setup should lead to a more effective utilization of a Teacher's time and a more satisfied class of students, with hopefully “no child left behind” in class.

 

Such new assessment technologies (teaching middle-ware) would make standardized tests, as we know them, obsolete. However it is noteworthy, that results emerging from system-driven assessment would be measurable and comparable. Actually standardized tests filter or sift the academically ahead from those behind, hence leaving detrimental effects on the psyches of those who find themselves in the latter lot While, new assessment technologies not only sort/rank students by their academic brilliance but also focus on ways to help/push those left behind and, so, keep the class together.

 

Teachers can create/share tests on various Learning Management Systems and have them system-corrected to quickly get a view of how the class is performing. However, this can be taken a level further, where the student has access to a continuous assessment system that he/she can answer at his/her own pace/schedule, giving the teacher a broader/deeper view as to how that individual and the class as a whole are progressing/performing. One such middle-ware technology is PSToM (available at www.pstom.com). PSToM (which stands for “Parents, Students, Teachers of Mathematics”) is a math learning/teaching system that promotes Algebra education, where students solve system generated problems, get complete solutions for answers that go wrong and proceed to the next problem type only on correctly answering the current one. Parents can view their ward’s progress/performance and teachers and peers can view each student’s progress/performance with varying degrees of access and discuss student-fed problems that the system’s solver couldn’t solve.

 

- Siddhartha Goel (sid AT mathvoyager DOT com), Founder, MindStretch Learning Lab

Permalink Reply by John Tanner on March 16, 2011 at 8:59am

Can assessment technologies make standardized testing obsolete?

Here is how I came to understand what the term “standardized” really means, how much it influences how we think and act, and why the answer to the question above is yes.

I realized at the end of my first year teaching freshman English while a graduate student that I was struggling as a teacher. I knew this because as of the first assignment I could tell the good writers from the bad, those first grades reflected that pecking order, and the final grades rarely differed. Kids were leaving my class looking pretty much the same as when they arrived, so while most probably got a little better that may have had as much to do with maturity as my teaching.

During my second year I tried something new after reading a book by Peter Elbow. My syllabus was reduced to a single page indicating that the only way to pass my class was to write at least one extremely good paper. It might take a poor writer the entire semester, or a good writer a week, but that, I said, was not something within my control. I would, however, support them in any way I could. Grades would be determined by how often you wrote well, with a single success resulting in a C, and additional successful work eventually earning an A.

As a result, I had good writers who wrote well once and took their C, poor writers work as hard as they could and achieve the A, struggling writers that took all semester to earn the C, and great writers who had an A half way through. Regardless, no one walked out the door without having met a certain standard. On the last day of class I could have easily ranked my students from the strongest to the weakest writers, but at that point it no longer mattered.

That is the difference between standardizing the assessment and standardizing an outcome. A standardized assessment will tell me how my students rank from top to bottom. That approach tends to produce consistent, predictable results and can (and in my case did) bias the system into replicating the results. Standardizing an outcome requires a different system, one that sets the standard and then differentiates against the amount of support and the time needed to meet it.

Our over-reliance on standardized testing is based in the belief that standardizing the test will result in higher achievement, but that cannot be as they require different systems that will often run counter to one another. The fact that we stop on a particular day and check the distribution (or assign passing scores) has little to do with the goal of having all our students achieve at a high level. If the system runs like my original classroom (and I would argue it does), seeing that distribution risks preserving what need not be preserved, limiting the opportunity to teach and to learn.

Technology can be a means to standardize an outcome, to show a student what it means to have written well, reasoned well, achieved at math, and read well, and to drive the system to offer the appropriate supports. Standardized testing in the face of public policy or our love affair with knowing where we rank may never truly become obsolete, but if technology can serve as a vehicle to standardize what actually matters, we won’t have to pay it any mind.

 

John Tanner,

Test Sense

johnt@testsense.com

Permalink Reply by Jen LaMaster on March 16, 2011 at 10:06am

Assessment technologies, like standardized test, focus on the minimum uniform tasks our students should replicate.  I argue that our students will not grow as creative, innovative learners if we continue to assess based on skill and drill knowledge.  Unfortunately, our current test-centric, data drives decision, educational climate does not agree.

 

Jen LaMaster

Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School

Indianapolis, IN USA

Permalink Reply by Elayne Kuletz (Evans) on March 28, 2011 at 1:21pm

Standardized testing may shift and change in the future, but it can only become obsolete when our education system begins to recognize the value of diverse education and experience. New assessment technology will only change our methods, not our madness.

 

Elayne Evans

Adjunct Faculty

Western Oregon University

Monmouth, OR, USA

Permalink Reply by Elayne Kuletz (Evans) on May 16, 2011 at 2:49pm

Allow me to expand on my previous statement: Can assessment technologies make standardized testing obsolete? No.

 

New technologies are rapidly transforming the way we evaluate student learning. Emerging digital tools and improved assessment strategies are having an impressive impact in the classroom. This is not because testing is the most important aspect of education. Rather, assessment is meant to guide instruction. Testing should not consume valuable time that could be spent instead on what is infinitely more important: teaching and learning.

 

Modern advances in related tools allow teachers and test proctors to more efficiently (and sometimes more effectively) evaluate students. Ideally, this means teachers will waste less time creating tests and students will waste less time taking them. However, this will not render standardized testing obsolete. If anything, standardized testing practices will improve just enough that our dependence upon them will grow.

