Download or read book Beyond Testing written by Deborah Meier and published by Teachers College Press. This book was released on 2017-07-14 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beyond Testing describes seven forms of assessment that are more effective than standardized test results. These assessments are more honest about what we can and cannot know about childrens knowledge, skills, and dispositions. Readers can compare and contrast each approach to determine which is most appropriate for their school.
Download or read book Classroom Testing and Assessment for ALL Students written by Spencer J. Salend and published by Corwin Press. This book was released on 2009-11-10 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A rare opportunity for the new generation of educators to learn alongside a well-known and experienced educator to integrate all learning styles into assessments. Principals should consider this for faculty book studies. The presented techniques will, no doubt, raise standardized test scores while teachers continue to present real curriculum."-Janette Bowen, Sixth-Grade TeacherJunction City Middle School, KSGive all students an equal chance to perform well on your classroom tests and assessments!In today's diverse classrooms, students of different socioeconomic, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds and ability levels share a common learning environment. To meet each student's unique strengths and needs, educators need flexible testing and assessment strategies that fulfill the requirements for standardized assessment and accountability in ways that don't put students at a disadvantage because of their differences.Classroom Testing and Assessment for ALL Students helps both general and special education teachers meet and move beyond the challenges of NCLB and IDEA by using teacher-made tests, appropriate testing accommodations, technology-based testing, and classroom-based assessments that support the teaching and learning process so all students have the opportunity to succeed. The book offers ways for teachers to better differentiate their testing and assessment strategies through: Classroom and school-based examples in each chapterBulleted information outlining hands-on, research-based strategies for teacher implementationForms, reproducibles, stories, vignettes, reflection questions, and checklists that guide educators in applying and tailoring the strategies to their classrooms and studentsTips on using technology to help all students perform better Teachers know their students best. This resource allows teachers to design tests and assessments to accommodate the various strengths and needs of all learners in their classroom.
Download or read book Beyond Test Scores written by Jack Schneider and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2017-08-14 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When it comes to sizing up America’s public schools, test scores are the go-to metric of state policy makers and anxious parents looking to place their children in the “best” schools. Yet ample research indicates that standardized tests are a poor way to measure a school’s performance. It is time—indeed past time—to rethink this system, Jack Schneider says. Beyond Test Scores reframes current debates over school quality by offering new approaches to educational data that can push us past our unproductive fixation on test scores. Using the highly diverse urban school district of Somerville, Massachusetts, as a case study, Schneider and his research team developed a new framework to more fairly and comprehensively assess educational effectiveness. And by adopting a wide range of measures aligned with that framework, they were able to more accurately capture a broader array of school strengths and weaknesses. Their new data not only provided parents, educators, and administrators with a clearer picture of school performance, but also challenged misconceptions about what makes a good school. With better data, Schneider shows, stakeholders at the federal, state, and local levels can undo the damage of present accountability systems and build greater capacity in our schools. Policy makers, administrators, and school leaders can better identify where assistance is needed. Educators can engage in more evidence-based decision making. And parents can make better-informed choices for their children. Perhaps most importantly, better data can facilitate communication among all these groups, allowing them to take collective action toward shared, concrete goals.
Download or read book The Testing Charade written by Daniel Koretz and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2017-08-31 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: America's leading expert in educational testing and measurement openly names the failures caused by today's testing policies and provides a blueprint for doing better. 6 x 9.
Download or read book Listening to Teach written by Leonard J. Waks and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 2015-10-14 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the 2016 Outstanding Book Award presented by the Society of Professors of Education What happens when teachers step back from didactic talk and begin to listen to their students? After decades of neglect, we are currently witnessing a surge of interest in this question. Listening to Teach features the leading voices in the recent discussion of listening in education. These contributors focus close attention on the key role of teachers as they move away from didactic talk and begin to devise innovative pedagogical strategies that encourage active listening by teachers and also cultivate active listening skills in learners. Twelve teaching approaches are explored, from Reggio Emilia's project method and Paulo Freire's pedagogy of the oppressed to experiential learning and philosophy for children. Each chapter offers a brief explanation of one of these approaches—its background, the problems it aims to resolve, the educators who have pioneered it, and its treatment of listening. The chapters conclude with ideas and suggestions drawn from these pedagogies that may be useful to classroom teachers.
Download or read book Will This Be on the Test written by Dana T. Johnson and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2019-04-23 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The essential survival guide for college students Getting into college takes plenty of hard work, but knowing what your professors expect of you once you get there can be even more challenging. Will This Be on the Test? is the essential survival guide for high-school students making the transition to college academics. In this entertaining and informative book, Dana Johnson shares wisdom and wit gleaned from her decades of experience as an award-winning teacher in the freshman classroom—lessons that will continue to serve you long after college graduation. Johnson offers invaluable insights into how college academics differs from high school. She reveals how to maximize what you learn and develop good relationships with your professors, while explaining how you fit into the learning environment of college. Answering the questions that many new college students don’t think to ask, Johnson provides tactical tips on getting the most out of office hours, e-mailing your professor appropriately, and optimizing your performance on assignments and exams. She gives practical advice on using the syllabus to your advantage, knowing how to address your instructors, and making sure you’re not violating the academic ethics code. The book also offers invaluable advice about online courses and guidance for parents who want to help their children succeed. Will This Be on the Test? shows you how to work with your professors to get the education, grades, and recommendations you need to thrive in the classroom and beyond.
