Higher-Level Thinking vs. State Benchmark Tests: A Battle Between Cognitive Development and “Measureable Success” Read this post from classmate, Jenna Sheeran!
She pulled this from some research writing she did in a graduate course, ENGL 797. The Problems with Too Much Testing Test companies and policy makers make the claim that holding teachers and students accountable to a benchmark test is the answer to improving the quality education. Higher test scores must mean higher achievement is taking place. However, as Linda McNeil states in her book, Contradictions of School Reform: Educational Costs of Standardized Testing, these policy makers consistently tout the benefits that standardized tests will bring to the table, but scarcely consider or report possible costs. McNeil follows children in Houston public schools that were receiving quality education before the implementation of stricter standards and testing, finding that much of this quality was lost as a result. She describes the effect that these standardized tests have had on teachers as “de-skilling” them. With the adoption of standardized tests comes a curriculum modeled after test questions, which is usually paired with teacher materials made by the test companies. A 2014 research brief published by the NCTE outlines how accompanying test materials have played a large role in lowering the quality of education, stating how teachers are now held to mandatory curricula that often comes with prepared teaching materials. Because of the rigidity of such a system, teachers are unable to design curriculum and use teaching methods that will be most effective for the individual needs of the students in their classroom (Burke et. al.). Additionally, these prepared materials tend to focus more on how to effectively answer lower-level multiple choice recall questions than on higher-level writing, invention, or creative thinking skills. This description of what standardized tests have done to teaching is a bleak one. Even as teachers are being trained to base their curriculum and lessons on student needs and abilities, guided test preparation materials are disallowing them from doing so. Despite value being placed in higher-level thinking activities and creativity in the classroom, these test partner materials are stripping that from public education as well, taking from teachers the freedom to run a student-centered classroom and instead imposing upon them older and less effective teaching styles, such as long lectures and “skill-and-drill” worksheets. These tests could be even more detrimental to the shape of education in that they are teaching students poor learning habits. In Alfie Kohn’s critical book, The Case Against Standardized Testing, he reveals how different studies have marked a correlation between students with high scores on standardized tests and shallow thinking. The main study that Kohn referenced categorized students into “actively” engaged and “superficially” engaged in learning. The superficially engaged students did not go back to check over answers, merely copied down answers, and tended towards guessing rather than thinking through a question. Surprisingly (or not surprisingly if you already harbor a distaste for testing), these superficially engaged students had high scores on the standardized tests that they took (Kohn). Looking at this example makes a frightening point that an over-reliance on high-stakes testing is rewarding students for being superficial learners and shallow thinkers, which will slowly push out the students that are engaged and employ critical thinking. It might be time to ask ourselves how this shift towards shallow intellect will shape society in coming years. At the same time, as I said in the beginning of this article, I think it is indolent to believe that doing away with some level of standardized achievement tests will be the final answer to education reform. Schools do need to be held accountable to some degree to their students and for the education they are providing for them. So what then are education reformers to do? If schools need be held to some level of quality, but standardized tests as they exist currently are in fact lowering the quality of public education, how do we measure success without sacrificing higher-level instruction and learning? Before finding a more logical solution to the problems that standardized testing has created, it is necessary to better understand how these tests operate, and the ways in which their formatting is contributing to the decline of quality education. There Must Be a Better Way Research suggests that most standardized tests used in public schools are questioning students at very basic levels, which means that the preparation guides and materials will reflect these basic levels, and classroom instruction in turn loses a good amount of its value and emphasis on higher-level thinking. Focusing on a study done by Rand researchers Kun Yuan and Vi-Nhuan Le, I would like to examine these tests a bit more closely, especially in relation to other forms of standardized tests that are doing a better job at assessing higher-level thinking. Yuan and Le used Norman Webb’s Depth-of-Knowledge (DOK) framework, which categorizes assessment questions into four levels, ranging from recall to critical thinking. For the purposes of the study, questions that were rated at or above DOK level 3 were considered cognitively demanding. Yuan and Le measured 6 different benchmark tests, including Advanced Placement (AP), International Baccalaureate (IB), National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), and Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), in comparison to several state-level achievement tests. It is important to note here that AP and IB tests are designed for specific AP and IB classes, which are usually taken by advanced high school students. The other four benchmark tests are designed more generally to assess student knowledge in a wider range of areas. Compared to the state achievement tests that were examined, the six benchmark tests (AP, IB, NAEP, PISA, PIRLS, TIMSS), were more successful in testing students at a higher level of thinking. Where the state achievement tests contained questions at or above DOK level 3 for