Reply to Mismatch between assignments and formative grades

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Why are the tests so hard? I don't remember high school tests being so difficult, and I am not that smart[/quote]

One big reason IMO is open enrollment honors/AP. Kids are taking classes they have no business signing up for because they want to for the grade bump, for their friend group, because it "looks good for college". Then they struggle. My class average is an 86%, but it's skewed way left because a handful of kids have 50s who really should never have registered for my class. Those who do belong are getting As.

[b]My tests now compared to my tests from 20 years ago are night and day. The current ones are half as long, much simpler[/b]. I actually found some old copies cleaning out a filing cabinet yesterday on the work day and was blown away what I used to expect kids to do.[/quote]

I believe it.  But also, what were the homework and/or classwork assignments 20 years ago?  Reading stamina has gone down - it also seems like "work" stamina, such as homework or classwork stamina, has also gone down in students.  Fwiw, when I see the tests that my 9th grader brings home, they seem both very short and also very difficult to me.  Although it's been years and years since I was in 9th grade and maybe I just don't remember.  I know his classwork and homework assignments are pretty minimal but still seem reasonably well done, just less than I remember doing.  And he had virtually no homework at all in middle school or elementary school.  [/quote]

We now have extremely low expectations for students.

When I first began teaching (25+ years ago):

• My students had at least 30 minutes of homework every night, in addition to being required to read an assigned novel every 4-6 weeks.
• Assessments were 100% essay-based and required true literary analysis. 
• There were absolutely no retakes. 
• Students were required to take notes, determining for themselves what was important to note.
• I never had to teach basics, such as paragraph structure, how to write a thesis, or correct usage of simple homophones, for every student came to eighth grade with that knowledge.
•The grading scale was strict!

Now:

• Students rarely do homework, and they don't even always complete class work.
• We can barely get students to read one book each semester, and the books we want to use, which are on grade-level, are often too difficult for most eighth grade students.
•We have had to simplify assessments to the point that they no longer require critical thinking.
• Students ask, before every assessment, "When is the retake?"
• Students don't know how to take notes, and parents complain if their children even have to complete "Cloze notes."
• I have to teach, in eighth grade, grammar and composition that are extraordinarily elementary skills.
•The grading scale is far less stringent.

It's unfortunate that we have such low expectations for students.

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