Okay for the record I would just like to admit that I am not that articulate now much less than when I was in the fourth grade.
Her name is Sydney Smoot, and she is speaking in front of the Hernando County School Board. Here is more on her story:
"This test defines me as a number," she said, holding up an index finger for emphasis. "One test defines me as either a failure or a success."
She questioned the merit of the exam that has been subjected to little vetting:
"Why am I being forced to take a test that hasn't even been tested on students in Florida?"
And she had a particular objection that brought all her other ones to a head.
Before taking the reading section of the FSA last week, she was required to sign a form that prohibited her from talking about its contents, even to her parents.
Jennifer Smoot, her mother, said her daughter came home upset because she felt as though this form kept her from sharing the burden of her testing anxieties with her parents.
"My daughter talks to me about everything," said Smoot, 38. "She was very upset."
I am a little late to this story as it happened over a week ago, but once I saw that video I knew I had to share it here.
As many of you know I am firmly against most of the standardized testing that resulted from No Child Left Behind, but I don't believe I ever expressed myself with near the eloquence of nine year old Sydney Smoot.
Take my word for it, this will not be the last time we hear from this young lady.
Smoot for President 2040?
ReplyDeleteSmoot for President 2016
DeleteThank you, young scholar.
ReplyDeleteYou gave me hope.
Smoot 'em Syd! Yes most definitely future Pres. or whatever she wants to be. That was delightful. What a kid! After watching that I think I'll just shut the puter down so nothing else will taint this feel good high.
ReplyDeleteThe testing companies' only real asset is the children that take their tests. So, of course, controlling and enhancing that asset is how a company generates profits. And teachers' job security and pay scales are getting more and more connected to these tests. So teachers perceive students as assets to be controlled as well.
ReplyDeleteUnderstanding that people are using you for their own ends is a good life lesson. This youngster will find it helps when she discovers what her government has planned for controlling her uterus.
I would have thought that a fourth grader can't legally enter into a contract. The "no talk" form seems illegal. I think it's just a piece of paper to scare the crap out the little darlings.
ReplyDeleteI agree 7:22. How can they make an under the legal age dependent sign anything without an guardian, or legal representative for that matter. The premise to not speak about it with your parents is extremely questionable also.
DeleteI hope it is looked into further. This seems like it could be potentially dangerous if allowed for other reasons.
You get em, Ms Smoot!
Mildred
In NY, the testing company (the evil conglomerate Pearson) doesn't make the students sign anything. At least I don't THINK they do, but our state tests are later this month so that may have changed. It does, however, force all staff to sign confidentiality agreements, which prevent you from discussing any of the material on the tests.
DeleteSupposedly, this is designed to protect the copyrights of the materials for the testing company. Some of the questions in the tests are not counted for the grade, but are used as field tests to evaluate their quality for inclusion in future tests. Some of the test passages and questions are released the following year for use in test prep but the field test questions are used on future tests, so they are not released for public view.
Unfortunately, this also prevents educators from discussing - or complaining about - problems with the materials, lack of correct or multiple correct answers on multiple choice questions, vague or poorly written questions that the students don't understand how to answer, etc.
Everything is designed to protect the reputation and profits of the publisher, NOT to provide valid information for students, parents and teachers.
Children like Sydney is what gives me hope for our future. Yes, I think the future is in very good hands.
ReplyDeleteNine year old children signing non disclosure agreements? Only in America...
ReplyDeleteAnon @ 8:39 A.M. - Yes indeed, it is sad to see children forced to sign NDA's - just like the palins force those who come into contact with them sign NDA's. Alas, no palin spawn displayed enough academic prowess in school to be considered for said testing!
DeleteAnybody want to bet the committee to which she was speaking completely ignores her points and had allowed her to speak only because they thought it was cute - until she said it?
ReplyDeleteHere in NY, there is a lot of disappointment and anger at what kind of governor Andrew Cuomo has turned out to be. He is deeply in the pockets of corporations and has turned a lot of his focus to destroying public education and privatizing our schools.
ReplyDeleteOur current system uses standardized test scores for 20% of the teacher's evaluation. The rest is based on local test scores and observations done by school administrators. Cuomo's new proposal wants to increase the percentage of test scores to 50% of the evaluation, and have the observations done by state observers, who know nothing about the individual school, district or community in which the teacher works. They know nothing about the teacher him/herself or the circumstances in which students in that particular class are living.
The test scores have been proven to be invalid measures of academic achievement, and there is absolutely no consequence for the student who does poorly on the test. This means that students who dislike a particular teacher (often the more strict ones who have high expectations) can intentionally blow the test and disrupt the class during the observation in order to affect that teacher's evaluation. A few disgruntled students can end up causing a teacher who has been considered highly effective for their entire career to be fired because of their actions.
In addition, the governor is using the budget allocations to force districts to support his 'reforms'. The districts have been told that they will receive only a portion of their allocated state funds unless they sign on to his proposals.
As a result, there is a growing movement to opt out of standardized testing throughout the state. Many districts have informed their parents that they can choose to have their child opt out of the test with no negative repercussions for the child. Some superintendents have even distributed a formal letter that the parents can use to do this. In one of the local districts, almost 1 in 5 students have already opted out of testing for this year, and the number promises to increase significantly before the testing begins later this month.
