Some of the criticisms surrounding the Common Core State Standards revolve around the testing involved. There are two organizations that are developing tests linked to the CCSS, and public school students in states that adopt CCSS will be taking one of these tests.
But similar testing regimens have been with us for a long time. Over the past several decades, as the educational world has moved toward various types of standards-based learning, there have been a multitude of tests developed, supposedly to show whether students have achieved the desired standards. In many areas, these tests not only measure student learning, but are also used to evaluate schools, teachers, and curricula. Much rides on these "high stakes" tests, including graduation from high school, teacher salaries, and even housing sales ("This house is in the XYZ district, which has the highest test scores in the state"). Students take the SAT and/or ACT to gain entrance into colleges, and some also take the AP exams to earn college credit. Students take many tests throughout their K-12 educational career. (I regularly administer the SAT in our high school. The instructions require that I read things to the students like, "Be sure and mark only one answer for each question. If you erase, erase completely." I am always tempted to say, although I resist the temptation, "If you are taking this test and don't know how to mark your answers by this time in your educational life, then you should just leave right now - there's no hope for you.")
With all this testing, there is an increasing emphasis on "test-prep" instruction. Parents pay big bucks for formal test-prep courses which teach students test-taking strategies, how to make intelligent guesses, what things to study for which test, etc. Schools offer courses in test preparation. Multitudes of books are available which offer strategies for getting high scores on the SAT, the GRE, and the AP exams. Some of this is helpful, in that it shows the students the types of material that is covered on the tests. But I believe the test-prep emphasis has gotten out of hand.
One problem is that some (not all) of this test-prep work almost makes the test out to be a mystery which the student must learn to solve through skillfully using various schemes. The focus becomes using some particular strategy at test time. If you use that strategy, you will score 200 points higher than if you don't know about that secret (which you can learn by paying some organization a lot of money).
Another problem with the whole testing regimen is that teachers end up spending more time in class on teaching students how to take tests, and less time on teaching the actual content of the course. This is in addition to the time taken away from instruction to take the actual test. A geometry course almost becomes a course in how to successfully answer the geometry portions of the SAT, rather than a course in the principles of geometry.
Additionally, concepts which are not included on the high-stakes tests may be de-emphasized in class or abandoned altogether. We might believe students should be able to formulate proofs in geometry, but if they're not going to have to do it on the SAT or the state End of Course Test, then we drop it in class.
I think this preoccupation with test prep is wrong-headed. Think about tests in another area of life - medical tests. At my last medical check-up, my cholesterol level was slightly high. What is my response? I haven't done research in the particular cholesterol test my doctor's lab uses, I haven't tried to find out how to make the test think my cholesterol level has gone down. I haven't done anything comparable to "test prep." Instead, I have taken steps which improve my health, particularly my cholesterol level - cutting out fats and sweets, adding fiber to my diet, exercising more regularly, etc. These are all things which contribute to my health. The result should be a lower cholesterol level on the test, but that test result is only a by-product of a general approach to a more healthy lifestyle.
I think the same thing applies to tests in school. The focus needs to shift away from passing the test and needs to move toward mastery of the content. If a student has really learned geometry well, he will do well on the SAT and the ACT without having to do endless test prep work. If the scores on the standardized test in 6th grade are low, don't spend a lot of time teaching the students how to take the test better - focus on teaching them the content. The test scores will follow from that.
Of course, there is some value in a limited amount of test prep. For example, the SAT currently penalizes students for wrong answers, to discourage random guessing - answering a question wrong deducts a fraction of a point, while leaving it blank does nothing to the score. So students should learn that they should not just randomly guess. But they also should learn that, if they can eliminate one or two answers, they have a higher likelihood of getting a correct answer even if they have to guess from the remaining answers. And test prep for things like the AP exams helps the students see what types of questions they will be asked on the actual exam. These are helpful. But we should not be loading our students down with endless test preparation or test-taking strategies - we need to be teaching the content effectively. The test-taking skills can be taught rather quickly, but the course content cannot. If our students master the material, their test scores will naturally increase.