Download or read book The New Division of Labor written by Frank Levy and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2012-11-26 with total page 187 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the current recession ends, many workers will not be returning to the jobs they once held--those jobs are gone. In The New Division of Labor, Frank Levy and Richard Murnane show how computers are changing the employment landscape and how the right kinds of education can ease the transition to the new job market. The book tells stories of people at work--a high-end financial advisor, a customer service representative, a pair of successful chefs, a cardiologist, an automotive mechanic, the author Victor Hugo, floor traders in a London financial exchange. The authors merge these stories with insights from cognitive science, computer science, and economics to show how computers are enhancing productivity in many jobs even as they eliminate other jobs--both directly and by sending work offshore. At greatest risk are jobs that can be expressed in programmable rules--blue collar, clerical, and similar work that requires moderate skills and used to pay middle-class wages. The loss of these jobs leaves a growing division between those who can and cannot earn a good living in the computerized economy. Left unchecked, the division threatens the nation's democratic institutions. The nation's challenge is to recognize this division and to prepare the population for the high-wage/high-skilled jobs that are rapidly growing in number--jobs involving extensive problem solving and interpersonal communication. Using detailed examples--a second grade classroom, an IBM managerial training program, Cisco Networking Academies--the authors describe how these skills can be taught and how our adjustment to the computerized workplace can begin in earnest.
Download or read book The Child Whisperer written by Carol Tuttle and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Child Whisperer teaches how to read unsaid clues that children naturally give every day, and shows how parenting, teaching, coaching, and mentoring children can be an even more intuitive, cooperative experience than ever.
Download or read book Understanding by Design written by Grant P. Wiggins and published by ASCD. This book was released on 2005 with total page 383 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is understanding and how does it differ from knowledge? How can we determine the big ideas worth understanding? Why is understanding an important teaching goal, and how do we know when students have attained it? How can we create a rigorous and engaging curriculum that focuses on understanding and leads to improved student performance in today's high-stakes, standards-based environment? Authors Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe answer these and many other questions in this second edition of Understanding by Design. Drawing on feedback from thousands of educators around the world who have used the UbD framework since its introduction in 1998, the authors have greatly revised and expanded their original work to guide educators across the K-16 spectrum in the design of curriculum, assessment, and instruction. With an improved UbD Template at its core, the book explains the rationale of backward design and explores in greater depth the meaning of such key ideas as essential questions and transfer tasks. Readers will learn why the familiar coverage- and activity-based approaches to curriculum design fall short, and how a focus on the six facets of understanding can enrich student learning. With an expanded array of practical strategies, tools, and examples from all subject areas, the book demonstrates how the research-based principles of Understanding by Design apply to district frameworks as well as to individual units of curriculum. Combining provocative ideas, thoughtful analysis, and tested approaches, this new edition of Understanding by Design offers teacher-designers a clear path to the creation of curriculum that ensures better learning and a more stimulating experience for students and teachers alike.
Download or read book Defending Standardized Testing written by Richard Phelps and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2005-03-23 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Everyone invested in the success of American education, from parents to policymakers, are affected by or concerned about educational testing. The education reform movement of the past 15 years has focused on raising academic standards. Some standards advocates attach a testing mechanism to gauge the extent to which high standards are actually accomplished. On the other hand, some critics view the push for standards and testing as precisely what ails American education. They view testing generally as an impediment to reform, an antiquated technology that reflects an antiquated view of teaching, learning, and social organization, and perpetuates inequality. At the same time, the testing profession has produced advances in the format, accuracy, dependability, and utility of tests. Never before has obtaining such an abundance of accurate and useful information about student learning been possible. And, never before has the American public been in such agreement about the value of testing for measuring student performance, monitoring the performance of educational systems, gauging the success of reforms, and accountability. acknowledge the benefits of testing. Many of these measurement specialists also believe that those benefits have been insufficiently articulated in the public discussions of testing. Although much has been written over the past decade on standardized testing policy, little has been published by measurement specialists who support the use of external, high-stakes standardized testing. Most of the published material has been written by those opposed to such testing. The contributing authors of this volume are both accomplished researchers and practitioners who are respected and admired worldwide. They bring to the project an abundance of experience working with standardized tests. standardized testing situation, arguments, and strategies; explain and refute many of the common criticisms of standardized testing; document the public support for, and the realized benefits of, standardized testing; acknowledge the genuine limitations of, and suggest improvements to, testing practices; provide guidance for structuring and administering large-scale testing programs in light of public preferences and the "No Child Left Behind Act" requirements; and present a defense of standardized testing and a practical vision for its promise and future. Defending Standardized Testing minimizes the use of technical jargon so as to appeal to all who have a stake in American educational reform - parents, policy makers, school board members, teachers, administrators, and measurement specialists.
