Public schools and high-stakes testing

My letter to the editor regarding the state of KCMO Schools:

The MAP test and other similar high stakes tests have done absolutely nothing to help children learn, and instead they tie teacher’s hands. MAP tests and state takeover undermine fundamentals of democracy (Strauss, “The complete list of problems with high-stakes standardized tests,” WashingtonPost.com,11/1/11.)

I wonder if James would fail the tests, like Strauss reports in “When an adult took standardized tests forced on kids” at WashingtonPost.com, 12/5/11.

Homeschoolers know the truth- if you want parents to be accountable to their children’s education you must put the parents- not the Testing Industry or the state- in charge of the education. This means getting RID of the beaurocracy. Get RID of standardized curriculum. Get RID of red tape. Get RID of the tests.

Why do homeschools succeed where public schools fail? They take individuals into mind, not classrooms full of standardized children. Choices are made by people who intimately know the children. Parents pick from myriad curriculum or eschew curriculum and pick and choose individual learning resources.

How can we apply this to our public schools? Let the teachers get to know the students and pick the curriculum that matches their teaching style and the children’s learning styles. Let the parents pick their schools and teachers according to what works best for their individual familes or even individual children. (For instance, I have 7 children who attended 3 different schools + homeschool last year, and this year 2 different schools + homeschool.)

How do we know what children are learning? How do we know it’s “working”? Look at the children. Listen to the children. Just pay attention to the *people* rather than sheets of data. The results will speak for themselves. You know as well as anyone that as soon as the Spelling Bee or Geography Bee winners are announced, people say “Bet they’re homeschooled.” Colleges know~ that’s why the best colleges have admitted homeschoolers for decades and now actively recruit homeschoolers.

But homeschoolers as individuals sometimes lack, due to financial constraints, something public schools have– inspirational mentors and teachers, dedicated labs, dance teams, orchestras, math bowls, chess teams, debate teams, robotics and science clubs. My kids have eventually transitioned into public schools so that they have access to those things that require group participation that I could not afford to access through homeschool channels. In the states of Washington and Colorado, homeschooled students have the options of a hybridized education where the parents can enroll their students in individual academic classes and/or extracurricular activities but still homeschool for all the rest. Those parents have something MO parents should have.

I fully support public school as an ideology- but not the dinosaur of an institution built for an entirely different world. It was public school teachers that so inspired my own son that he is applying to colleges as an education major. I do think that KCMO Schools can learn from homeschooling- Very few homeschoolers submit their children to the high stakes, standardized tests, and even those that are required by law (in other states, not MO) to have their children tested, they do not “teach to the test” or choose curriculum that matches the test questions. My homeschool friends will even throw away the envelopes with the scores, without looking at them.

Test scores have so little to do with learning… that my opinion is that if you are going to allow testing in your school you may as well also put an Xbox in each classroom and publish the high scores kids get on them.