Bibliography: High Stakes Testing (page 21 of 95)

This annotated bibliography is reformatted and customized by the Center for Positive Practices.  Some of the authors featured on this page include Richard D. Kahlenberg, Frances Jacobson Harris, Diane C. Jerome, Jolie Ziomek-Daigle, Holly Hertberg-Davis, Tonya R. Moon, Paula M. Salvio, Peter M. Taubman, Nancy Patterson, and Yvette Q. Getch.

Bruce, Angelia M.; Getch, Yvette Q.; Ziomek-Daigle, Jolie (2009). Closing the Gap: A Group Counseling Approach to Improve Test Performance of African-American Students, Professional School Counseling. This article evaluated the impact of a group counseling intervention on African-American students' achievement rates during the spring administration of high-stakes testing at a rural high school in Georgia. Eighty percent of eligible students who participated in the intervention received passing scores on the four sections tested during the spring administration of the Georgia High School Graduation Tests (GHSGT), and all participating students received passing scores on the English Language Arts and Math sections of the GHSGT. Additionally, the achievement gap between African-American students and White students on the Enhanced Math narrowed during the 2007-2008 testing period, with 63.2% of African-American students achieving pass rates as compared to 70.5% of White students. The pass rate increased from the 38.7% pass rate among African-American students from the previous school year, indicating that the intervention was successful in improving pass rates on high-stakes testing. Implications for professional school counselors include utilizing the practice of group counseling and disaggregating data to promote achievement among underachieving student subsets.   [More]  Descriptors: Intervention, Eligibility, Testing, Graduation

Glisan, Eileen W. (2013). On Keeping the Target Language in Language Teaching: A Bottom-Up Effort to Protect the Public and Students, Modern Language Journal. The issue of high-stakes testing for teachers has been a debated topic in the larger educational arena for some time now and certainly has the potential to spark a lively argument by language professionals in this "Modern Language Journal (MLJ) Perspectives" venue. In his popular text, "A Rulebook for Arguments" (2009), Weston asserts that arguments should emanate from "reliable premises" and "substance, not overtones" (pp. 4-5). With this in mind, this author combines her commentary on the issue of high-stakes language proficiency testing with clarifications to several inaccuracies, incomplete information, and omissions in the Burke position paper, without which any healthy debate about this topic will be rendered not only unproductive but perhaps, more importantly, ethically misleading to the readers of the "MLJ." These clarifications are based on her knowledge of the standards as a result of working with them for over a decade in a national leadership role, and they are provided to situate the argument within the appropriate context, particularly for those readers not familiar with the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) and the "ACTFL/NCATE Program Standards for the Preparation of Foreign Language Teachers" (ACTFL, 2002). The author concludes that above all, language professionals should protect the public and students by continuing bottom-up efforts to produce qualified language teachers who meet the profession's expectations for language proficiency as a necessary prerequisite for entering classrooms.   [More]  Descriptors: Second Language Learning, High Stakes Tests, Persuasive Discourse, Language Proficiency

Hempel-Jorgensen, Amelia (2009). The Construction of the "Ideal Pupil" and Pupils' Perceptions of "Misbehaviour" and Discipline: Contrasting Experiences from a Low-Socio-Economic and a High-Socio-Economic Primary School, British Journal of Sociology of Education. This paper examines the effect of school social class composition on pupil learner identities in British primary schools. In the current British education system, high-stakes testing has a pervasive effect on the pedagogical relationship between teachers and pupils. The data in this paper, from ethnographic research in a working-class school and a middle-class school, indicate that the effect of the "testing culture" is much greater in the working-class school. Using Bernsteinian theory and the concept of the "ideal pupil", it is shown that these pupils' learner identities are more passive and dominated by issues of discipline and behaviour rather than academic performance, in contrast to those in the middle-class school. While this study includes only two schools, it indicates a potentially significant issue for neo-liberal education policy where education is marketised and characterised by high-stakes testing, and schools are polarised in terms of social class.   [More]  Descriptors: Discipline, Testing, Academic Achievement, Ethnography

