Testing - online by ‘09

Our great state of Minnesota is exploring putting all state tests online. (Online by ‘09 -rah, rah, rah!) The debate is beginning among educators whether this is a particularly good thing for student workstation time, bandwidth, training, etc. to be used for considerable periods of time during the school to accomplish this goal. It’s a terrific “allocation of scarce resource” question, and perhaps not as simple as it seems on first blush.

Our district is just starting online testing this year using NWEA’s MAPS tests. I am sold on this use of technology for testing for two reasons:

1. Since the tests are online, they can adjust to the student taking the test. As students get questions correct, the questions get more difficult. As students miss questions, the questions get easier. This allows us to see not just how the middle range of students are doing, but the very high and low performing kids as well. A “RIT” score is generated which can then be used to actually measure growth during a time period, say from fall testing to spring testing - not just look at how a student scores against a national norm. (The leveling also decreases frustration and boredom for our best and struggling kids.)

2. The scores of individual students are available immediately. This means a classroom teacher can (theoretically) use them to group students and provide differentiated instruction during the school year.

In other words, the technology is being used for genuine educational purposes, not just because of cost, convenience, or coolness.

I don’t know if the tests being proposed by our state take advantage of the technology. Will they simply be a standard, non-adjusting, norm or criterion referenced tests? Will the scores be immediately useful to teachers? If not, I’d lobby for paper and pencil tests and better use of technology for instructional purposes, such a project-based learning.

We are already learning that providing all students (at least grades 2-10) access to a relatively high-powered computer with good bandwidth for 140 minutes of over a two-week testing window will be a challenge for some buildings in our district. Using wireless labs is not recommended by NWEA. Even if the state gives us money for additional workstations and more Internet connectivity (I am not holding my breath), we don’t have the physical space (for labs) and electrical grid to support more test-taking areas at present. Hmmm, building classrooms now for the sake of online test-taking? I don’t think so.

A number of folks have raised concerns over the seeming shift of emphasis in technology use in districts from creating learning opportunities to running administrative applications. Funding right now seems to be making this an “either/or” situation. I see the indirect benefits to kids of a well-administered district; but my heart is with the direct benefits I see to kids when they become engaged in learning because it’s their fingers on the keyboard.

Experiences with online testing? Can we have both efficient administration and exciting learning opportunities?
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2 Comments »

Our system has done two “online” tests, both are in the implementation stage. U.S. History EOY has been the last two year, Biology EOY began last year. We have no data back yet, mostly because they want the test to run three years before they really begin reporting the data. In the case of the history test, after the MC part, they write out answers to 4 essay questions. The US history teachers feel it would be more effective writing them in class rather than the lab.

In both cases it is a BIG problem. The library had to partially shut down for two weeks during the practice test and the read test. In a lab setup it was/is hard to provide the kind of test taking practices, ie not looking at another person’s test. We had network glitches all over.

The History teachers all feel that it would be more effective done in the classroom.

Comment by Deborah Stafford — September 8, 2005 @ 4:34 am

The NWEA tests have about a 3 week time window for both fall and spring. In our K-3 school, we have five 3 third grade classes. Each test is about an hour for the students taking the tests and a half-hour setup time. 1.5 hours times 5 classes times 2 tests (reading and math) times 2 times a year (fall and spring) = 30 hours of lost lab use time by all other students, and 4 hours of lost instructional time per student taking the tests. With limited resources, this is tough.

Can we demonstrate that student achievement has increased with the taking of these tests? How are teachers using the data collected? I can’t say I have an answer for either. The rush to these tests has somewhat left these 2 questions unanswered, and our district is rushing to catch up and answer them. Hmmmm.

Comment by John Dyer — October 6, 2005 @ 10:48 pm

You know you are a librarian in 2005 when…

You’ve probably seen some version of this popular list…
You know you’re living in 2005 when…
1. You accidentally enter your password on the microwave.
2. You haven’t played solitaire with real cards in years.
3. You have a list of 15 phone numbers to reach your family of 3.
4. You e-mail the person who works at the desk next to you.
5. Your reason for not staying in touch with friends and family is that they don’t have e-mail addresses…
(15 more…)