only 2% of mathematics questions and 20% of English language arts (ELA) questions, the six benchmark tests surpassed this by having 15% of mathematics questions and 40% of ELA questions at or above DOK level 3 (Yuan and Le, 2012). With state tests that have 2% of mathematics questions asking students to think strategically and use extended thinking, and only 20% for ELA, it is clear that these tests are not asking much of our students, nor preparing them for life outside of the classroom. The majority of test questions require only minimal demonstration of a skill or simple recall. It is alarming to think that state tests meant to assess student learning design most of their questions around low-level thinking, especially when there is research that says better testing methods exist. While these state tests may show how well students are able to memorize information and spit it back out, it doesn’t do much to encourage that our students be able to think, or even apply the facts they have memorized to other situations. In William McComas’s and Linda Abraham’s article “Asking More Effective Questions”, they hone in on questions that teachers themselves are asking of students in their classroom. Questioning is an important tool for teachers to guide students to think about what they know and formulate it into an answer, as well as to foster verbal and written skills, and to simply to assess how much of a concept the class is grasping. However, what McComas and Abraham found about the nature of teacher questioning is that it is beginning to follow the same low-level thinking pattern as the state achievement tests. Citing previous research from William Wilen, they highlight how only 5% of questions that teachers are asking their students are challenging students to do more than just remember facts and recite them, but to apply knowledge and think critically. As these state tests take on more and more importance, and can mean the difference between a pay raise or a pay cut, it is not really surprising that teachers are reforming their classes to model test questions that students will see at the end of the year. The students may very well pass these tests, but are they truly receiving a valuable education? I would like to take a look at two of the benchmark tests in Yuan and Le’s study that were most successful at requiring students to operate at higher levels of thinking: the AP and IB tests, which were both deemed cognitively demanding per the DOK rating system in both mathematics and ELA. These results are important because if teachers are modeling their classroom instruction after test formats, then it would follow that students who are on the track to take an AP or IB test at the end of the class are receiving a higher quality education. They are doing more than answering close-ended questions and completing fill-in-the-blank exercises. They are actively learning, applying knowledge, justifying and thinking through their answers, and creating new thoughts and ideas. In an article written by Applebee and Langer, they include brief interviews with teachers who have experience teaching AP or IB classes, showing the extent to which the format of the AP and IB tests influences the culture of their classes. A sixth grade language arts teacher in an IB school commented, “Because we’re an IB school, there is a big emphasis on students being able to reflect their learning…So there is a big emphasis on writing that reflection. So they’re getting writing in all their classes”. Similarly, a high school math chair reports how the AP exams have shifted instruction in math classes: “I guess 15 years ago, I would never have asked my kids to justify anything; it was just an answer, and I graded it. And now, I am trying to get them to be able to validate what their answer is and be able to put it into words so that they can support it…I think one of the main influences in that has been the AP test, probably” (Applebee and Langer). Both of these instances reflect a shift towards better teaching and a push for students to exhibit higher levels of thinking, all due to a certain format of test that is used to culminate the class. Seeing how both low-quality and high-quality tests influence teaching to such a large degree, it is explicitly obvious that high-quality tests should be the replacement for the many state achievement tests that are corrupting public education. Better Questions Can Lead to Better Teaching When looking at the value that AP and IB tests have put on higher levels of student thinking, and how they have given a quality boost to their respective classes, it begs the question why state tests and other benchmark tests are not doing the same thing. Obviously one must take into account that AP and IB classes are higher-level in terms of content, and are majorly constructed with the aim to prepare students for post-secondary learning. However, there is a difference between asking questions of difficult content level, and asking questions of difficult thinking level. If we are happy to content ourselves with having students memorize information and nothing beyond that, then maybe the existing nature of state tests and consequential teaching is acceptable. But as public education continues to be slammed for not meeting standards and slipping in quality, it is evident that this kind of testing and teaching is not sufficient. I propose a re-working of state tests that is modeled after AP and IB exams, not so much in content but in question form. If state tests for all students required higher levels of thinking, while keeping with grade-level content matter, not only would students be tested more accurately on their abilities, but the education they would receive in preparation for the tests would be monumentally more useful and enriching. The answer to the high-stakes testing question seems clear after looking into the design of state achievement tests and their higher-quality counterparts. If the public school system is being asked to reach higher standards, than the achievements tests that assess its students need to actually measure higher standards. The low-level of thinking that current achievement tests assess has trickled down into instruction, creating a trickle-down by which