But similar testing regimens have been with us for a long time. Over the past several decades, as the educational world has moved toward various types of standards-based learning, there have been a multitude of tests developed, supposedly to show whether students have achieved the desired standards. In many areas, these tests not only measure student learning, but are also used to evaluate schools, teachers, and curricula. Much rides on these "high stakes" tests, including graduation from high school, teacher salaries, and even housing sales ("This house is in the XYZ district, which has the highest test scores in the state"). Students take the SAT and/or ACT to gain entrance into colleges, and some also take the AP exams to earn college credit. Students take many tests throughout their K-12 educational career. (I regularly administer the SAT in our high school. The instructions require that I read things to the students like, "Be sure and mark only one answer for each question. If you erase, erase completely." I am always tempted to say, although I resist the temptation, "If you are taking this test and don't know how to mark your answers by this time in your educational life, then you should just leave right now - there's no hope for you.")
With all this testing, there is an increasing emphasis on "test-prep" instruction. Parents pay big bucks for formal test-prep courses which teach students test-taking strategies, how to make intelligent guesses, what things to study for which test, etc. Schools offer courses in test preparation. Multitudes of books are available which offer strategies for getting high scores on the SAT, the GRE, and the AP exams. Some of this is helpful, in that it shows the students the types of material that is covered on the tests. But I believe the test-prep emphasis has gotten out of hand.
One problem is that some (not all) of this test-prep work almost makes the test out to be a mystery which the student must learn to solve through skillfully using various schemes. The focus becomes using some particular strategy at test time. If you use that strategy, you will score 200 points higher than if you don't know about that secret (which you can learn by paying some organization a lot of money).
Another problem with the whole testing regimen is that teachers end up spending more time in class on teaching students how to take tests, and less time on teaching the actual content of the course. This is in addition to the time taken away from instruction to take the actual test. A geometry course almost becomes a course in how to successfully answer the geometry portions of the SAT, rather than a course in the principles of geometry.
Additionally, concepts which are not included on the high-stakes tests may be de-emphasized in class or abandoned altogether. We might believe students should be able to formulate proofs in geometry, but if they're not going to have to do it on the SAT or the state End of Course Test, then we drop it in class.
I think this preoccupation with test prep is wrong-headed. Think about tests in another area of life - medical tests. At my last medical check-up, my cholesterol level was slightly high. What is my response? I haven't done research in the particular cholesterol test my doctor's lab uses, I haven't tried to find out how to make the test think my cholesterol level has gone down. I haven't done anything comparable to "test prep." Instead, I have taken steps which improve my health, particularly my cholesterol level - cutting out fats and sweets, adding fiber to my diet, exercising more regularly, etc. These are all things which contribute to my health. The result should be a lower cholesterol level on the test, but that test result is only a by-product of a general approach to a more healthy lifestyle.
I think the same thing applies to tests in school. The focus needs to shift away from passing the test and needs to move toward mastery of the content. If a student has really learned geometry well, he will do well on the SAT and the ACT without having to do endless test prep work. If the scores on the standardized test in 6th grade are low, don't spend a lot of time teaching the students how to take the test better - focus on teaching them the content. The test scores will follow from that.
Of course, there is some value in a limited amount of test prep. For example, the SAT currently penalizes students for wrong answers, to discourage random guessing - answering a question wrong deducts a fraction of a point, while leaving it blank does nothing to the score. So students should learn that they should not just randomly guess. But they also should learn that, if they can eliminate one or two answers, they have a higher likelihood of getting a correct answer even if they have to guess from the remaining answers. And test prep for things like the AP exams helps the students see what types of questions they will be asked on the actual exam. These are helpful. But we should not be loading our students down with endless test preparation or test-taking strategies - we need to be teaching the content effectively. The test-taking skills can be taught rather quickly, but the course content cannot. If our students master the material, their test scores will naturally increase.