I'm a teacher in Ontario, and my eldest daughter is in grade three next year. I've already made the decision that I'm going to opt her out of the grade three testing at the end of the year. I already know how well she's doing, as does her teacher. I already know what she reads and how well, what interests her, what she struggles with. Her teachers know this too. So the test isn't benefitting her or us directly. If it's only being used to pit schools and teachers against each other, to stress them out over a measure they cannot truly control, and to take away valuable exploratory learning in favour of lessons about how to take a multiple-choice test and how to at least try to answer every question, why would I subject my daughter to it?
I'm going to ask her teacher next year if it would be possible for her to spend test-prep periods in the library reading, since she won't be taking the test. Hopefully she'll get the opportunity to explore more books that way and actually learn something of value
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Ontario teacher opts child out of testing
Here is a comment left on a guest post titled Alberta Teacher Excuses Their Child From PAT:
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So I guess the only way we'll reach a tipping point of common sense with regard to testing is if more teachers had kids. Until we left Canada we were also planning to refuse our kids be plugged into the testing matrix. That was seven years ago and I'm proud to say they have never been involved in any such gimmicks - nor have we, as teachers, been involved in pedaling them.
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