Falcon, Raymond (2009). Pedagogy of Latinos: From Accountability to Critical Mathematics Pedagogy, Online Submission. High stakes testing in the state of Texas creates greater achievement gaps between Latina/os and White students. With the state adopting strict guidelines for graduation, Latina/os find it difficult to stay in school and proceed to higher educational institutions. Latina/os choose to drop out of schools with curriculums which do not embrace their potential and academic ability. This paper will construct an argument for schools to provide a critical mathematics education for Latino students. High stakes testing creates curriculums which are irrelevant leaving minority students to fail. With the No Child Left Behind Act, schools are pressured to perform academically causing Latino students to become de-sensitized to schooling, learning, and their future. Schools rather should embrace a curriculum of caring, creativity, culture, language, empowerment, critical consciousness, transformative, and agency. Schools must also change the place of teachers from technicians to engineers who analyze, create, apply, assess, and reform their curriculums to better cater to minority students. Teachers are better able to provide a mathematics education which acknowledges Latino students' culture and create real life connections to their learning. This paper will discuss factors involving high stakes accountability, a literature review, need for a study, purpose, methodology, a discussion, and recommendations.   [More]  Descriptors: Caring, Mathematics Education, Federal Legislation, Schools

Harris, Frances Jacobson (2009). Challenges to Teaching Evaluation of Online Information: A View from LM_NET, School Library Media Research. An analysis of postings on the LM_NET discussion list was conducted to better understand school library media specialist (SLMS) perceptions of the potential effect of structural challenges on their role in teaching Web evaluation skills. Structural challenges are institutional in the form of government regulation and school culture, and are defined in terms of a three facets: (1) high stakes testing; (2) "everyone in charge, no one in charge" (in which professional roles and school norms vary or are poorly defined); and (3) limited access to digital media. Results reveal relatively little discussion of the effect of high-stakes testing despite the high profile of this issue in the education literature and the mainstream media. The "everyone in charge, no one in charge" category garnered the most emotionally charged responses and was further subdivided into discussions of professional standards and of defining and defending professional roles. The limited access category addressed externally imposed limitations (generally in the form of filtering software) as well as the occurrence of self-limiting behaviors and choices. A prevailing theme throughout the discussions was the "workaround," in which SLMSs attempt to get by or even thrive within a set of circumstances that are beyond their control.   [More]  Descriptors: School Libraries, Librarians, Attitudes, Discussion Groups

Boldt, Gail Masuchika, Ed.; Salvio, Paula M., Ed.; Taubman, Peter M., Ed. (2009). Classroom Life in the Age of Accountability. Occasional Paper Series 22, Bank Street College of Education. Concerned that various reforms promising greater professional autonomy and status as well as student success are actually disempowering teachers, impoverishing intellectual life in schools, and serving as a portal for the marketization of teaching and education, editors invited teachers to respond to the ways in which the proliferation of standards and testing combined with their own loss of professional control is altering the landscape of American education. The editors' goal was to raise questions about whether and how educators are balancing the demands of high stakes testing, scripted curricula, and a focus on performance outcomes with the emotional complexity of classroom life. Selections include: (1) Squeezed, Stretched, and Stuck: Teachers Defending Play-based Learning in No-nonsense Times (Karen E. Wohlwend); (2) Invisible Ink: A Psychoanalytic Study of School Memory (Lisa Farley); (3) Imaginary Stories in School: First Steps towards Literacy (Gillian Dowley McNamee); (4) In Defense of Playfulness (Peter Nelsen); (5) Mouthy Students and the Teacher's Apple: Questions of Orality and Race in the Urban Public School (Alyssa D. Niccolini); and (6) Confounded and Compounded by Language: English Language Learner and High Stakes Testing (Elizabeth Park).   [More]  Descriptors: Professional Autonomy, Student Evaluation, Accountability, Classroom Environment

Jerome, Diane C. (2010). Exploring Relationships between the Use of Affect in Science Instruction and the Pressures of a High-Stakes Testing Environment, ProQuest LLC. This study explored how science teachers and school administrators perceive the use of the affective domain during science instruction situated within a high-stakes testing environment. Through a multimethodological inquiry using phenomenology and critical ethnography, the researcher conducted semi-structured interviews with six fifth-grade science teachers and two administrators from two Texas school districts. Data reconstructions from interviews formed a bricolage of diagrams that trace the researcher's steps through a reflective exploration of these phenomena.   This study addressed the following research questions: (a) What are the attitudes, interests, and values (affective domain) that fifth-grade science teachers integrate into science instruction? (b) How do fifth-grade science teachers attempt to integrate attitudes, interests and values (affective domain) in science instruction? and (c) How do fifth-grade science teachers manage to balance the tension from the seeming pressures caused by a high-stakes testing environment and the integration of attitudes, interests and values (affective domain) in science instruction?   The findings from this study indicate that as teachers tried to integrate the affective domain during science instruction, (a) their work was set within a framework of institutional values, (b) teaching science for understanding looked different before and after the onset of the science Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS), and (c) upon administration of the science TAKS–teachers broadened their aim, raised their expectations, and furthered their professional development. The integration of the affective domain fell into two distinct categories: 1) teachers targeted student affect and 2) teachers modeled affective behavior.   [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800)1-800-521-0600. Web page: www.proquest.com/en-US/products/disserta…   [More]  Descriptors: Student Evaluation, Testing, Ethnography, High Stakes Tests

