Overlooked Problems With Standardized Tests

Marion Brady | Nov 22, 2007 | 0

America is in love with the idea of "accountability," with measuring how much students know of what a school teaches.  But that isn't really what's important.  It's a second level of functioning which should concern us--what the young can DO with what they know.

But there's an even MORE important third level of functioning--what students do when they don't know what to do . . .  

. . . and a critically important FOURTH level--what students do when nobody knows what to do.  

Because the future is unknowable, our survival as a society hinges on students being able to function at this fourth level, but we're so  preoccupied with the first "how-much-does-the-kid-know" level we're ignoring it completely.