Early Childhood Links

Sunday, October 14, 2012

Testing for Intelligence?


I believe children should be measured in all areas of development, doing observation of the whole child to give us an idea on how to plan individual activities for each child. I remember when I was in school and all the tests that I was obligated to take, and the great stress I felt, and the worst, the low self-esteem that caused me for years. I never did well in tests, I always was extremely nervous, and my concentration was in the lowest level. I know that the majority of the children feel this way when they are taking a test. Testing is not reflecting what children are capable to do. I believe that the best way to know children abilities is thru ongoing observation, and documenting observation to analyze the data to adjust or change curriculum or teaching styles. I know the standardized testing is beneficial to some extent to know the strengths or weakness of the education system. Also these testing bring emotional effect (children low self-esteem, stress, etc.), punishing students and the school for not scoring high, competition (between students, teachers, schools), and even dishonesty (teacher teaching to the test, students cheating, etc.). I would like for the education system not to limit the funding going for better education, if we have more money to spend in education, the quality of the services and the outcomes will be very positive. We do not need tests; we just need the money to keep purchasing equipment, and materials that our children need to continue learning.


 Researching, I found out the China has a two days high-stakes testing. Chinese teenagers spend eight to ten hours a day for four-years in preparation for this test. High School in China has this only purpose of preparing children for this test. The curriculum is based on the information from the test, and no curriculum presented outside of the test. Some of the rich families pay professionals to help their children in passing this test. If the students pass this test, this will determine if they are able to attend college or not.  It is very hard for me, as a parent, to understand how a test will determine if my child can go to the college or not.  I am glad we have quite different system, still not perfect, but better than other part in the world.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-levy/what-i-learned-from-china_b_872126.html
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6 comments:

  1. UnknownOctober 14, 2012 at 11:48 AM

    Rhonna,
    What a horrible educational system in China. Unfortunately, the US is moving in that same direction by placing so much emphasis on the results of these tests. You are so correct about tests causing anxiety and not giving a true indication of a child's abilities. For our early childhood children in my state, the decision has not been made on what assessment is going to be used to determine school readiness but there will be one implemented by next school year. I am hoping they use authentic assessments which will allow the teacher to observe children meeting goals. What a child knows can be determined with more validity by observing him/her in a natural setting. From your personal experience, you know that standardized tests do not measure a child's abilities.

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  2. R NovellOctober 14, 2012 at 4:24 PM

    Dear Rhonna,

    I felt the same way about tests! Thank you for your great post!

    I really enjoyed reading your post about China's testing system.

    I confess it sounded very familiar to me...

    There is a test in Brazil called Vestibular. It will tell if one can attend or not Federal Universities (which are free). If one fails, he or she can try the private Universities, which cost a fortune, or keep trying over and over (every year)for a chance to attend the Federal Universities.

    I like to think that Brazilian Vestibular(test) is less strict than Chinese, but I actually do not know if it is true. Usually, families with high-incomes, pay for a special course targeted to help teenagers succeed in this test.

    There are differences though, the curriculum is not based on the Vestibular, but it takes into consideration. Teenagers prepare for it in their last 3 years of school.

    Fortunately, the Brazilian testing is changing. There is a new process called ENEM that considers student's overall performance, which generates a grade (similar to GPA), this grade serves as an entry to Federal Universities.

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  3. R NovellOctober 14, 2012 at 4:41 PM

    VESTIBULAR TEST
    THERE ARE 6.492 VACANCIES AND 48.500 CANDIDATES
    VESTIBULAR TEST CONCURRENCE:
    (E.G. 34 CANDIDATES PER SPOT)

    MEDICINE 34.9
    LAW 20.2
    PHYSIOTHERAPY 17.8
    ADVERTISING 16.9
    PSYCHOLOGY 16.7
    NUTRITION / 16

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  4. AnonymousOctober 14, 2012 at 6:38 PM

    Your entry about China was very interesting. It seems that the US isnt that different from their ideals. Much of the instruction provided is alligned with successfully passing a state standardized test, and less to do with simply learning for the sake of learning.

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  5. Torri McMorrisOctober 14, 2012 at 7:00 PM

    I enjoyed reading your post on "Testing" and just as you I hate standardized testing I truly feel that they are not a true judge of your ability simply because if you dont know the correct answer you can guess upon it.

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  6. UnknownOctober 15, 2012 at 6:15 AM

    I agree that I was also very nervous as a child when I had to take those tests. I believe that may be a reason a lot of children don't do well on those tests because they are nervous about them. I believe we should test but this shouldn't be the basis for judging how a child is developing.

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