This is a link to a blog that discusses many of the issues surrounding the education 'reforms' that are destroying our public schools. Some of the most egregious issues are:
- the typical state test for a 3rd grader takes almost TWICE AS LONG as the tests used for admittance to college, law school or medical school
- many of the standards for Common Core are developmentally inappropriate, meaning that the children are expected to achieve standards they are simply incapable of mastering at their age
- cut scores - the percentage of correct answers that determines a grade on the state test - are determined AFTER the test is administered and CHANGE EVERY YEAR:
"From 2006 to 2013 the score needed to pass went on a wild ride. One year, a 63% was needed to pass. In another year, students had to score 87% in order to pass.
In 2013, the score needed to pass the NYS ELA dropped to a record low 63%. While we are not able to see the actual test, we were informed about the make-up of the test. The 3rd grade practice set contained items that proved to be on readability levels above 8th grade. "
In other words, the cut scores are set to produce a pre-determined percentage of failures. Those percentages are determined by a small handful of people in the State Education Department.
https://lacetothetop.wordpress.com
And, just for clarification, I am NOT a teacher so none of these reforms will affect my evaluations or my job security. I do, however, work as an Educational Interpreter for the Deaf in a city school district, providing language and academic support for deaf and hard of hearing students. I won't even begin to discuss what this whole reform movement has done to damage the education of children with special needs!
One great concern for teachers in regard to many states' increasing reliance on test scores for teacher evaluations is the dilemma of what to do for those educators who teach subjects that do not have state tests.
ReplyDeleteIn some states, teachers are evaluated using scores from other subjects that they don't even teach. Imagine if you were a dentist but the quality of your work was based solely on how good the accountant on the next floor was.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2015/03/25/how-is-this-fair-art-teacher-is-evaluated-by-students-math-standardized-test-scores/
I believe in monitoring and assessment. How else am I going to know if my child is progressing in academics and not just recess.
ReplyDeleteI believe in monitoring and assessment.
DeleteIn the 1950s I attended a private school for grades 8-12. Every fortnight we were tested in all subjects. The results were posted, ordered by each student's average score.
The tests being discussed have been proven over and over again to be invalid measurements of progress. They are often scored by part-time, minimum-wage, temporary employees who are not teachers.
DeleteThe schools and parents do not receive the scores until months after the tests are administered, usually during the following school year.
District-developed tests created by real, experienced educators based on the actual material the students are being taught are far more accurate measures of progress, but they are being eliminated in favor of the tests developed by mega-publishers and created by researchers who have never worked in an actual classroom.
@ 10:21.
DeleteI agree with you - to a point. What is being exposed here is NOT monitoring and assessing. It is leveraging test scores to produce desired results without any affect on the needs of the student.
What I would like to know - aside from the ignorant idea of going fully to non-state participation in schools, i.e., no public schools - is why parents haven't bitched more and sooner.
Monitoring and assessment is not the same as using children involuntarily to develop a product (the tests) to sell for a profit. Compulsory education should not mean your child is an unpaid employee of a testing corporation.
DeleteTeachers that are evaluated, promoted and paid based on test results focus students on test scores. Why bother educating when teaching to the test gets you a pay raise.
I was very good at taking tests. I raked in scholarships. Not bad for someone that decided freshman year that (for a lark) I would not read a single word of Shakespeare in high school. The tests didn't assess my educational progress, just how good I was at taking tests. Just an example of the kind of techniques I developed (independently, no test prep industry yet existed), a quick glance at my multi-guess answer sheet would show some areas that were too heavily "a" or "b" etc. so I would know where to spend my time reviewing questions to look for errors. I knew then, as students do now, that the goal was to be smarter than the idiot that made up the test.
If the SAT and ACT tests were truly an reasonable assessment of a student's "education", then test prep books and course should not be able to raise scores.
Back in my day, before the ACT and test prep courses and manuals, I thought the most effective part of the SAT testing was the subject-matter testing. I remember taking tests in history, French and probably English, and also a three-hour essay (subject provided at the time of the test) which was graded by the English teachers at my high school. I did much better in the tests that covered actual subject matter and in the essay than in the general ones, especially the math test. Fortunately for me, the college I wanted to go to was also more interested in the subject matter testing. Do any of the SAT tests still cover actual subject matter anymore?
DeleteBeaglemom
You think this won't be the last time we've heard from this girl, but I don't believe this is the first time we've actually heard from this young lady-I think she is reading something an adult wrote. She's been well-coached, but no 9-year old understands issues like test accuracy or validity. Those are adult concerns. And note she's actually asking for more testing: at the beginning, middle, and end of the year. Teachers give assessments of their own creation all the time, throughout the year, so the notion that this is the only test she's being judged on is not accurate. Cute gimmick for a complicated subject, though. They surely got the attention they were looking for.
ReplyDeletee!!!!! She's a hundred percent right and she's got what it takes to communicate it quite succinctly. There's another from NJ from a parent to a school board. The teacher spends forty minutes a day teaching, and has to administer a test on three of those days per month. They're not being taught to learn, they're being taught to pass the next test, btw the test has nothing to do with the subject in school. Why isn't johnny learning?
ReplyDeleteThis girl's parents have a lot to be proud of, hopefully she'll bring about change for all students.
"Take my word for it, this will not be the last time we hear from this young lady."
ReplyDeleteSure, it may have been written by an adult, or a least edited. Still, it feels that our young lady has an admirable grasp on what she's saying, and a lovely ability to address a group of her elders. I wish I'd been that self-posessed when I was her age. Or even now. Live long and prosper, little one!