At the same time, however, they gathered views of educators through focus groups and learned many teachers believe tests provide a roadmap for instruction and yield useful data. Buck et al. also concluded that test prep did not necessarily squelch teachers' creativity. Researchers and teachers both cited the Arkansas State Assessment Test as a positive example of an open-response test that requires creativity in student responses; hence, creativity is needed in the teachers' approach to the material.
Winkler (2002) found that new teachers were more likely than veteran teachers to see advantages to standardized testing. Veteran teachers were frustrated, feeling that standardized testing robbed them of power and freedom. New teachers in the study felt that standardized testing helped foster a climate of collaboration, in which teachers met to discuss pedagogy and methods with an eye toward improving students' performance and mastery.
There are dual goals as educators and policymakers review standardized testing. One is to ensure that tests increasingly provide opportunities for students...
In addition, teacher-training programs must help prepare new educators to work with standardized tests and not against them. It is important to help new teachers understand how standardized tests will guide instruction and enable them to better prepare their students to participate in them.
References
Buck, S., Ritter, G.W., Jensen, N.C., & Rose, C.P. (2010). Teachers say the most interesting things -- an alternative view of testing. Phi Delta Kappan 91 (6), pp. 50-54.
Friesen, S. (2010). Uncomfortable bedfellows. Teacher Librarian 38 (1), pp. 8-14.
Oswald, J. (2008). The future of testing. District Administration 44 (9), pp. 58-59.
Steedle, J., Kugelmass, H., & Nemeth, Al. (2010). What do they measure? Comparing three learning outcome assessments. Change 42 (4), pp. 33-37.
Winkler, a. (2002). Division in the ranks: standardized testing draws lines between new and veteran teachers. Phi Delta Kappan 84…