students are not given a valuable education that can be transferred to real-world applications. The first step to rectifying the quality of public education is not to abolish high-stakes tests, but to drastically reform their question construction. As the research done by Yuan and Le show, this kind of testing can be achieved. It is already being used in AP and IB tests. What Are We Waiting For?? Although my suggestion is fairly simple: give students better tests; the road to this goal is not quite as simple. Better tests cost more money, and more money is not something that is readily available for America’s public schools. But if we can understand the massive effects that bad tests are having on students, it seems more than sensible to spend a little bit more. Testing students with low-quality tests leads to low-quality instructional materials (which cost money), which leads to low-quality teaching, which leads to low-quality and ill-prepared students (which eventually will cost money to society). It is clear that the need and desire for better education exists, but improvement cannot happen until we are ready to identify bad tests as a huge culprit for the declining status of education, and solve this problem by increasing funding for testing to ensure a future society that has not been taught to memorize answers and think shallowly. Works Cited Burke, Ann, Gail Gibson, James Hammond, Anna Knutson, Ryan McCarty, Chris Parsons, Molly Parsons, Elizabeth Tacke, and Bonnie Tucker. "How Standardized Tests Shape— and Limit—Student Learning." How Standardized Tests Shape— and Limit—Student Learning (2014): n. pag. NCTE. Web. Kohn, Alfie. The Case against Standardized Testing: Raising the Scores, Ruining the Schools By Alfie Kohn (2000) (n.d.): n. pag. Teacher Renewal. 2000. Web. Kohn, Alfie. The Case Against Standardized Testing: Raising the Scores, Ruining the Schools. Portsmouth: Heinemann, 2000. Print. McComas, William, and Linda Abraham. "Asking More Effective Questions." (n.d.): n. pag. University of Southern California Center for Excellence in Teaching. Web. McNeil, Linda M. Contradictions of School Reform: Educational Costs of Standardized Testing. New York: Routledge, 2000. Print.
5 Comments
Kaitlyn Cannon
4/6/2017 05:26:10 am
Well done, Jenna.
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Alana Reynolds
4/12/2017 05:37:40 am
Excellent insight, Jenna!
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Maci Catoe
4/18/2017 06:19:05 am
Excellent work! I really enjoyed reading this piece, Jenna! It is ridiculous that teachers are expected to not only cover all required standards in the curriculum, but to explicitly prepare students for the standardized testing that they will encounter. Teachers are dedicating critical class time to cover information about the tests and feel tremendous pressure from the whole process. Our classrooms should not be SAT/ACT Prep! I think it is incredibly selfish and wasteful to expect students and teachers alike to be excited and engaged in the classroom if all they are learning is how to correctly fill in bubble sheets. I am in a speech class this semester and I chose to speak on standardized testing, so I have gained a load of information about testing that I did not know before. I have also found many amazing ideas about the alternatives of testing that would still provide an accurate account of what students have learned. My main concern is that we will continue to silently judge these tests, without ever speaking up and advocating for change. I fear that our students will be exposed to these outdated tests for many more years to come.
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Derrick Chariker
4/19/2017 08:09:48 pm
Incredible work on an ever changing subject, this has to be mother of all blog posts. I remember in high school taking standardized tests and wondering why do I have to take these? I am and have been a firm believer in the fact that measured tests given at different points of the year are not the measure but are how well you can follow instructions. True knowledge comes from reading over at the period of time, taking notes, discussing with the teacher what you think and at the end being tested on it. What you knew in the beginning and you know at the end will be two different things. Tests lead to stress and can have an effect on the child's grade which may in term stress them out more on what they believe their final grade will be.
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Estefani Domingues
4/25/2017 06:09:29 am
There is a good bit that I want to touch on about Jenna's work. The first is that I'm worried with the fact that so many people are associating high scores with successful teaching. While good grades shows progress of some sort, it does not necessarily mean good progress. Standardized tests are something that over time has simply become mundane. I recall standardized tests back in high school mostly focusing on memorization. There was never much critical thinking put into it. I agree that this is 'de-skilling' teachers as well. Standardized testing has simply put teachers in a position where they are made to have students repeat the same thing back to them. There is no real deeper discussions especially since the tests put all of the students on the same level. This is worrisome due to the fact that not all the students are on the same level. A classroom of students are a mix of different mindsets and all of them think differently. To hold all of them to the same standards is not fair to the students. This brings up another other point. Teachers are not able to plan accordingly around each class. No class will be exactly the same, so teachers have to pick and choose their methods to those that best fit the class. Standardized tests strip this away from the teachers when they come in with they ready made plans and materials. Standardized testing either needs to be restructured to fit the needs of the schools or it should be thrown away all together. My belief is that if policy makers really cared, they would not hold strict standards about testing that schools should achieve in order for students to be fully able to unravel their talents.
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