{"id":4309,"date":"2013-02-12T08:49:10","date_gmt":"2013-02-12T13:49:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/?p=4309"},"modified":"2013-02-06T14:59:26","modified_gmt":"2013-02-06T19:59:26","slug":"february-17-2013","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/february-17-2013\/","title":{"rendered":"February 17, 2013–Standardized Test"},"content":{"rendered":"

Contributed by Seth Moland-Kovash, Palatine, IL<\/p>\n

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Warm-up Question<\/h3>\n

When was the last time you took a standardized state or national or school district-wide test?<\/p>\n

Standardized Test<\/h3>\n

\"shutterstock_11411374edit\"<\/a>The trend in the last couple of decades in education has been toward more standardized tests. They\u2019re often controversial in negotiations between teachers\u2019 unions and school districts, and in elections. Some people think that teachers should be assessed based on their students\u2019 standardized test scores and some think we need many more factors in assessing how teachers are doing and how much they should be paid. There are more standardized tests given today than ever and lots more importance is given to the results.<\/p>\n

One reason for this emphasis on standardized tests is a fear that our education system in the United States is not doing the best job that it could in preparing students. Studies are cited about the performance of American students when compared to students from other countries around the world. People argue about why those results are what they are.\u00a0 Standardized testing is one of the reasons often cited for the difference and one of the solutions often given for fixing the problem. Here is one example: in this story\u00a0 The education system of Finland (which is often cited as the best in the world) is also written about as having no standardized testing<\/a>. One more piece in the argument.<\/p>\n

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Discussion Questions<\/h3>\n