Reply to Underwhelming appearance by Principal Martin at Wilson HS Open House

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]So I've always kind of wondered something:  what are these tests actually testing?  I always hear about how teachers have to stop teaching what they are supposed to be teaching so they can focus on teaching what is on these tests.  Why aren't they lining the tests up with what the teachers are supposed to be teaching?  It seems to me that these tests are mostly evaluating a teacher's ability to simultaneously teach DCPS and PARCC curriculum.  For the life of me, I can't figure out how the geometry these kids learn in their HS classroom isn't the same geometry the PARCC system thinks they should know.  Where is the disconnect here?[/quote]

Kids are supposed to be learning the things in the common core standards for a particular grade (you can look up what they are). DCPS and other schools can use lots of different curriculums and textbooks that turn those standards into lessons.

PARCC is a test that has been developed to determine whether the common core standards have been mastered. There is another web-based test out there that does the same thing (called "Smarter Balance" and it's being used by some states).

The Common Core standards are new, and are supposedly 'tougher' than what was expected of students 10 years ago. So teachers are having to teach new stuff.

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Yes, I understand.  Thank you.  This is a very rational reason, and makes sense.  But, if teachers are teaching new stuff, and the curriculum/textbooks they use to teach this new stuff are being used effectively, presumably we would see better results on these tests than we are (tanking aside).  I still can't shake the feeling that, despite Common Core, these students are either not being taught all of what they need to know, or there are other factors at play here.  In either case, you would think DCPS would do more to figure out what that is and address it.  Some of these numbers are abysmal.
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