So how do you know you’re a librarian in 2005? When…
1. You have to remind kindergarteners to turn off their cell phones before the story starts.
2. You know what an IP number is but not an ISBN number.
3. You have a student who does a better job troubleshooting the circulation system than the district technician.
4. Your students think both The Little Mermaid and Hunchback of Notre Dame were written by Walt Disney.
5. You know more librarians in Texas than you do in your home state because of LM_Net.
6. The best way to remind a student about an overdue book is by e-mail.
7. You don’t talk in the teachers lounge about a project because it is not tied directly to a state test.
8. When answering a reference question, you start with Ask Jeeves.
9. You’ve used the last of your check-out cards for scratch paper.
10. Kids look at you funny when you call it the “the card catalog.”
11. You have 5th grade girls who show more skin at school than you would have ever dreamed of doing on the beach.
12. You have as more polo shirts with computer logos than you do book logos.
13. Your students show you how to get around the district Internet filter.
14. Your aid spends more time troubleshooting the network than reshelving books.
15. You never see anyone copy out of the print encyclopedia anymore.
16. Your index finger has a callous from tapping the SmartBoard.
17. You didn’t get your last grad class assignment turned in on time because the network was down.
18. You’ve Googled the new teachers in your building.
19. You don’t remember the last time you’ve had to alphabetize something.
20. You have all your passwords and PIN numbers on your PDA - and you can’t remember the password for your PDA!

Add your own!

Bullshit Literacy

(The bullshitter) does not reject the authority of the truth, as the liar does, and oppose himself to it. He pays no attention to it at all. By virtue of this, bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies are. Harry G. Frankfurt, On Bullshit

Once again I’ve had a perfectly nice Saturday morning ruined by yet another set of “21st Century Literacy” skills dumped on my lap. Sent to me by my good (and I am sure well-intentioned) friend, Ian Jukes of Committed Sardine fame, this one comes from the New Media Consortium - whatever that is.

New Media Consortium Global Imperative: the Report of the 21st Century Literacy Summit joins a couple others, including NCREL (Learning Point) eGauge 21st Century Skills and Partnership for 21st Century Skills, excoriating we simple educators for not doing an adequate job of preparing this current batch of kiddies for the big bad work world of the future.

If current employment trends continue, it looks like about 90% of our students will work for Wal-Mart where the most important job skills are:
- Looking good in a day-glow vest
- Passing drug screenings
- Living on the minimum wage, not getting ill, and coping with the relatives who are wiling to take them in.

For the other 10% of the workforce, their single, salient marketable skill will be knowing how to bullshit. (See professor Frankfurt’s definition above.) When, then, are the responsible think tanks going to call summits and issue papers addressing this serious gap in our schools’ curricula?

Since this is a beautiful morning and I’ve only been thinking about this topic for about ten minutes, the core competencies in bullshitting below are somewhat sketchy. You, dear reader, need to embellish.

The Bullshit Literate Student will:
1. Show no social conscience or balance when deliberately distorting factoids, data, or expert opinion in presenting a conclusion.
2. Skillfully use any medium and all persuasive techniques in order to convince others. This includes the ability to use technology to doctor images and edit text.
3. Consistently, vociferously, and blindly hold to a single point of view, and know that volume, repetition and rhetoric trump reason. (ie: Stay the course.)
4. Convincingly fake sincerity.
5. Ably disguise personal gain as public good.
6. Take a single incident or news story or incident and follow it to an illogical conclusion. (See employment prediction above.)
7. Claim any idea as original.
8. Deny prior knowledge. (ie: Nobody expected the breach of the levees)
9. Create a website, wiki, blog, or podcast. (beginning level). Find a publisher, broadcaster or corporate sponsor for whom the bottom line is the bottom line. (advanced).
10. Never, never, never show doubt.

OK, I think I have that out of my system. I’m going on a long - hopefully cynicism-draining - bicycle ride.

Other skills the Bullshit Literate should master?

A follow-up post with a link to Art Wolensky's rubric for measuring bullshit literacy attainment.

A 2009 revision is here.

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2 Comments »
[…] Bullshit Literacy. Oh yes. This one really works for me. All those surface ideas that sound good but lack substance: 8. Deny prior knowledge. (ie: Nobody expected the breach of the levees) […]

Pingback by Tangled up in Purple » Slacker — September 10, 2005 @ 2:07 am

we have in washington, an administration that makes blatant use of these skills. they are completely in the open about it and have been since day one. and they got re-elected. conclusion: 1 through 10 above are not merely tolerated — they are rewarded.

i long ago came to the conclusion that a politician’s job is to listen to what people say, to look behind the words so you can give them what they *really* want, and then convince them that the two are the same.

Comment by jim shirey — October 4, 2005 @ 2:10 pm