Anderson 1 Sheryl Anderson Megan Keaton ENG 112- 15 04 April 2013 Annotated Bibliography Jost, Kenneth. "Testing in Schools.

" CQ Researcher 20 Apr. 2001: 321-44. Web. 27 Mar. 2013. This article by Kenneth Jost, is about standardized testings history, current situation, and current concerns that it is creating. He talks about President Bushs involvement with standardized testing, with his No Child Left Behind Act. Jost also talks about the people who think Bushs plan to increase the amount of testing is not going to benefit students. He speaks about a variety of experts and their opinion of the subject of standardized testing. Josts argument consists of providing one sides information, and then countering those facts with opinions from the opposing side. He is making the people who support standardized testing sound invalid. He has provided the reader with all the information on standardized testing and what laws are being set out that are supposedly going to help students. Then he efficiently tells the reader why those laws are not doing what they are saying they are going to do. Some of his information seems to be dragged out and unimportant; but at the end it is all brought together to create a point on why the country should question standardized testing. Jost has provided a lot of unimportant information, but it does create a well-researched argument that is convincing. I plan to use this article to help understand the background of how standardized has become so popular today. This article was written in 2001 when NCLBA was just becoming law. So it provides a good base for me to be able to explain the history of standardized testing. It

Anderson 2 also provides me with a lot of expert opinions on some of the benefits or drawbacks of standardized testing. By having well known or experts own words in my paper it helps me create ethos in my argument. This article basically just gives me a lot of information that will help me explain my topic to the reader. Nearly seven in 10 teachers said that instruction stresses state tests far or somewhat too much, while 66 percent said tests were forcing them to concentrate on things covered in the tests to the detriment of other important topics. The responses the weekly concluded suggest state tests may be looming to large in classrooms and encouraging undesirable practices Concern about teachers teaching to test recurs frequently in the debate over testing. Critics see it as sure that tests dont drive curriculum The perfect system is hard to identify, Linn says. But people want to know [how schools are doing], and its widely accepted, and it has some positive aspects. ProCon.org. "Standardized Tests ProCon.org" ProCon.org. 22 Mar. 2013. Web. 27 Mar. 2013. <http://standardizedtests.procon.org/>. ProCon.org provides a reader with a very simple list of facts that provides the pros of standardized testing and also the opposing cons. It goes in to detail to how the United States testing compares to students in other high performing countries. It gives the reader interesting facts on standardized testing that not everyone might know. Such as how standardized testing affects students success rate, their stress level, the schools success, and many other factors of education. The article has a brief history on standardized testing and its beginning. The article provides an argument on both sides of the topic with mostly just factual information. Both sides only way to persuade the audience is with logical stats, studies, and

Anderson 3 logical statements. The arguments are uninteresting and most likely not going to convince the reader to agree with one side over the other because both sides are represented equally. For each fact that represents a positive aspect of standardized testing there is one that represents the negative side as well. I think that the pro side of this article was interesting; the facts were mostly about how testing was fair and how it benefited the country. While the con side spoke mostly about how the testing harms or lessens a students chance for success. I think because the pro side did not speak about how it benefited the student it made standardized testing in my eyes seem not student oriented but more about success of schools and our nation. I plan to use this article to give me hard facts to present to my reader about standardized testing. I think it is important to have a hard evidence on a subject something that gives the reader concrete information that is not just someones opinion. It also gives me examples from other countries failure to teach students to become successful through overuse of standardized testing. Chinese schools are very good at preparing their students for standardized tests. For that reason, they fail to prepare them for higher education and the knowledge economy. China is trying to depart from the drill and kill test prep that Chinese educators admit has produced only competent mediocrity Stricter standards and increased testing are better preparing school students for college66% of college professors said elementary and high schools expect students to learn too little. By Mar. 2002, after a surge in testing and the passing of NCLB, that figure has dropped to 47%

Anderson 4 qualities that standardized tests cannot measure include creativity, critical thinking, resilience, motivation, persistence, curiosity, endurance, reliability, enthusiasm, empathy Farley, Todd. Making the Grades: My Misadventures in the Standardized Testing Industry. Sausalito, CA: PoliPointPress, 2009. Print. This book is about Todd Farleys experience while being a professional standardized test scorer. He speaks about his first day on the job all the way to end of his career. He talks about how grading a students free response whether it be an essay, a picture, or small paragraph is not at all standardized. Todd discovered this on his very first day working; he talks about being given dozens of examples on how to grade a free response question which asked students to draw a picture that illustrates bike safety. Todd felt he had a good understanding on how to do so until he was asked to grade an actual response. He soon realized that grading students tests in a standardized way is an impossible task. Farley also speaks about the types of people who are being hired to decide whether a student deserves a passing or failing grade are not at all qualified to do so. He talks about one man who thought he was the one being tested. In reality he was the one deciding whether a student deserved a passing grade. He feels that those types of people have no right grading students tests. Farleys main argument is that the way that states grade their standardized testing is inadequate. He proves his argument by providing a variety of reasons that demonstrate how standardized testing fails to correctly grade the tests they administer. He is effective in this because he is such a credible source for this information. Much of the book is about his experiences and it provides a large amount of back up for his statements. It is obvious from his