Miller, Kelly; Schell, Julie; Ho, Andrew; Lukoff, Brian; Mazur, Eric (2015). Response Switching and Self-Efficacy in Peer Instruction Classrooms, Physical Review Special Topics – Physics Education Research. Peer Instruction, a well-known student-centered teaching method, engages students during class through structured, frequent questioning and is often facilitated by classroom response systems. The central feature of any Peer Instruction class is a conceptual question designed to help resolve student misconceptions about subject matter. We provide students two opportunities to answer each question–once after a round of individual reflection and then again after a discussion round with a peer. The second round provides students the choice to "switch" their original response to a different answer. The percentage of right answers typically increases after peer discussion: most students who answer incorrectly in the individual round switch to the correct answer after the peer discussion. However, for any given question there are also students who switch their initially right answer to a wrong answer and students who switch their initially wrong answer to a different wrong answer. In this study, we analyze response switching over one semester of an introductory electricity and magnetism course taught using Peer Instruction at Harvard University. Two key features emerge from our analysis: First, response switching correlates with academic self-efficacy. Students with low self-efficacy switch their responses more than students with high self-efficacy. Second, switching also correlates with the difficulty of the question; students switch to incorrect responses more often when the question is difficult. These findings indicate that instructors may need to provide greater support for difficult questions, such as supplying cues during lectures, increasing times for discussions, or ensuring effective pairing (such as having a student with one right answer in the pair). Additionally, the connection between response switching and self-efficacy motivates interventions to increase student self-efficacy at the beginning of the semester by helping students develop early mastery or to reduce stressful experiences (i.e., high-stakes testing) early in the semester, in the hope that this will improve student learning in Peer Instruction classrooms.   [More]  Descriptors: Self Efficacy, Peer Teaching, Misconceptions, Introductory Courses

Hertberg-Davis, Holly (2009). Myth 7: Differentiation in the Regular Classroom Is Equivalent to Gifted Programs and Is Sufficient–Classroom Teachers Have the Time, the Skill, and the Will to Differentiate Adequately, Gifted Child Quarterly. In many ways, meeting the needs of gifted students through differentiation of curriculum and instruction within the regular classroom seems a perfect solution to the issues that have plagued gifted education for many years and remain largely unresolved. So why "is" it a myth that differentiated instruction in the regular classroom is an appropriate substitute for gifted programs? Although differentiation and state standards can peacefully coexist in a classroom, teachers often find it difficult to reconcile attending to student differences with a broader high-stakes testing culture that seems to mandate the opposite. Recent research indicates that the high-stakes testing associated with "No Child Left Behind" has rendered the regular classroom even less hospitable to gifted learners than it was previously, causing teachers to resort to drill-and-kill techniques over more student-centered approaches. Differentiation of instruction both within the regular classroom and within homogeneous settings is critical to addressing the needs of all high-ability learners, including twice-exceptional students, underachievers, students from underserved populations, and highly gifted students. But, like any approach to educating gifted students, it functions best as a critical component within a spectrum of services provided for high-ability learners.   [More]  Descriptors: Academically Gifted, Federal Legislation, State Standards, High Stakes Tests

Nathan, Linda (2002). The Human Face of the High-Stakes Testing Story, Phi Delta Kappan. Describes the adverse impact of Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System high-stakes testing on the unique educational environment of the Boston Arts Academy. Descriptors: Academic Achievement, Alternative Assessment, Educational Change, Elementary Secondary Education

Moon, Tonya R. (2009). Myth 16: High-Stakes Tests Are Synonymous with Rigor and Difficulty, Gifted Child Quarterly. The myth equating high-stakes testing with rigor and difficulty is one that can be debunked given the empirical work that has been conducted in this area. To completely debunk this myth in gifted education, the field must centralize efforts. Educators need to consider alternatives to the current system of assessment and the delivery of instruction. Although the focus on high-stakes testing for accountability purposes does not seem to be a passing fad typical of many educational phenomena, it does suggest that leaders in the field and proponents of gifted education need to "become strong voices" for a balanced system that emphasizes assessment for learning with assessment for accountability purposes. School settings must advocate for flexible grouping configurations to accommodate the varying needs of gifted students to master basic skills and concepts as well as opportunities to move beyond the test preparation when evidence warrants. To move beyond the myth, a balanced approach to assessment must occur, one that includes changes in educators' actions as well as their beliefs about high-stakes tests.   [More]  Descriptors: Academically Gifted, Misconceptions, Testing, High Stakes Tests

