Teachers Nationwide Have Expressed Concern

¶ … Teachers nationwide have expressed concern about the amount of time they must spend preparing students for content-based assessments, some of which have implications for high school graduation (Journell, 2010, p. 111). Testing has been criticized for" forcing teachers to abandon creative lesson plans in exchange for the dreary process of rote memorization and prepping for multiple-choice tests" (Buck, Ritter, Jensen, & Rose, 2010, p. 50). There are arguments on both sides of the issue of content-based testing. Buck et al.

(2010) found an interesting paradox in teachers' views of testing and wanted to explore the topic further. They found that teachers generally expressed dislike for testing, but nevertheless used testing frequently in their classrooms in the forms of spelling tests, quizzes, end-of-chapter exams and the like. The researchers spoke to forty-two Arkansas teachers. Arkansas students in grades 3-8 take weeklong, criterion-referenced, benchmarked tests; these items are combined with items from the norm-referenced Stanford Achievement Test (SAT).

Students in virtually every state of the union take similar tests, so Arkansas is hardly a unique example. In a series of interviews, Arkansas teachers criticized tests for being too knowledge-based. They also disliked the multiple-choice format and the tests' failures to address the needs of active learners (Buck et al., 2010, p. 51). Still, they cited several positive benefits to testing, agreeing that the tests provided useful data regarding individuals' grasp of content. The teachers felt that testing provides a "road map" for the school year.

They did not feel that testing necessarily destroyed creativity. Science is one subject area in which teachers have really struggled with content-based assessments. "Inquiry-based science instruction has led the way in assisting students in the process of discovering knowledge for themselves instead of simply being asked to recall information" (Longo, 2010, p. 54).

In other words, should students be expected to retain information they are given, or should they understand the process necessary for finding the information they need, when they need it? Achievement -- or, more accurately, the lack thereof -- in the sciences is a trend many find disturbing. Visone (2010) cited results from the 2007 Trends in International Science Study (TIMSS) showing that American students lag behind students from many other countries, with no significant progress since the mid 1990s. Visone questioned whether TIMSS and comparable tests truly measure scientific knowledge.

"The importance of reading cannot be overstated in our information-rich society…Reading is a critical variable that must be considered when assessing students in science" (Visone, 2010, p. 96). Content-based assessments have gotten a bad reputation for requiring teachers to "teach to the test." These tests do measure students' grasp of standardized material. They provide a means to compare students to one another in the classroom and at the local, state and national levels. They provide benchmarks for student achievement.

Most teachers would agree that multiple-choice tests are not the best measure of student achievement, but at present there is no other way to objectively assess student performance on a massive scale. Content-based assessments do not offer a way for all students to showcase their learning. Some students simply do not test.