Download or read book The Pedagogy of Standardized Testing written by Arlo Kempf and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-04-29 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Based on a large-scale international study of teachers in Los Angeles, Chicago, Ontario, and New York, this book illustrates the ways increased use of high-stakes standardized testing is fundamentally changing education in the US and Canada with a negative overall impact on the way teachers teach and students learn. Standardized testing makes understanding students' strengths and weaknesses more difficult, and class time spent on testing consumes scarce time and attention needed to support the success of all students—further disadvantaging ELLs, students with exceptionalities, low income, and racially minoritized students.
Download or read book Assessment Strategies for Online Learning written by Dianne Conrad and published by Athabasca University Press. This book was released on 2018-07-15 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Assessment has provided educational institutions with information about student learning outcomes and the quality of education for many decades. But has it informed practice and been fully incorporated into the learning cycle? Conrad and Openo argue that the potential inherent in many of the new learning environments being explored by educators and students has not been fully realized. In this investigation of a variety of assessment methods and learning approaches, the authors aim to discover the tools that engage learners and authentically evaluate education. They insist that moving to new learning environments, specifically those online and at a distance, afford opportunities for educators to adopt only the best practices of traditional face-to-face assessment while exploring evaluation tools made available by a digital learning environment in the hopes of arriving at methods that capture the widest set of learner skills and attributes.
Download or read book Beyond Testing Classic Edition written by Caroline Gipps and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2011-10-27 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is an exceptionally thoughtful assessment of assessment, and I am (along with anyone else who broods about education) much in your debt. Jerome Bruner, personal communication with the authorWhen this award-winning book was originally published in 1994, a review in the TES said: Beyond Testing is a refreshingly honest look at the dilemmas faci
Download or read book The Case Against Standardized Testing written by Alfie Kohn and published by Heinemann Educational Books. This book was released on 2000 with total page 112 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kohn's central message is that standardized tests are "not a force of nature but a force of politics--and political decisions can be questioned, challenged, and ultimately reversed."
Download or read book The Global Testing Culture written by William C. Smith and published by Symposium Books Ltd. This book was released on 2016-01-04 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The past thirty years have seen a rapid expansion of testing, exposing students worldwide to tests that are now, more than ever, standardized and linked to high-stakes outcomes. The use of testing as a policy tool has been legitimized within international educational development to measure education quality in the vast majority of countries worldwide. The embedded nature and normative power of high-stakes standardized testing across national contexts can be understood as a global testing culture. The global testing culture permeates all aspects of education, from financing, to parental involvement, to teacher and student beliefs and practices. The reinforcing nature of the global testing culture leads to an environment where testing becomes synonymous with accountability, which becomes synonymous with education quality. Underlying the global testing culture is a set of values identified from the increasing literature on world culture. These include: education as a human right, academic intelligence, faith in science, decentralization, and neoliberalism. Each of these values highlights different aspects of the dialogue in support of high-stakes standardized testing. The wide approval of these values and their ability to legitimate various aspects of high-stakes testing reinforces the taken-for-granted notion that such tests are effective and appropriate education practices. However, a large body of literature emphasizes the negative unintended consequences – teaching to the test, reshaping the testing pool, the inequitable distribution of school resources and teachers’ attention, and reconstructing the role of the student, teacher, and parent – commonly found when standardized, census-based tests are combined with high-stakes outcomes for educators or students. This book problematizes this culture by providing critical perspectives that challenge the assumptions of the culture and describe how the culture manifests in national contexts. The volume makes it clear that testing, per se, is not the problem. Instead it is how tests are administered, used or misused, and linked to accountability that provide the global testing culture with its powerful ability to shape schools and society and lead to its unintended, undesirable consequences.
Download or read book Even Monsters Need Haircuts written by Matthew McElligott and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2013-06-27 with total page 39 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Perfect for Halloween, this hilarious story is about a boy who follows in his father's footsteps . . . in his own monstrously unique way! Just before midnight, on the night of a full moon, a young barber stays out past his bedtime to go to work. His customers may be regulars, but they are anything but normal--after all, even monsters need haircuts! Business is steady all night, and this barber is prepared for anything with his scissors, rotting tonic, horn polish, and stink wax. It's a tough job, but someone's got to help these creatures maintain their ghoulish good looks.
Download or read book Beyond the Textbook written by David Kobrin and published by Heinemann Educational Books. This book was released on 1996 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Describes a method of teaching history in which students act as historians, researching documents and primary sources; provides accounts of how this curriculum worked in actual classrooms; and includes sample handouts, and excerpts from student writings.