Kahlenberg, Richard D. (2015). Tenure: How Due Process Protects Teachers and Students, American Educator. Teacher tenure rights, first established more than a century ago, are under unprecedented attack. Tenure–which was enacted to protect students' education and those who provide it–is under assault from coast to coast, in state legislatures, in state courtrooms, and in the media. In June 2014, in the case of "Vergara v. California," a state court judge struck down teacher tenure and seniority laws as a violation of the state's constitution. Meanwhile, with incentives from the federal Race to the Top program, 18 states have recently weakened tenure laws, and Florida and North Carolina sought to eliminate tenure entirely. Richard Kallenberg opens this article by providing an exact legal definition of tenure, and what it means to teachers who have earned tenure. He goes on to explain that historically, tenure laws were enacted to protect teachers from favoritism and nepotism, and to ensure that students received an education subject to neither political whims nor arbitrary administrative decisions. Kallenburg asserts that given current fixation on high stakes testing, and the linking of students' test scores to teacher evaluations, tenure protection is still necessary today. He argues that rather than doing away with tenure completely, teacher dismissal procedures could be mended to strike a better balance between providing fairness to good teachers and facilitating the removal of incompetent ones. Kallenburg also believes that there are innovative ways to connect low-income students with great teachers. Creative ideas are proposed to enable policymakers to connect high quality teachers with students in low performing schools.   [More]  Descriptors: Tenure, Teacher Rights, Court Litigation, State Legislation

Patterson, Nancy (2002). Raising a Different Standard: Rallying against High-Stakes Testing, Voices from the Middle. Provides an annotated list of 12 web sites to turn to for information concerning the ramifications of high-stakes testing. Descriptors: Annotated Bibliographies, Elementary Secondary Education, High Stakes Tests, Internet

Fletcher-Bates, Keisha N. (2010). The Embedded Context of the Zero Tolerance Discipline Policy and Standardized High Stakes Testing: The Interaction between National Policies and Local School Practices, ProQuest LLC. A valid concern facing School districts within the state of Ohio, as well as across the country, is situated around methods to increase student performance on standardized high stakes tests and achieve the requirements of the mandated No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Law. Simultaneously, school districts are confronting a multitude of challenges to decrease the impact of student suspension and expulsion within school cultures and comply with local policies such as the Zero Tolerance Discipline Policies. The contextualization of both the local Zero Tolerance Discipline Policy and the national NCLB mandate in relationship to standardized high stakes testing and the impact of the two upon one another define the purpose of this qualitative study. This study investigated the systematic methods in which K-12 faculty in an urban school district responded to the sometimes conflicting testing mandates of complying with NCLB and the Zero Tolerance Discipline Policy. The rationale was to use critical theory to examine education faculty's opinions, perceptions, and strategies involving the implementation of: (1) locally mandated Zero Tolerance Discipline Policies; (2) nationally mandated standardized high stakes testing laws; and (3) how both policy and law can be counterproductive to one another. The information discussed and the findings of this study have implications for legislatures, superintendents, administrators, teachers, students, parents, intervention specialists, state agencies and researchers.   [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: www.proquest.com/en-US/products/disserta…   [More]  Descriptors: Educational Policy, Critical Theory, Suspension, Elementary Secondary Education

Reddell, Samantha (2010). High Stakes Testing: Our Children at Risk, Online Submission. The purpose of this research paper was to examine the effects of standardized testing on the youth of America. It was intended to point out the shortcomings of the usage of such tests. There were comparisons of the effects testing has on different cultures of students as well as different socioeconomic classes. Court cases were brought into play to show that there were discrimination suits brought against the use of standardized tests in determining if a student should graduate. The No Child Left Behind Act was scrutinized in relation to standardized tests and how it is lowering the nation's standards of education. Results of research show that standardized testing is more detrimental to America's youth than any school would have someone believe. It was found to have emotional effects on students that could cause problems later in life. Parents and teachers need to make themselves aware of the dangers of standardized testing and come up with new ways of assessing student proficiency.   [More]  Descriptors: Evaluation Methods, Student Evaluation, Court Litigation, Test Bias

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