 

Standardized testing, regardless of its form, may be made more valuable or may be conducted more swiftly due to these new ideas and technological advances. But the medium does not change the nature of standardized testing, which suggests that every student should learn the same things at the same time (often in the same way) as their peers.

 

While performance-based assessment may have more merit than a multiple-choice exam, for example, the standardization of requirements and expectations will not change because of new strategies or software. Many lawmakers in the United States embrace standardized testing as an accurate appraisal of the success of our education system. Teachers are held responsible for their students’ performance, regardless of classroom demographics, personal lives, or individual challenges. This will not change until we are bold enough to challenge the convention that students must be grouped by age to learn a regulated list of concepts. 

 

What are the goals of an education system? If we mean to create a standardized experience for our youth so that every child grows up to have known, seen, and done similar things, we do them a great disservice. A unique perspective is invaluable to any situation. Just as biodiversity is important to the survival of a species in order to resist disease or withstand environmental challenges, a heterogeneity of exposure and understanding is vital to the intellectual future and success of our students.

 

Standardized testing may shift and change in the future, but it can only become obsolete when the system begins to recognize the value of diverse education and experience. New assessment technology will only change our methods, not our madness.

 

Permalink Reply by Jen LaMaster on May 17, 2011 at 11:18am

To expand ideas...

 

I am all for using technology to enhance teaching and learning. The power of learning environments facilitating collaboration and communication, moving beyond geographic boundaries, certainly energizes learning. But is anyone else concerned about a "learning environment" such as the one presented in "The Rise of K-12 Blended Learning" by Michael B. Horn and Heather Staker (Innosight Institute, January 2011)? The report asks the reader to image this dystopia of learning environments:

"A large room filled with 280 cubicles with computers—similar in layout to a call center—sits in the middle of Carpe Diem’s current building. Students rotate every 55 minutes between self-paced online learning in this large learning center and face-to-face instruction in traditional classrooms. When students are learning online in the learning center, paraprofessionals offer instant direction and help as students encounter difficulties. In the traditional classroom, a teacher re-teaches, enhances, and applies the material introduced online…In the Carpe Diem learning center, if a student struggles for more than three minutes with a concept, the e2020 system (e2020 is the online-learning content provider) alerts an assistant coach, who responds with immediate, on-the-spot help. This simple alert motivates students to stay on task and helps resolve problems quickly."

As an Ignatian educator, and a parent, this type of educational view terrifies me. I do not want my children sitting in a "call center" in front of screens where they are watched for signs inattention at three minutes. Really, three minutes? When was the last time any adult stayed on task for 55 minutes of screen time without wandering into inattention? But I digress...

The ideal interaction between the learner and the teacher is cura personalis. Generally translated "care of the person", the charism requires an educator to consider a leaner’s context (what past experiences makes them who they are). This concern for the individual requires educators to see each learner as a unique, loved, and talented creation. While assessment technologies have come a long way in pacing algorithms, I have yet to meet one that considers each individual user as a unique creation to be nurtured. Rather, most assessment technologies start with normative data forming an imaginary "average" learner based on grade level. The best use of normative data is to find systemic calls for improvement and change. Treating every individual as a clone of a false norm is the antithesis of our call for concern of the individual.

When we embrace the ease (or thrift) of educating and assessing large numbers of students uniformly in a call-center environment, we frame the computer as educator and the learner as statistical norm. Self-pacing still covers the same information required of the standardized test. The software will spit all the data required for the state report. Outstanding! A paraprofessional is cheaper to hire than a trained professional educator. The CFO is thrilled! The machine makes the human educator obsolete – and in turn dehumanizes the learner. If the content is such that skill and kill on a computer screen can accomplish the learning objective, I imagine the focus is on the minimum, uniform tasks easy to replicate without a trained educator. I argue that our students will not grow as creative, innovative learners if we continue to assess based on skill and kill knowledge. Unfortunately, our current standardized test-centric, data drives decision, educational climate does not agree. The call-center classroom of the future beckons.

 

Jen LaMaster said:

Assessment technologies, like standardized test, focus on the minimum uniform tasks our students should replicate.  I argue that our students will not grow as creative, innovative learners if we continue to assess based on skill and drill knowledge.  Unfortunately, our current test-centric, data drives decision, educational climate does not agree.

 

Jen LaMaster

Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School

Indianapolis, IN USA

Permalink Reply by Elayne Kuletz (Evans) on May 17, 2011 at 11:47am

Jen,

 

I heartily concur. So much so that I feel like I need a tankard of ale to slam down while I do so. While I see the benefit of incorporating these kinds of learning technologies (that range from nudging encouragement to practically babysitting our students), I too am frightened of a future in which students spend more time in a chair, staring at a screen, hardly recognizable as alive or young. We often undervalue actual human interaction. While I love what modern communication technology has done for humanizing distance education, I don't believe that most children should be plopped into a cubicle instead of learning in a real, tangible way. Saving money (or creating beautiful charts of student data) should always be secondary to the creation of a quality educational environment for our children.

 

Permalink Reply by Jen LaMaster on May 18, 2011 at 6:33am

Thanks Elayne. Like you mentioned - I too fear we are losing site of value of diverse experiences.  Technology should be helping facilitate diversity of experience instead of creating a monochromatic learning environment.