Standardizing Tests Suck
Standardizing Tests Suck
Standardized tests are an excellent way to evaluate a student’s ability to retain information. However, a student’s ability to utilize what he has learned is not a direct reflection of his motivation to achieve. There are so many methods that can be used to determine one’s work ethic and ability to push him to the limit to accomplish his goals. Standardized tests are only a way to measure retained information, there are multiple ways to determine mental prowess.
A teacher deals with so many students in her career that a particularly bright or talented student will stand out in her mind without a doubt. Any college or scholarship application should require at least one teacher recommendation. The SAT score sheet doesn’t reveal how many times someone asked a good question in class or recognized one of Shakespeare’s allusions. A teacher recommendation is an excellent method to determine one’s motivation to learn.
Visual presentations are excellent ways to observe a student’s ability to not only apply information, but to apply it in a creative sense. There aren’t very many students who would rather write and essay or take an exam than build a model or make a poster. A visual presentation also makes learning the material more interesting and usually teaches a student something more than he could learn from reading a straight-to-the-point textbook. Also, a model would be much more interesting to someone reading or grading it than an answer sheet filled with bubbles that just goes straight through the machine anyway.
There are probably thousands of people who have had their intelligence inaccurately measured by these tests. Supposedly Albert Einstein, who was such a legendary scientist that his brain is in a freezer somewhere, had a learning disability that probably would have affected his scores on a standardized test. Can you imagine someone declaring Albert Einstein an idiot because of what he made on some test?
I don’t think that these tests should be eliminated, but they should be modified to meet the needs of less intellectual individuals. Perhaps a test could be developed that measures problem solving, critical thinking, and creativity. All of these scores could be taken and tied in to what the individual chooses as his course of study to paint an accurate picture of that student’s abilities and potentials.