Comments on: Reflections on the Test

By: bunzi

bunzi — Tue, 18 May 2010 12:45:37 +0000

Was Moose cheerful or bored ?

By: Ruben Brosbe

Ruben Brosbe — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 01:49:51 +0000

I wasn’t able to find any record of the number of schools that have been cited for cheating, however I did come across an audit report by the NYC Comptroller’s office (http://www.comptroller.nyc.gov/bureaus/audit/07-22-09_MD08_102A.shtm%5C) which states generally that the DOE does a good job educating schools of the regulations and procedures,
“However, DOE lacks sufficient preventive and detective controls aimed at deterring inappropriate manipulation of test scores, which would help to ensure the overall integrity of the assessment process.”
According to the report, the DOE disagreed with the tone of their audit as well, but, “After carefully reviewing their comments, however, we found them to be without merit.”
Doesn’t really surprise me however since it’s not remotely in the DOE’s interest to uncover wrongdoing since it would be a black eye for pretty much every stakeholder involved in the new era of high-stakes testing and “accountability”.

By: Maestra

Maestra — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 23:05:10 +0000

Ruben, no monitors at mine for the past 5 years.

By: Ruben Brosbe

Ruben Brosbe — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 22:42:04 +0000

Maestra, no such shenanigans at my school, but there does seem to be a lot of room for variability between testing conditions. There are certainly teachers who take “active proctoring” to a new level and way past the line of appropriate behavior. I’m thankful my school does things by the book, but I have heard stories of teachers allowing extra time or pointing out wrong answers and telling students to “double-check”. Prior to the test there was a lot of time given to the rules and we were warned how serious an infraction would be, and what it would mean if the school was to be audited. There were not any monitors at my school though. Did anyone else have officials checking in on testing conditions? I’m interested to know. I’m also curious (I’ll see if I can track it down) how many schools have actually been audited over the past 5 years of testing.

By: Maestra

Maestra — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 22:18:47 +0000

Yes, the third-grade passages themselves were easy, but the questions were poorly constructed and could yield some grading surprises. As the poster Third Grade noted, the questions about the listening passages tested kids on remembering extraneous details. I saw that one strong reader couldn’t remember one of these details because it wasn’t at all important to the narrative. I also noted the problem with the Pony Express question that Third Grade mentioned. These tests are very flawed instruments.

Moreover, though the test administration instructions explicitly stated that students were NOT to look at the questions for the listening section before hearing the passage, I understand that some teachers around the city DO allow students to look at the listening-section questions first. That would make a huge difference in the students’ performance on the listening part. Moreover, this kind of cheating would be difficult to detect. If the students had already been trained to look at the questions before listening, and if the teacher decided not to read aloud the instruction about NOT turning to the questions first, who would catch them? An assistant proctor might not be familiar with the rule. A teacher at my school said she had actually attended a professional development session where she’d been advised to have students read the listening-section questions before hearing the passage. Has anyone else heard of this infraction?

By: Teacher in the Bronx

Teacher in the Bronx — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 21:47:22 +0000

The 3rd grade test was amazingly dumbed down. However, in June when scores are announced and the city went up 20% Klein and Bloomberg will take all the credit.

By: third grade

third grade — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 21:05:50 +0000

The fifth grade listening passage was a passage that is in a commonly used third grade test prep book. Seriously?

By: third grade

third grade — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 21:04:43 +0000

I agree that the third grade test passages were quite easy. However, some of the questions were poorly worded and did not have a clear right answer. Specifically, in the passage about the pony express, one of the questions had no clear answer. It was an inferencing questions, but not enough information was given in the story to make a solid inference. Also, the listening passage today was incredibly boring and a few of the questions asked were nit-picky. But you are totally correct, this was a second grade level test. The test makers just added few trick questions to make sure not too many kids got 4s.

By: Miss Eyre

Miss Eyre — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 18:15:03 +0000

My column at NYC Educator today draws pretty much the same conclusions about the 8th grade test.

By: ceolaf wolfhelm

ceolaf wolfhelm — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 16:35:27 +0000

You know what warms my heart? “With such a sample size it’s difficult to draw any clear conclusions.”

That’s awesome.

Now, if only trained journalist and others who opine on education could master this idea.