As I navigated and read through the Partnership for 21st Century Skills website I was overwhelmed by the amount of information discussed. I liked how each section on the table of contents page was typed in a different color, this made it very easy to go back and re-read certain sections on the site. The fact that each section was titled, was helpful to me because it gave me a good idea about what I would be reading.
I was somewhat surprised to hear information that supported a shift from standardized testing as I know it, to that of a more broad testing of academic and work related skills. I am currently in my fifth year of teaching and all I have ever heard is teach the standards and benchmarks that will directly effect the FCAT scores. It seems everything we are doing in Florida is related to the FCAT test, even the reading assessments we use are ultimately a prediction on how well the students will perform on FCAT test.
The article stated: Today's education system faces irrelevance unless we bridge the gap between how student's learn and how student's live. WOW! As a educator this statement absolutely floored me because at my school we don't embrace the vast amount of knowledge our students have when it comes to technology, we dismiss it because all we care about is how well they perform on the FCAT test. When a student receives a failing score on the FCAT we just assume this student is a poor reader or he/she is lazy, but what we have not considered is the disconnect between how we as teachers prepared them and how technology influences how they learn.
Jerry Brown
Overall I thought this site was very user friendly and contained some very good information.
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Hi Jerry,
ReplyDeleteI can understand your frustration with your FCAT. Our state has also been dealing with some frustrations with our Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) Test. In theory it sounded great. Students were tested on knowledge as well as demonstrating skills in writing up proper investigations, writing different types of English papers, completing math equations to solve problems complex word problems, etc. The bottom line, the grading was subjective on many parts of the tests, it took more than a week out of our school year to implement, and it was very costly.
I can imagine why Florida does not want to change the test. They like an easy to grade objective test. Summative assessments are much easier to grade. I believe the State of Washington got side-ways when they attempted a blend of summative and formative assessments which led to much subjectivity in the grading process as well as the costliness in time required to grade it. I believe we have a long way to go in developing formative standardized test.
Jerry,
ReplyDeleteThis site certainly is overwhelming and takes quite a few visits to get used to navigating around. I was amazed at the amount of inforamtion and varying resources on the site!
I think that all states have tests mandated by the state and this is something that seems like it is something that is going to stay with us.What I do think is that there needs to be more of an integration of technology standards and then perhaps we would be able to embrace technology skills that the students already have. However, I can also see that as something teachers would seem as an extra and an area about which to bemoan that it is more work.
I would hope that with a site like Partnership for 21st Century Skills educators will be inspired to increase their knowledge and use of technology within their classrooms.
MInty
Jerry,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your post. I agree with some of the things you liked about the site However, I had some difficulty navigating around. I felt like the links within the site that interested me the most, I was unable to access. Although it is clear, why some areas were inaccessible to me, I felt like I needed "more" after viewing the site.
Furthermore, I too, found the statement about "bridging the gap" very powerful. It seems very clear what we need to do, but I feel it has to change from the "top-down". I am sure you know the pressures that administrators and supervisors put on us as teachers to have our students achieve scores. I am constantly finding that "time" is never on my side. I am concerned that even though I whole-heartedly support the crucial need for 21st Century skills to be taught to our students, without the support of those above me, I feel that I run the risk of being considered ineffective.
Sarah Horner