I can’t recall my first “test” in school, but it might have been a spelling test, and it might have happened in First Grade. Spelling tests were definitely a challenge for us kids. We were typically given a list of perhaps ten words and assigned the chore of learning how to arrange selected alphabetic symbols in the correct order, so that another person (who had themselves already learned to spell) could recognize the word and its meaning. As I recall, the spelling test was typically given on Friday, allowing us four days to memorize the order of the letters. Initially, the answers were fairly simple. “Cat”. “Bat”. “Dog”. “Frog”.
But as things progressed, the universe of words became more challenging. Repeated letters started to appear, seemingly out of nowhere, and for no apparent reason.
“Banana”. “Tomorrow”. “Mississippi”. “Occasionally”.
And then there were the words that didn’t look anything like they sounded, or words that were purposely trying to trick us.
“Caught”. “Neighbor”. “Wrought”. “Colonel”.
Although I never interviewed my classmates about their feelings, I would guess from my own experience that every child in the room felt anxious, when Friday rolled around and we were expected to demonstrate how well we’d learned those ten words.
As the years rolled by, we were “tested” on many other aspects of modern existence and historical fact, concerning subjects we had studied.
“Explain the meaning of Shakespeare’s phrase, ‘To be or not to be.'”
“What is the role of the mitochondria in the cell?”
“What role did James Madison play in the American Revolution?”
I feel anxious, right now, just writing out these example questions.
But the point I’d like to make is that we were expected to study the information, and the finer details of said information, prior to the test. That is to say, we were tested on our understanding and memorization of information we’d been directly exposed to. Those who listened in class (and who understood what the teacher meant) and who actually did the homework, had a better chance at succeeding during the quiz than did the kids who didn’t listen and who didn’t do the homework. Some kids went home with a big “A” on their test; some went home with an “F”.
Although we didn’t really think much about it at the time, the primary function of the test was to encourage us (or perhaps compel us) to actually listen in class to information about which we felt very little natural curiosity — and to complete homework tasks that almost no one found interesting.
This was the state of “testing” in the 1960s.
Fast forward to 2019, and the recently released results of the Colorado Measures of Academic Success — the CMAS standardized test. Every year, in the spring, 3rd through 8th graders in every Colorado public school are given tests in English Language Arts and Mathematics. Two other subjects — science and social studies — are tested occasionally, in 5th and 8th grade. (You can view the results of that test on this website.)
No one can study for these tests… because standardized, statewide tests don’t attempt to measure, with any specificity, what a particular classroom teachers has taught in his or her classroom, or what listening or homework a particular child has done concerning that classroom information. The CMAS test, instead, supposedly measures a child’s general knowledge of the English and Math, based on the Colorado Academic Standards (CAS).
I can’t say whether the children feel anxious, and perhaps insecure and unsafe, sitting down at a test for which they have never been allowed to prepare themselves.
But the main aim of the CMAS test isn’t to rank the children — though they do get ranked. The main aim of the CMAS test is to judge the Teacher, and the School, and the District. The main aim of the CMAS test is to encourage (or compel) school districts and schools and teachers to “teach the CAS.” To teach the standards, however they may choose to teach them. What the CMAS actually tests, however, is how well the children can take a test for which they have never studied.
I cannot say whether the teachers and administrators feel anxious as the children sit down to take the CMAS test. Although it’s actually the teachers and administrators who are going to be judged, the teachers and administrators are not the ones actually taking the test for which no child has been able to properly prepare, in the traditional sense of preparation. So I imagine the feeling among the teachers and administrators is more like “resignation” rather than “anxiety.”
I wonder how “resignation” fits into the well-documented shortage of new teachers.
We’ve also been talking, in the editorial series, about school security and school safety, and I’ve suggested that most Americans — exposed as we are to mass media — believe that the most important aspect to the idea of “safety and security” is to prevent school shootings. There’s not much talk in the media, lately, about “safety and security” in the sense of how teaching staff and students feel, day to day, preparing for a big, important test for which no student can properly prepare.
Last year, the voters in Archuleta County approved an increase to their own property taxes, to provide an additional $1.7 million a year to the Archuleta School District, to increase staff salaries (including, apparently, a huge increase in the Superintendent’s salary) and to hire security guards to patrol the hallways of the three school buildings. The local tax increase was also supposed to pay for “full-day” kindergarten, but the Colorado legislature decided to cover that cost in this year’s state budget.
A portion of the tax increase — the mill levy override — is being shared with our local, public charter school: Pagosa Peak Open School. Pagosa Peak did not hire police to patrol the school halls. Instead, the Pagosa Peak staff decided to hire additional assistant teachers to work in the classrooms, to improve the “student teacher ratio.”
Which is to say, there’s more than one way to skin the “security” cat.
Bill Hudson began sharing his opinions in the Pagosa Daily Post in 2004 and can’t seem to break the habit. He claims that, in Pagosa Springs, opinions are like pickup trucks: everybody has one.