Since the No Child Left Behind Act was passed by Congress and signed into law in 2002, there has been no shortage of criticism of its guidelines for the implementation of standardized testing. While some states argue standardized tests cause teachers to focus a disproportionate amount of their efforts on those skills that ensure the testing success of their students, others contend the tests themselves are deliberately “dummied down” in an effort to foster the perception of educational improvement. Both sides seem to agree, however, that the federal government, through the Department of Education, is to blame for the standardized testing failures of the No Child Left Behind Act. Unfortunately, it is the states themselves that are to blame.

     The standardized tests employed by the great majority of states are based in behaviorist psychological theories from the nineteenth century (Neill, 2004). While our understanding of the brain and how people learn and think has progressed enormously, tests have remained the same. Those who ascribe to the behaviorist model of intellectual development assume knowledge is broken into separate bits and that people learn by passively absorbing these bits. Today, however, cognitive and developmental psychologists understand knowledge is not separable bits and that individuals of all age groups learn by connecting what they already know with what they are trying to learn. If they cannot actively make these connections and ultimately meaning out of what they are doing, they do not learn or remember. Most standardized tests created to accommodate No Child left Behind do not incorporate modern theories and remain based on recall of isolated facts and narrow skills (FairTest, nd.).  Such behaviorist-based tests are over-reliant on multiple choice and true/false questions to evaluate understanding and thus fail to address true learning as a process of conceptualization.

     In Standardized Testing and Its Victims, Kohn (2000) cites several “indisputable facts”:

• Standardized tests were never intended to measure the quality of learning or teaching. The main objective of these tests is to rank, not to rate.
• Standardized test scores measure superficial thinking.
• Virtually all specialists condemn the practice of giving standardized tests to children younger than 8 or 9 years old.
• Virtually all relevant experts and organizations condemn the practice of basing important decisions, such as graduation or promotion, on the results of a single test.
• The time, energy, and money that are being devoted to preparing students for standardized tests have to come from somewhere.  Schools across the country are cutting back or eliminating entire programs in the arts, trades and many other subject areas that do not appear on standardized tests that narrowly focus on language arts and math.

     Further, Gagne, Brigs and Wagner (1992) state that an individual’s learning cannot be assessed unless there is observable evidence of that learning.  It cannot be known if learning has occurred unless it can be seen, heard or detected by any other sense.  Standardized tests do not meet any of these conditions.

     During the past 20 years, education has moved away from the conception of “learner as a sponge” toward an image of “learner as an active constructor of knowledge” (Wilson & Peterson, 2006).  In this prevailing view of learners as builders of knowledge, known as constructivism, measurement of learning is evaluated through three capabilities: declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, and problem solving.  Declarative knowledge is that information that can be conveyed in words; that is, knowledge that can be declared.  Procedural knowledge involves making discriminations, understanding concepts, and applying rules that govern relationships.  Problem solving requires both declarative and procedural knowledge and is evaluated through activities that involve reaching a goal for which a means has not been identified (Oosterhof, Conrad, and Ely, 2007).  Constructivist-based assessment of learning is conducted through case-studies, scenario evaluation, and essay writing activities.  Therefore, the question remains: if constructivism is the prevailing educational philosophy in our schools, then why are students evaluated using the behaviorist methods of standardized testing?   The answers are, quite simply, time and money.

     Multiple choice tests can be graded quickly and efficiently through the use of technology.  Computers can easily grade hundreds of multiple choice exams in a matter of minutes.  The system employed by the State of Florida, for example, can grade a million multiple-choice tests in a day at a cost of pennies each.  Correcting tests that contain essay questions that require human intervention, however, can take weeks at a cost of 50 cents to $5.00 per question.   In May 2003 the U.S. Government Accountability Office estimated that the cost for all states to administer multiple-choice, machine-graded, standardized exams would be approximately $1.3 billion.  It also estimated that the cost for all states to administer a mixture of multi-choice and open-ended, essay exams would be nearly three times that amount at $5.7 billion.

     A benefit of standardized testing that many states have taken advantage of is that the results of such exams can be empirically documented, can be proven to have a relatively high degree of validity and reliability, and can be statistically replicable.  The outcome of such testing is also controllable.  States wishing to garner a greater portion of federal funding have the latitude under the No Child Left Behind Act to modify both curricula and the standardized tests used for its evaluation.  As a result, states can easily prove their students are at more of a disadvantage and, therefore entitled to additional funding for remediation.

     Methods far better than standardized testing already exist.  Observational checklists and rubrics used by well-trained educators have proven far more useful in the assessment of learning.  Such methods prove their validity every few years during the conduct of the International Olympic Games.  During such “high-stakes testing,” gymnasts and divers are evaluated by panels of qualified judges; the high scores and low scores are thrown out.  Studies have shown that, with training, the level of agreement among judges is high (FairTest, nd.).

     The U.S. is the only economically advanced nation to rely heavily on standardized, multiple-choice tests. Other nations use performance-based assessment where students are evaluated on the basis of real work such as essays, projects, and activities. Ironically, because these nations do not focus on teaching to multiple-choice tests, they score even higher than U.S. students on those kinds of tests (FairTest, nd.).

     To improve learning in our schools, as well as provide meaningful accountability, we must not rely solely on standardized tests. The fundamental limitation of such evaluation instruments is the generation of statistics and information that is inadequate in both depth and breadth. As such, we must employ methods of constructivist-based assessment that not only strengthen education and improve understanding, but also provide the public a better and more realistic view of their children’s educational progress.

References

FairTest, (nd). How Standardized Testing Damages Education. Retrieved October 19, 2007, from The National Center for Fair & Open Testing Web site: http://www.fairtest.org/facts/howharm.htm

Gagne, R., Briggs, L., & Wagner, W. (1992). The Cognitive Psychology of School Learning. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Kohn, A. J. (2000, September 27). Standardized Testing and Its Victims. Education Week, [20(4)], 46-47.

Neill, M., Guisbond, L., & Schaeffer, B. (2004). Failing Our Children. Cambridge, MA: The National Center for Fair & Open Testing.

Oosterhof, A., Conrad, R., & Ely, D. (2007). Assessing Learners Online. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Wilson, S., & Peterson, P. (2006). Theories of Learning and Teaching: What Do They Mean for Educators?.Washington: National Education Association.