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Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
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Saturday, July 12, 2008
Obama and the idea of “new tests”
Yesterday, I got a lucky break. I managed to tag along with our political reporters to cover a speech by Barack Obama at Dayton’s Stivers School for the Arts and, prompted by a question from the crowd, Obama repeated a chunk of his position on education.
He didn’t say anything he had not said before, but he did repeat something he’s been saying that peaked my interest. Here is the comment in question:
“We need to change how measures of progress works. A standardized test given at the beginning of year would give teachers a tool to know where kids are starting. If they want, they can have another test at the end of year to see how they end up. In the middle, let teachers do what they do best, which is teach. We need to work with teachers to develop other assessment tools to be sure we are making progress.”
Several times now, I’ve heard Obama call for “new tests” or “new testing technology” designed for 21st century learning. So here is the question I’d like Obama to answer — exactly what do you mean by “new tests” and what is your vision of how these futuristic tests would look like?
Here’s where I suspect these statements by Obama might be coming from.
When you talk to standardized test makers, many will acknowledge that standardized tests are based on old technology that could be improved. And some of the researchers at the big test making companies are excited about the idea that new test technology in the future could better serve students and teachers. But there is a problem. Those advances are pretty far off from being implemented on a wide scale.
But on a small scale, you are seeing some of the techniques employed. An example is computer software programs that adjust to the students. For instance, some district use computer-based assessment programs that offer questions up to kids and as they answer, the computer offers up easier questions when they get wrong answers and harder questions when they get right answers. That technology could have useful application for state exams.
But those sorts of programs require something that is not readily available to every student in every classroom — a computer. If Obama has ideas for new testing technologies, won’t those new tests require a computer? And if they do, does Obama have a plan for scaling up technology across the nation so those new tests can be widely administered?
That’s the question I’d like to ask.
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