Anderson 5 stories that his argument is in fact true. This book leaves me with the question of how has the grading system changed since Farley wrote this book. I plan to use this book to disprove the statement that standardized testing has the ability to correctly measure a students understanding of material and how well they are doing in a course. Because that is one of the major points that the pro standardized testing uses to advocate testing; I can use Farleys experience to counter their statement. I also like the novel because it gives me a lot of insight on how standardized testing works after the students actually takes the test. It means saying youre not interested in what the Mrs. White or Mr. Reyes who stands in front of a classroom of children every day might think about their students progress, but youre absolutely enthralled to hear the thoughts on the same subject of a dopey Hank, a non- English- speaking Michi, a senile Alice, or a uninterested Todd.(242) If I had to take any standardized test today that was important to my future and would be assessed by the scoring processes I have long been a part of, I promise you I would protest, I would fight(242) Fifteen years of scoring standardized tests has completely convinced me as much: that the business Ive worked in is less a precise tool to assess students exact abilities than just a lucrative means to make indefinite and indistinct generalizations about them.(241) Harte, Oliver. "Does the High School Curriculum in the U.S. Actually Prepare Students for the Real World?" The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 02 Feb. 2013. Web. 04 Apr. 2013. This article is about a young high school student who is taking action to change the way he is being taught. He talks about how the focus on testing is not teaching students important life skills that they can use in the real world. Oliver Harte has taken numerous steps to try to make a

Anderson 6 difference for himself and his peers. Such as writing letters to the board, and speaking to teachers about the problem with standardized testing. His response is that it is over their heads or no response at all. His main argument is that the way that students are being taught leaves them without the proper knowledge to be successful adults. Oliver believes that as of right now students just retain and memorize information long enough to take a test on it. He proposes that if we introduce classes like business, journalism, or psychology that we can improve the knowledge that students leave high school with. This argument is completely convincing because it comes from a student himself. How can someone tell Oliver that he is in fact being prepared for his future? He knows what he is really being taught, not the teachers, or government officials. He is a student and that is the most credible opinion on this subject I plan to use this article to give me a view point that is against standardized testing. It gives me a view point from an actual student in high school. That gives a me a person whose has a great deal of experience who believes there is a better way to teach students. Oliver also gives me a good plan on how we can change the schooling system. His plan is also a compromise so neither side will have to give up everything. His argument is very convincing because he is so young, and yet still has a very strong opinion on a complex topic. My answer: teach us real skills; create more elective programs such as criminal justice, psychology, classes about the basics of business, more specific science and medical courses, more journalism and writing courses, etc..; bring in guest speakers to work with those subjects; take field trips to those places; and more.(Harte)

Anderson 7 Teachers give us information, we memorize it, we bubble in the answers on the exams and that's about it. That is the premise of the education system in American schools.(Harte) The idea of the five core academic courses: Science, English, Social Studies, Math and Language, is necessary. How in-depth they go is a different story.(Harte)

Walberg, Herbert J. "Standardized Tests Effectively Measure Student Achievement." Standardized Testing. Ed. Dedria Bryfonski. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2012. At Issue. Rpt. from "Stop the War Against Standardized Tests." Defining Ideas: A Hoover Institution Journal (20 May 2011). Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 28 Mar. 2013. Walberg speaks about how standardized testing is beneficial to students. He feels that testing can make students more globally competitive and more prepared for life after high school. He says it does this by teaching them to deal with stress and also how to prepare for tests that they will be given in their future when they are trying to start a new profession. He also talks about how some peoples arguments about how standardized testing is harmful are invalid for a number of reasons. Walberg makes a very convincing argument. He is persuading the reader to believe that standardized testing has many benefits for students. He goes into to detail first about the many good things that testing can provide. But, he also brings up the other side of the argument which says that testing is unfair, lacking direction, and is just a stressful for students in general. Then in logical matter, he says how studies have been unreliable and misguided. By actually stating the other sides argument instead not mentioning it at all it makes his argument stronger. Those who

Anderson 8 do not explore the entire arguments topics sometimes are not as convincing. It also shows the reader that he has educated himself on the entire issue not just on what he believes to be true. This is article will help by giving me a person who is definitely for one side of the topic. Some of the other articles I have are either on both sides or not really on either side. So this gives me a point of view that is definitely pro standardized testing. K-12 students who practice demonstrating their knowledge and skills on standardized tests throughout their school career become better prepared to meet future educational, occupational, and professional goals.(Walberg) Another complaint against standardized tests is that they cause stress among educators and students. But the world outside of school is demanding. Indeed, the knowledge economy increasingly demands more knowledge and better skills from workers, which require larger amounts of intense study of difficult subjects.(Walberg) Those who oppose standardized tests also argue that the tests can only measure simple facts that can be memorized. But tests assessing advanced understanding and judgment do exist(Walberg)