Special Education Teacher: The Absurdity of Testing My Students

Diane Ravitch’s blog originally posted this.

I get so angry when I read a post like this one. When will policymakers wake-up and realize this is not working and we need to make changes so another generation of students are not part of this outrageous testing debacle. It is obvious that whoever is mandating this has never taught a day in his or her life. Below is a portion of the post. Click here to read the entire post.

• “In my career (and this is every year), I am potty training, teaching self hygiene, teaching self regulation, executive functioning, how to SPEAK, for God’s sake.”
• “I teach children how to hold a pencil, write their name, the fundamentals that they need and more. On top of that, I teach a ridiculous curriculum, mandated by NYS, to a self-contained class of what has been Kindergarten through 3rd graders, sometimes all in one class. I have taught class sizes from 12 to 17, when there were only supposed to be 12.”
• “According to my rating, my teaching was effective and the same went for my state measures. Where I apparently “fail” as a teacher is on my local measure.

 

Source: Special Education Teacher: The Absurdity of Testing My Students