vent about summative/formative

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Was another thread on DCUM last week or week before about more teachers giving short tests/few questions. Some who said they were teachers said was because they are required to give extra time to certain 504/IEP students and so if give short test that takes only 30 minutes, then allows time for other kids to take the 60-90 that they are allowed by their plans. If give longer tests like 60 minutes and more questions, then would need to find 120-180 minutes for the 504/IEP plan students and said becomes impossible. It does set up scenario where if miss 1 problem get a C.

Triple time is incredibly rare as an accommodation. You are blaming kids with disabilities for something that has nothing to do with them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was an elementary teacher when teachers had freedom to teach.
It sounds like everything is scripted and controlled now so that everyone gets exactly the same instruction.

I taught first grade for years. Each class was different. There were different learning styles and different levels of achievement. I did not teach exactly the same thing in exactly the same way from year to year.

My goals and objectives were the same, but the kids were different. Sometimes, I needed to repeat a lesson or two. Some kids moved fast and some kids moved slower. So, I adapted lessons to them. I also shifted kids around as needed and as they progressed. Some kids went in spurts. Some were slow and steady. And, occasionally, some plateaued for a while. I was able to adjust and push and pull as needed.

Are teachers no longer able to do this?

According to my middle schooler, the teachers don't teach. They show a video or possibly some power point slides for 5 minutes or less. Then the kids have worksheets to work on. If there is something that the kids don't understand while working on their work sheets they can ask a question and the teacher will explain ( teach) . I encourage my kid to ask a lot of questions. This is for honors level MS courses.

This is true at our MS. Plus, the kids don’t have textbooks so they are forced to use Google and AI.

[Anonymous]

The formatives are awful. Only 4-5 questions and it’s a huge percentage of your grade. There are only 2 summatives a quarter. These are not all easy questions, so the poor kids are always caught up in doing retakes. The tests are not designed appropriately.

[Anonymous]

^ meant only 2 summatives

[Anonymous]

^And that summatives are awful.

[Anonymous]

Don't send your kids to universities in the rest of the world. Their grade is usually just a midterm and a final. That's it. And no retakes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don't send your kids to universities in the rest of the world. Their grade is usually just a midterm and a final. That's it. And no retakes.

But the midterm is not 4 multiple choice questions

[Anonymous]

Yes, I agree. The tests accounting for 70% of the grade is insane. My child is so stressed out because she has 100% in everything and then the entire class just bombed a test (like the ENTIRE class), so now they all have Bs, just like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, I agree. The tests accounting for 70% of the grade is insane. My child is so stressed out because she has 100% in everything and then the entire class just bombed a test (like the ENTIRE class), so now they all have Bs, just like that.

If they all have Bs (80%+) and 100% formative/homework (30% of grade), then the lowest they got on the test was 50/70 = 71%. That's not "bombing" a test.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't send your kids to universities in the rest of the world. Their grade is usually just a midterm and a final. That's it. And no retakes.

But the midterm is not 4 multiple choice questions

It’s usually an essay or two. Since public schools here don’t teach students how to write, the students will be screwed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't send your kids to universities in the rest of the world. Their grade is usually just a midterm and a final. That's it. And no retakes.

But the midterm is not 4 multiple choice questions

and MS is not college

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree, OP. Also the tests are so short! 5 questions multiple choice math test, no partial credit, no showing your work.

They tend to make them MC more now because they are faster to grade, easier to create a re-take version and I guess practice for SOL/SAT. Either way it isn’t great for student learning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The summatives are awful. Only 4-5 questions and it’s a huge percentage of your grade. There are only 2 summatives a quarter. These are not all easy questions, so the poor kids are always caught up in doing retakes. The tests are not designed appropriately.

Has anyone had success pointing out the bad format of summatives?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The summatives are awful. Only 4-5 questions and it’s a huge percentage of your grade. There are only 2 summatives a quarter. These are not all easy questions, so the poor kids are always caught up in doing retakes. The tests are not designed appropriately.

Not sure of other schools but my DC cannot get a copy of the test taken in order to study for the retake. The teacher won't release them because ostensibly not all students have taken the first one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Was another thread on DCUM last week or week before about more teachers giving short tests/few questions. Some who said they were teachers said was because they are required to give extra time to certain 504/IEP students and so if give short test that takes only 30 minutes, then allows time for other kids to take the 60-90 that they are allowed by their plans. If give longer tests like 60 minutes and more questions, then would need to find 120-180 minutes for the 504/IEP plan students and said becomes impossible. It does set up scenario where if miss 1 problem get a C.

Do they not have block scheduling? With block there is plenty of time to give a good size test and allow extra time.