In the United States standardized testing has played a leading role in facilitating the privatization of education. Under the No Child Left Behind policy, schools which do not meet the standards, as measured by test scores, for a number of years can eventually be replaced by charter schools[1]. Consequently public education for most children, especially in the poorest communities, has become highly regimented, with the use of scripted programs that are geared towards preparing the students to pass tests in reading and math.
The corporations, such as McGraw Hill Company, that publish the scripted programs are often the same ones that publish the state assessments, as well as having been hired as consultants to develop the state standards that must be met. This has become such a lucrative business that the five largest testing companies made over $2 billion in profits in one year.
As education has been more and more focused on ‘teaching to the test”, there has been less and less time in the classroom for the arts, physical education, the sciences and social studies, providing children with little time to develop their creative, analytical and social skills, not just in the upper grades but even in the primary grades and kindergarten.
How has this played out in the education of four and five-year- old children who are more often than not coming to their first educational experience in a school setting?
When I first decided to become a kindergarten teacher, after a number of years of teaching at the secondary level, I was hired by an inner city Los Angeles school with a bi-lingual Spanish/English program. Four of the eight kindergarten classes were taught in Spanish. There were 4 morning classes and 4 afternoon classes. Teachers team-taught in pairs, helping their partner for most of the class, yet still having an hour of time for individual lesson preparation. A full-day teaching assistant also worked with each team, which meant that there were 3 adults working with the children in each class.
When California reduced the class size for primary students to 20 students, we could spend much of the instructional time working with small groups. The children were usually divided into 4 groups of 5 students. The groups were rotated so that each adult worked with 5 children at a time and the students in the fourth group could participate in activities such as reading, listening to story tapes, art, science, using a computer. Playing with blocks or in a playhouse by themselves or with a partner. The ratio of 5 children to one adult allowed for much more adult attention for the children and their individual needs and interests. We had much more time for art, music, dance, gardening, drama, physical education and playing which is so important for active young children who are busy exploring the world and learning social skills as well as academic ones. We had more time for school assemblies, celebrations, and neighbourhood excursions and for several field trips to places like the zoo or a museum. The relaxed but organized and stimulating environment allowed ample time for the children to develop a joy of learning along with their academic and social skills.
Formal assessments were used to identify the children’s language abilities and basic skills when they entered kindergarten. Assessments for measuring children’s progress were developed by individual teachers and also collectively as a grade level. With three adults in the classroom, the few assessments that we did use could be administered without major disruptions to instructional time.
Over the next few years, more and more emphasis was placed on measuring achievement in language skills and mathematics as No Child Left Behind was put into place. A state proposition was passed that dismantled almost all of the bilingual programs in California. Testing was to be done in English no matter what the child’s English language abilities were. Assessing children’s language abilities and kindergarten skills at the beginning of the academic year would take up almost the first month of school as kindergarten children have to be tested individually.
Then in the name of equality, scripted programs were introduced where children were to be taught as a whole group. Because all the classes were to offer exactly the same program and the same amount material was to be covered in each classroom, rigorous pacing plans were put into place. There was no place for small group learning throughout most of the instructional time. Four and five year old children were now starting off their academic experience by being forced to sit still on a carpet for long stretches of time. Because they were now mostly being taught as a whole group, we were told there was less need for a teaching assistant, so their hours were reduced.
To measure the children’s progress, we were now required to administer periodic assessments in language arts and mathematics. We have to then enter all the data into a district computer program so that every school can be ranked within, not just the district, but the state and nationally. The data program of course is provided by a large corporation.
Four years ago, the district decided to change the half-day kindergarten programs to full day programs. A full day program would, according to the school district, would give the students time for all the for all the kindergarten activities that had been crowded out of the curriculum by the increasingly rigorous academic programs. For example, a survey of kindergarten teachers in the district who had participated in a popular gardening program found that they had dropped it because they no longer had time for gardening, or much of anything else for that matter.
Full day kindergarten has not lived up to its promise. First of all, team teaching was discontinued. Then, the teaching assistants have either been removed from the classroom completely or only come in for an hour. Most instruction is now whole group with little time for the teacher to give individual attention to the students. As more and more rigorous “standards” are applied and everything must be taught to a particular standard or standard, (which must be posted at all times), there is not enough time in the day to teach all the subjects that are now required; the minutes for each subject actually total up to more time than the children are in the classroom! Surveys have shown that physical education and art, field trips and time for playing are drastically reduced. I myself only had time to have the children paint 4 times last year!
The academic year consists of 40 weeks. During the course of the year, kindergarten teachers have to administer 2 initial assessments, a periodic assessment in language arts twice a year, a math assessment every 10 weeks and an English Language Development test about every 5 weeks. Then of course there are the teacher-developed tests that we use for instructional purposes.
Kindergarten children are not at the stage where they can be tested as a whole group, so each test has to be administered individually to 20 students. The initial assessment, takes about 30 minutes for each child. The math assessment takes 10 to 30 minutes per child as do the language arts tests. It takes about 5 hours each time to give the periodic assessment. Those children who are English Language Learners, have to take the ELD (English Language Development) test every 5 weeks which can take up to half an hour per child.
One of the most frustrating aspects of the testing is that the teacher, who no longer has a Team Teacher or Teaching Assistant to help, has to be testing each child while monitoring the academic activity of the rest of the students at the same time! Obviously the quality of instruction suffers immensely during the assessment time. Most of us try to avoid teaching to the test but still end up doing so various degrees because of the tremendous pressure from the administrators to improve test scores so that sanctions will not be placed on the school or the district. Schools that are placed under sanctions eventually have their teachers transferred to another school, which increases the pressure on us to have the students perform well.
The children do not like the testing periods because they do not receive the kind of instruction that they need and it disrupts their routines. They tend to get bored and act out. Many of the children feel pressured, get restless, and, even at 5 years of age, voice concern about how they are performing. This is the antithesis of what I want my teaching to be!
Moreover, scoring the tests and entering the data on the computer is time-consuming. It’s also heart-wrenching to see that a child who you know is bright or creative has low test scores simply because the test does not measure his/her abilities or that he/she has not acquired sufficient English skills yet to understand the questions. Even if a student has a serious learning disability, he/she must take the same grade-level test as his peers. If children feel like this at the beginning of their educational career, how far will they get in school before they completely lose interest in learning?
The high stakes testing agenda, and the accompanying regimented curriculum that is taking over public education do not provide children with an education that nurtures their nature joy of learning, build their self esteem or develop the creative and analytical skills that they need to realize their potential. If we as teachers want to reclaim our joy of teaching and if we believe that all children should have a free, quality public education then we must work together with our colleagues, with parents, with students and with our communities to develop our vision of what education should be. We must educate others to see what is the real agenda of the corporations that are making billions of dollars as they dismantle public education and sell it off piece by piece.
Referencias:
[1] N. de T. En Estados Unidos, una escuela constituida es aquélla que no obstante recibir financiamiento de fondos públicos es una escuela independiente establecida por docentes, padres-madres de familia o grupos de la comunidad, bajo un “contrato” (chart) establecido con una autoridad local o nacional.
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